Seattle's Volunteer Park and Conservatory

Every trip to Seattle is an adventure.  There are so many beautiful parks and recreation areas to visit. I so enjoy the Pacific Northwest!  On a recent tip to Seattle, my daughter suggested that we go to Volunteer Park and Conservatory.  I was amazed at the children's play structure, the lush vegetation, and gorgeous flowers.  Everything is planted with color in mind!

We first stopped off at the play structure to tire somebody out!



The Volunteer Park Conservatory was next!


The Conservatory has five sections or "houses."  The Palm House has the Orchid Collection, crotons, banana, ginger and many species of palms.


The Seasonal Display House is filled with color and fragrance.  The displays change each season. The spring display featured bulbs, lilies, cyclamen, and hydrangeas.



Did you know that all cacti are succulents, but all succulents are not cacti?  In the Cactus House there are succulents which are descendants of plants that adapted to dry hot conditions when the earth began to warm after the last ice age, as well as cacti.



The Fern House is home to many species of ferns as well as a diversity of tropical plants.  In the boggy area around the pool are papyrus as well as carnivorous plants.



The last house we visited featured Bromeliads.  Most bromeliads are epiphytes.  "Epi" is Greek meaning upon.  They grow by attaching themselves to the outside of rough surfaces like tree branches or rocks.  The plant I recognized immediately was the staghorn fern!  I did not know that it was in the epiphytes family.  I guess I never put it together....We had grown staghorn ferns years ago and it never dawned on me that it wasn't truly a fern.


After enjoying the conservatory we continued walking to the old water tower.


We ended our day by viewing the space needle through the Black Sun sculpture by Noguchi.


I am sharing today at Outdoor Wednesday hosted by Susan at A Southern Daydreamer.

Comments

  1. Kate, That is a beautiful conservatory. Great photos! But the big question is...did you really manage to tire her out? Take Care, Big Daddy Dave

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  2. She's so cute!Savannah.?! Lovely blooms..I bet you adore going.

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  3. Happy children and pretty flowers. That always makes me happy and I love the ferns.
    Sam

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  4. Wow - your trip to Seattle was certainly worth it! I love staghorns, I have a baby plant of the more common one. Your daughter(?_ looks very determined to master that net:)
    Thank you for your enthusiasm for the blooming hills on my blog. Now you've been there, please connect today
    again with one of these beautiful views of your trip. Started 6 weeks ago with the meme/challenge SEASONS - anything and any experience during the season goes! Link is open Sunday - Wed. 7pm, Pacific time.
    Click on the "Click here" in red on the bottom of the page - a new page will open. Your url on the first line, etc. Choose To Web or To File and choose the pic you like. Voila you're done!
    Hope to see you there today and enjoy the rest of the week!

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    Replies
    1. The little one is my three year old granddaughter, Sabine. She has more energy than all of us put together!

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  5. This is so great. I adore the Conservatory (I love it so much I made a book about it, "Flowers of Volunteer Park Conservatory: Blooming Month by Month." Did you see it in the gift shop? Your photos are wonderful and do a fine job showing the Conservatory's beauty. So glad you liked your visit. I call it Seattle's hidden gem!

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  6. What a lovely place! It has a little something for everybody. The flowers are just awesome!

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  7. Beautiful images from the conservatory. I would love to visit it.

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  8. What a beautiful conservatory! I love visiting botanic gardens wherever I travel--this one looks well worth it!

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  9. Many thanks for being a part of SEASONS with your beautiful image! I love your blog and hope to see you back on Sun-Wed. when the link is open. Have a great weekend!

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  10. Sabine!!! I thought Savannah..Sabine..adore that name.

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