Night of a Thousand Candles - Brookgreen Gardens

Brookgreen Gardens, Pawley's Island, SC

We skipped work early enough to beat the traffic and headed up the coast to Pawley's Island for the Night of a Thousand Candles festival at Brookgreen Gardens. I'd been to Brookgreen sculpture garden of course but this was our first visit to the holiday festival and it was a bit hit. We got there at dusk and got the lay of the land before all the candles were completely lit. It gets very dark. We had a little drizzle but not enough to spoil the mood.

We sipped a glass of wine, wandered the gardens and enjoyed a seafood dinner in the food tent. There were two entertainment tents and bagpipers under the trees. It was all a success and very well done but our favorites were definately the children's garden and the avenue of oaks with the hanging lights from the limbs. There were a lot of people there but it never felt too crowded or loud. It was lovely.

Two birds and a heart

Brookgreen Gardens, SC  

This is a small piece in the base of a large sculpture at Brookgreen Gardens. The intricate detail work caught my eye and does even more so now in the image.

I just cleaned up after a little dinner party for a few co-workers and  may have made my last tomato pie of the season. It's sad to see the delicious tomatoes go, isn't it?

My new netflix show is the British Inspector George Gently series. It is good to have something to look forward to watching with all of the nonsense that is on regular tv.

Short week ahead, kids! Does that mean we have to work even harder? 

Water Lilies

Brookgreen Gardens, SC 

Wash in, dishes drying. I am doing all my chores in the last hour of the weekend as usual. At least I don't need to water the plants after the regular downpours we've been having.

Don't you love it when you find a new series to love on Netflix? Indulging in another episode is like eating bonbons. Then, don't you hate it when you are watching the last episode? What will I do now? There is such nonsense on regular tv.  I am watching the last episode of three seasons of Rita, a Danish show about a school teacher. Rita is outspoken and rebellious and gets entangled in the lives of all the students she teaches. Be forewarned, it is subtitled and she is pretty outrageous. 

As much as I enjoyed the statues at Brookgreen Gardens yesterday I really loved these water lilies in the fountain and the fields of caladiums under the oak trees.

 

Brookgreen Gardens

Brookgreen Gardens, SC  

I often feature sculpture pieces so walking through Brookgreen Gardens sculpture garden is an exhilarating afternoon for me!  Brookgreen is just under two hours up the coast from Charleston and Pawley's Island Hammock Shops a perfect lunch spot before hitting the garden. The entry fee is good for a week which would be perfect if you were staying in the area since I never get to see the entire place.

Brookgreen Gardens is a sculpture garden and wildlife preserve, located just south of Murrells Inlet, in South Carolina. The 9,100-acre (37 km²) property includes several themed gardens with American figurative sculptures placed in them, the Lowcountry Zoo, and trails through several ecosystems in nature reserves on the property. It was founded by Archer Milton Huntington, stepson of railroad magnate Collis Potter Huntington, and his wife Anna Hyatt Huntington to feature sculptures by Anna and her sister Harriet Hyatt along with other American sculptors. Brookgreen Gardens was opened in 1932, and is built on four former rice plantations, taking its name from the former Brookgreen Plantation.^[3]

Tilting at Windmills

Sancho Panza, Brookgreen Gardens, SC 

Just then they came in sight of thirty or forty windmills that rise from that plain. And no sooner did Don Quixote see them that he said to his squire, "Fortune is guiding our affairs better than we ourselves could have wished. Do you see over yonder, friend Sancho, thirty or forty hulking giants? I intend to do battle with them and slay them. With their spoils we shall begin to be rich for this is a righteous war and the removal of so foul a brood from off the face of the earth is a service God will bless."

"What giants?" asked Sancho Panza.

"Those you see over there," replied his master, "with their long arms. Some of them have arms well nigh two leagues in length."

"Take care, sir," cried Sancho. "Those over there are not giants but windmills. Those things that seem to be their arms are sails which, when they are whirled around by the wind, turn the millstone."

 

—Part 1, Chapter VIII. Of the valourous Don Quixote's success in the dreadful and never before imagined Adventure of the Windmills, with other events worthy of happy record.

 

Don Quixote, Brookgreen Gardens, SC

Brookgreen Gardens

Brookgreen Gardens, Pawley's Island, S.C. 

I was without a computer for about a week recently so I have a few backlogged photos waiting to be posted. Spring is the most beautiful time to visit Brookgreen Gardens and well worth a trip up the coast. It is the first sculpture garden in the US and has an impressive collection of statues.

Brookgreen Gardens, the first public sculpture garden in America, has in its collection more than 1,400 works by over 350 sculptors. Exhibited within the gardens is the largest and most comprehensive collection of American figurative sculpture in the country, by sculptors who worked from the early nineteenth century to the present. Brookgreen Gardens is a National Historical Landmark, and is accredited by the American Association of Museums. Brookgreen offers workshops in sculpture by nationally known sculptors throughout the year.