virginia lake park in wanganui

Virginia Lake is 'the perfect' spot for a walk or picnic or just to stretch your legs. It has a walk-through bird enclosure, botanical garden building that changes with the seasons, a cafe and lots of grass.

Of course, there are also lots of ducks. They know you have food. The want some. They are not shy about it.

We harassed the ducks by feeding the birds on the hood bonnet of the car. The birds are not shy, either, but they don't attack you en masse.

some random shots

Art and artistic homes

Ducks in monochrome

roadside buildings

fringe festival water photos

Dive into other wet worlds at Watery Wednesday!

thrush with attitude

We have many thrushes around our house. Lately, there are a couple of brave juveniles that dare to hop around the patio in search of the occasional bread that I throw out for them.

church at opunake

The bell is on the right-hand side of the church, behind the bushes.

Find more friendly skies to watch at Skywatch Friday!

favorite shots from the fringe festival

These are just a few of the 225+ photos I took this year. I wish you all could come and see the gardens with me--some of them are just exquisite.

Visit other worlds at My World Tuesday!

fringe festival panoramas

These are all put together with autostitch. Click for larger view.

fringe festival extras

Every year at this time, we visit the annual Taranaki Fringe Festival gardens.

Needless to say, most of the gardens are quite breath-taking and we take lots of photos, but I thought I'd show you a few of the 'extras' that make the festival more fun. Click here for last year's post.

And, in case you missed the post last year, Missy won the overall best photo and best in the children's division (age 14)!! She, of course, has to defend her title again this year, but we are all competing again, so I will keep you posted!

This is a whale bone that was dragged up from the beach.

Garden pages

I take a lot of pictures of the flowers in my garden. A lot. No, really, lots and lots. I guess that is because I never had a proper flower garden before and the details of each bloom enthrall me. You wouldn't believe the amount of macro shots I have, but I understand that not everybody is as interested in my garden as I am so... I put together some quick pages for your perusal. I hope you enjoy them. They were all taken on our rented quarter-acre of space.