Door County Trip

On Thursday of last week, Carl and I boarded a bus (one of two buses, we were a big group!) and headed up to Door County with our local garden club.  We've been members of the Green & Gold Hosta Society for almost fourteen years and we've seen many great gardens in that time.  This trip was no exception to the rule. 

There's the lead bus ahead of us as we drive about 90 miles to Door County which is sometimes called the 'Cape Cod of the Midwest.'  Since I highly doubt I will ever see the real Cape Cod in person as I don't travel very much, we're very fortunate to live so close 'the Wisconsin one'.  We usually wind up in Door County on our own at least once or twice a year to go to the fabulous county parks along the shoreline. 

Despite the fact the population up there is only around 30,000 people year round which swells to over 200,000 during the summer months, it really isn't the tourist trap you might expect with water slides and fast food joints on every corner.  The entire area has a quaint charm about it with many little shops and restaurants.  Carl and I aren't much for shopping but enjoy driving through the area.  It's usually a good ten to fifteen degrees cooler in Door County on a hot summer day and even the air feels different.  I can't describe it, really, it's just Different.  As we drove through the little towns on the way we saw artists with easels set up on the sidewalks painting the lakeshore vistas, see, it's that kind of different. Artsy and Charming.

The first garden we toured was huge.  Ann had 600 different varieties of hostas planted in her fantastic garden with the perfect backdrop of a mature woods. 

Hard to tell who's who, but Ann, the owner of this fantastic garden, is standing in the middle of the photo having her picture taken as almost 100 people tour her yard.

 Ann's hostas were all labelled and all of them were healthy and some were downright huge!

She had many pieces of garden art in the hosta beds, too.  This one was a blown glass ornament.

This little pair of bib overalls was decoupaged and stood on it's own in the garden, I thought it was really cute.

There were hostas as far as the eye could see.

All too soon, it was time to board the bus for our next destination, a wonderful garden and stained glass studio/teaching center on the shores of Lake Michigan.

There's me and the president of our club chatting about something in the driveway.  (I'm the big one in the stylin' hat.)  This is home to two very talented artists, Barbara & Doug,  and is situated on a very narrow strip of land that goes very deep from the road to the lake.  The driveway in itself is a work of art...I wish I'd taken more pictures, but I was too busy yakking.  Carl took almost all the pictures on the trip which was fine; but I found myself viewing the pictures at home and saying 'Oh, you didn't get a picture of this or do you remember that thing?  Why didn't you take a picture of it?"  Plus, we didn't have Joel's nice camera with us so they didn't turn out as good as they could have.

As we were strolling down the driveway, there were many questions about the sculptures lining the garden.  The big planters with the bowling ball towers were really neat.  I know they don't show up well here, but there were many rectangular concrete shapes buried along the way.  They are septic tank covers, stood on end and partially buried.  See, there is an alternate use for just about everything!

The artists specialize in fused glass work and have colorful surprises throughout the gardens.  They also find old pieces of junk (in their case, I think it should be spelled 'junque') and turn their finds into Art.

Fused glass and stained glass mosaics add just the right touch of color to their gardens, there is so much attention to detail everywhere.

In some cases, old arbors and porches off of homes being demolished were resurrected in their garden into various garden rooms, the one above is even home to a chandelier (though it doesn't show up very well here, sigh.) 

I loved the cast iron pineapple seated on it's fancy mosaic base.

Or how about an iron origami bird?

Check out this bench.....

What an inventive way to use broken plates.

Wonderful fountain made out of campfire rings.

The water bubbles out of the hole in the middle of each pan and then drains out the bottom pipes into a stone grotto.  It makes a lovely sound.

Gorgeous mosaic stepping stones are scattered here and there all over the pathways:

 

There was a sweet little garden cottage (the picture didn't turn out, but this was the window anyway...

There was just so much color, interest and art all over this lovely garden.  The owners teach classes at this location, too, and I can see how it would such an inspirational place to work.

There I am in the middle (remember the hat?) gabbing again with a friend. If there's one thing I do well, it's talk.
(I still wish I had thought to bring Joel's camera with me, we could have had two different views of the gardens.)

Old garden gate.

 More ornamentation, much of this is industrial or old farm equipment remade into art.

Lovely Mosaic planters

Neat weathervane.

This is their studio.

Love the railings and the planter dripping with sedum.

Quite the fellow!

I wish this picture were A. Closer B. Clearer C. Straight!  but anyway, these fantastic flowers are all fused glass.  They are absolutely spectacular.  I'm starting to think glass fusing might be something we'll have to try in the future.  It's so beautiful.  I also should make mosaics since I have lots of scrap glass here from our lamp and window projects.  (As Carl would say, 'Something more to do with our spare time.')

So many creative ideas in this garden!  We have been here once before and I hope we get to visit again.

Ah, Door County.  What a perfect place for a garden walk.  There are still a few more gardens left to showcase, so I hope you stay tuned!