An unlikely rock garden and more

 The banks of the Mississippi river are the LAST place I'd expect to find a rock garden. But find one I did: I have not yet done the research on when it was built, but I'll bet dollars to donuts it was in the Victorian, or at latest the Edwardian era--making it one of the oldest extant rock gardens in North America. Annoyingly, the Lobelia erinus appears to be perennial here! And rather charming.

The estate is Rosedown--surely one of the lovelist of many Cotton plantations that line the Mississippi in Louisiana and beyond. This one is now a state park: Click here to access the website. I didn't find mention of the rock gardens specifically here. I would love to know the history of them. As you can see from the panorama (which only shows part of them) they are extensive.

The effort it took to amass, gather and place the rock--especially since it was likely back before motorized vehicles--is astonishing. Of course, a plantation that boasted 450 slaves at its height was up to such challenges.

More views...can't get over it! I am so curious what was originally planted. The Turnbulls visited England--did they once attempt an "Alpine" type rock garden?

One last video clip--you have to fiddle with it sometimes to get it to run,,,

Of course there's more to Rosedown that rock gardens: here is another classic allee of live oaks: I never tire of these!

To give them proper scale I had James David (our Cicerone of this wonderful trip) to stand in front. I admire the vision of those who planted saplings a hundred or far more years ago that are now maturing into such spectacular living sculpture.

Forgive me while I indulge in a little Quercus virginiana worship...Here I should insert Walt Whitman's beautiful poem dedicated to one of these behemoths--I'll let you Google it!

Just as evocative for me are the long chains of Spanish moss: I have seen Usnea waving in the wind like this in the Chinese Himalaya. Not something we could fake on our cold, hot, windy Steppe!

I posted this on Social Media and got very little comment: there was an ENORMOUS red cedar (Juniperus virginiana) that had a live oak arising out of its heart. The two virginianas were both looking healthy despite the desperate clasp.

Another view of the lovers..

And another clip showing the majesty of a giant live oak.

I know a friend thinks they're passe (you have to supply the accent ague)...but I enjoy water in gardens--especially old ones...

Pansies in a parterre: it would be quite a chore to keep these large parterres blooming year around--not sure a State Park can afford that luxury...

And even a greenhouse...must get hot this time of year!

More fountains!

And even more fountains...

I don't know, but Gary (traveling companion and friend) looks a bit aghast at carpet bedding columbines!

I rather like using holly fern as a filler!

A charming gazebo...

And yet another vista with oaks. Obviously, for a die-hard liberal like myself, I squirm a bit when I think of the system so dependent on slavery that produced such elegant neoclassical beauty. But then slaves were used in Classical times to build the monuments of the Mediterranean basin. Even today much of our technological society relies on labor bordering on slave wages throughout the second and third world. The Cultural Revolution destroyed untold billions, perhaps trillions of dollars of antiquities across China to attempt to obliterate the Past. I would rather honor the labor of the slaves who actually built these majestic homes, while pitying the "owners" who were slaves to their prejudices and class.