Portland Walks: Rose Test Garden

  

The roses are in bloom! I guess that's why the Rose Festival is happening right about now. We just became members at the Portland Art Museum & the Portland Japanese Garden recently, and we spend a chunk of our weekend enjoying that fact. We caught the very end of the Rothko & John Frame Exhibits, and I decided that this is now one of my favorite paintings. It's hard to find any good pictures of it online, but I really like the texture given to the railing. 

Anyway, The Japanese Garden is right next to the Rose garden and it's really easy to get distracted by roses on the way. I found on this trip that I was partial to the English roses. I don't know a lot about roses, but the ones pictured above are named (from left to right) Carding Mill, Crown Princess Margareta, & The Shepardess, and were all labeled English. I especially like the shape of the Shepardess, very round, but all the blooms seemed to be hiding beneath the leaves. 

Rose names are always fun. These are Scent-sation, Shockwave, & Easy Does It. While I was taking pictures, Chuck went off and bought me a peach flavored snowcone. It's been a long time since I've had a snowcone, and I'm not sure I've ever had peach. It was very good.

  

We have plans to head back to the Japanese Garden (which will surely mean a detour in the Rose Test Garden again) for at least the next two weekends. Next weekend there's a Ikebana Exhibit, and the following weekend a textile exhibit begins. If it's anything like the one we saw last year, you shouldn't miss it.