Spread over 155 acres, the Norfolk Botanical Gardens contains 40 distinctively themed gardens along 12 miles of trails.  The gardens are home to almost 65,000 plants, displaying some of the largest collections of azaleas, camellias, roses, and rhododendrons on the East Coast.  Throughout the seasons, the gardens are visited by 30 species of butterflies and 95 species of birds.  Since the gardens are located near the coast, the variety of birds is impressive.  On any given day, you can see several different types of ducks, geese, herons, songbirds, and hawks and falcons.  There were resident bald eagles nesting on top of some tall loblolly pines, but federal and state officials removed the nests, claiming the eagles posed a threat to the neighboring international airport.  Apparently four eagles had collided with planes over the past ten years.

Although the gardens are beautiful, I didn’t get the connection to nature that I’m used to finding during my travels.  This was mainly because of the number of well-dressed people that were either participating in the tram tours or walking the paved trails, and there was consistent noise pollution from the airport and the heavy automobile traffic.  I should have expected these conditions while visiting an organized garden in a heavily populated city, a type of excursion I had not done before.  But for photography purposes, I would visit the gardens again if I find myself traveling through that area.

Some of the themed gardens I visited were the Bristow Butterfly Garden, the Japanese Garden, and the Bicentennial Rose Garden.  Throughout the afternoon, the sun peaked out between periods of light drizzle, leaving the flowers and insects covered in beads of water.

Near the Butterfly Maze

Frog chillin on a lily in the Japanese Gardens

Grasshopper hanging on a passion vine in the Butterfly House