As promised, here are the tulips – and lots of them! On Mother’s Day, John and I biked to bagels and met my parents there for breakfast.
Hi mom!
While breakfasting, I had mentioned about wanting to go to the Albany Tulip Festival, but not sure I wanted to drive and hour and spend the gas. Turns out mom wanted to go as well, so a plan was formed! We biked home and made ourselves presentable, then drove down to Albany. I really had no idea how big a deal the Tulip Festival was. We were going to try to park near the festival, but since there was free shuttle from the free parking garage, we chose to take that instead. Best.decision.ever.
John and I all cleaned up riding the shuttle.
The shuttle dropped us off to a throng of crowds!
😯 Bigger festival than I was expecting! There was a huge craft show, entertainment stages, lots of food on a stick:
I was there to see the tulips, though! Moses proclaims “Let there be tulips!”
They are pretty much in peak bloom.
I fell in love with these crown imperials (fritillaria). They aren’t tulips, but they are bulbs. I have only seen pictures of them and they are fairly expensive, so I never got any. I think I will be purchasing some now that I have seen them up close and personal.
They kind of look like pineapples.
Grape hyacinths (muscari)
I love the color combos.
Some Morris dancers performing.
Accompanied by a concertina:
My poor mom and John. I took soooo many tulip pictures Although my mom did as well:
The colors just almost didn’t look real.
I took pictures of the names of the tulips so I could remember them. Orange Princess double late:
Chiquita bordeaux double late:
The coolest tulip EVER!
Obviously a mutation, but so cool. It was hidden with all these yellow ones.
Fancy frills fringe tulips:
Red Georgette multiflora:
Posing:
Maybe next month’s challenge to myself might be working on posture??
As most of you know, I did a 7 day vegetarian challenge. I was a little worried at first about finding something at the fest to eat without resorting to cheese fries or something like that to stay veggie. Well, there were a ton of choices! I ended up at the Turkish booth:
There were some feta cheese filled samosa-type things. Then the sarma (the green things), which were vine leaves stuffed with rice, parsley, onions and spices (actually really good), and then sekerpore. Those are a sweet almond cake soaked in a simple syrup. A good plate. I shared the sekerpore with mom and John because the lady gave me a couple free ones. Maybe I looked hungry?
More flowers. Monte Carlo double early. I think the doubles are also called peony tulips.
Rajke Triumph:
Pink cloud mixed (love these).
Estella parrot:
Another crown imperial
And just some pretty color combos here:
I guess I had better stop! I wasn’t kidding when I said I took a lot of pictures 😀
Flowers make me so happy