As we were approaching Seattle from Portland, I saw the words "Kubota Garden" on one of those attraction signs by the side of the highway. When I googled it, I found that the Kubota Garden is a public park. It was initially the private project of one Mr. Fujitari Kubota, who immigrated here from Japan and in 1927, bought five acres of swampland to convert into a Japanese garden. Eighty-two years later, it is a sprawling, stunning, winding twenty acres.
Even when it was privately owned, it was shared with the public. The serenity of the place is apparent at the first glimpse of the gate. Of course, I then noticed the sign warning visitors not to leave valuables in their cars. After returning to the car to remove the faceplate from our stereo, a week-old replacement for our old one, Zorah and I proceeded to passs through the gate.
Immediately to our right were some artfully placed rocks which Zorah climbed for a while.
We wound down some paths that I think may have been strictly for maintenance of the park rahter than for exploration, when we heard someone coughing the sick, hacking cough of the unsavory. Now traveling in the opposite direction, we came to a stand of pines and saw this bumblebee trying to burrow into the ground. I have never heard of that before, and we were fascinated with watching it. I guess this was the queen bee trying to find a new nest? It seemed like it kept digging.
We went down and up more narrow and windy paths, shaded by huge rhododendrons that had been growing here probably for 80 years or more. Each clearing led to a beautiful surprise, be it a red bridge or one made of stone slabs.
We began walking up a hill and ran into a little girl and her grandmother. They were at the park searching for letterboxes. If you've never heard of them, as I hadn't, they are little boxes people hide on the grounds of parks/points of interest around the world. Clues to their locations are posted on a website. You take a stamp you have made and a notebook with you to find the boxes, in which are contained a notebook and a homemade stamp. Each notebook gets a stamp and a note on who you are and where you're from. Pretty neat. And a little bit of a motivator to go out and explore your world. Zorah and Ellie had fun searching for them.
When Ellie and her grandmother had to go, Zorah and I walked around the park for a little while longer. Being hot and tired, though, we didn't stay for long.
Just long enough to figure out that I can use the timer on my camera fairly successfully.
And to take a picture of this tree with leaves like fans.
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