Thomas Edison and Henry Ford's Gardens

 

I am so happy to join Alma, The Tablescaper's new linky party "Oh The Places I've Been". Check out Alma's blog and her participants at http://thetablescaper.blogspot.com/  I am a traveler so you can just imagine how excited I was when she announced about this new meme. Naturally, I will not want to miss it and for my first entry, I thought I would share my latest trip to Florida. We bought a home there which is right next door to my daughter's and her family. The house shown below is my daughter's and ours is the house on the right which is not shown. Anyway, I just spent this past 3 weeks there and while I was there, my friend Brenda and her family drove from Natchez for 16 hrs, where our primary residence is and came for a visit. They spent 3 days with me before going to Orlando to take their kids to Disney while on spring break.

 

Here is Brenda, helping Tina with my grandkids cause I wanted to take them to tour Thomas Edison's place.

 First, we stopped by Bennett's Fresh Roast in Fort Myers for breakfast. As if donuts aren't fattening enough on their own, they had to add bacon to them, lol.

 The Edison estate was just closeby. We toured the grounds first and then the houses, then the laboratory and museum, but I will only show you the gardens and outside the houses today since I already have an overload of pictures. It's hard to capture everything in pictures so I took a few panoramic shots to get a better view. I was admiring the surrounding so much that I did not listen to the details on the tapes. You can google Thomas Edison in Fort Myers if you want more info. The property is right on the water and would you believe he paid only $25 or $27/acre at that time?

 This is the biggest bouganvilla plant that I have ever seen. I never thought they grew that huge.

 And I would love to have this mango tree. Look at all the fruits!

 This pond and garden is my favorite. That's my youngest daughter, Tina with 2 of her 3 kids, Nathan and Reese. The oldest, Brendan was in school.

 I was really in love with this pond and all the plants surrounding it.

 Here is another pond, which is Brenda's favorite.

 I think Nathan has the cutest smile. I miss him so much.

 They had so many huge banyan trees there too. I believe the very first one was a gift from India.

 Here are the tourists, Brenda and her family, posing with Thomas and Mina Edison's main house in the background.

 This is a pretty fountain but I love the gorgeous Crown of Thorns they placed around. I did not know they came in different colors. I have only seen the yellow ones.

 There were three houses on the property. The Edison's home, their guest house next to it and then, Henry Ford's house. Edison and Ford were best friends and after Edison bought a property there, Ford decided to buy also.

 Edison's houses were connected with a beautiful pergola with a gazebo (not shown very well) in the center.

 And if you keep going, you will get to Henry Ford's house.

 Ford's garage.

 

Thank you so much for stopping by. I will share more pictures next time. I have toured the lab and the museum a few years ago but this is the first time I toured the houses and garden and I am glad I did.

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