Gertrude Stein was wrong. “A rose is a rose is a rose,” she said. Well, I can verify that she was simply incorrect. A rose is not a rose. They come in so many varied colors and shapes, but still all roses. One has this abundantly verified when one visits Portland’s International Rose Test Garden. So many beautiful roses. So many different shades and combinations. So many different styles. And the lovely rose perfume filled the air. I’ve got lots of photos to go through when I get home, too. The question becomes, how many ways can you take a picture of a rose? (Especially in a garden when one has no control over the environment)

Before I visited the rose garden, I enjoyed quite a bit of time at the beautiful Japanese garden nearby.  It was a real pleasure to walk through on a beautiful day like today. One spot also had a wonderful view of Mount Hood. Different areas provided different styles, from the dry Zen garden type to wonderful water areas. One area had some huge and beautiful irises blooming. And there was a lovely teahouse in one spot. I’m looking forward to sharing the oodles of pictures I took today.  Hopefully I got some good ones.

I won’t be able to process photos until I get home.  But I’ll post about new galleries when I get them uploaded.  Stay tuned….

One thing about carrying around a dSLR camera and a big camera bag, though,  is people figure you can take pictures. There was on woman I ran into a couple of times today who asked me several times to take her and her friend’s picture. I was happy to oblige, but at one point her friend joked “Is he going to charge you a sitting fee.” I thought that was funny.  Later I saw she had accosted another fellow to take pictures of her with roses.  She seemed to be enjoying the gardens, anyway.