“The purpose is to do the mission that we have which is to show man’s relationship to nature, to show a child under six years old something beautiful…all those things is part of our mission.” – Bo Callaway, 2002

Since we were visiting Callaway Gardens, we decided to eat breakfast at the Country Kitchen which was owned by the gardens but not on the main property. After checking out, we went to the restaurant where we had an amazing view overlooking the valley with our meal which consisted of biscuits and gravy (and Thea trying the muscadine jelly which was delicious). Unfortunately, I ended up having an upset stomach while we were eating breakfast which ended up limiting how much I could walk at the gardens since it continued throughout the morning.

Thankfully, the gardens are 2,500 acres and fully drivable with areas you can park and choose to walk around, so we started by driving along the main path of the park, taking in the lovely vistas of the ponds and trees that we passed along the way. The Callaway’s decided to turn the land into a garden after discovering that a rare plumleaf azalea grew on the land and added the lakes/ponds that are there today as additional attractions to get people to visit. They officially opened in 1952 which makes the gardens over 70 years old. It is the world’s largest azalea garden, although unfortunately we were visiting too late to get to see them in bloom. That’s alright though since we definitely want to make a return trip in the future (and live in azalea city so we get to see them every year anyway).

We decided to stop and take a walk around the Azalea Bowl which is home to over 3000 azaleas and azalea hybrids with over 700 different varieties. While we didn’t get to see the actual flowers, we enjoyed the shade from all the various trees and got to see some other flowers like lily of the valley which is my birth flower! There’s a walking trail that goes around a pond with a little water feature that feeds it next to the gorgeous Ida Cason Callaway Memorial Chapel. Some of the birds that we heard on our walk were fish crow, brown-headed nuthatch, northern parula, Carolina wren, red-eyed vireo, pine warbler, hooded warbler, eastern kingbird, eastern phoebe, chipping sparrow, cedar waxwing, and a red-shouldered hawk.

The chapel is what I most wanted to see because the pictures of it were stunning and it was even more striking in person. Cason Callaway who was the founder of the gardens with his wife Virginia had the chapel built as a tribute to his mother. The stained glass windows are the centerpieces depicting various trees native to Georgia going through the four seasons. After we finished visiting the chapel, we returned to the car after walking 1.23 mi around the garden and chapel so we could stop by to use the bathroom and check out the gift shop at the Exploreum before making our final trip to the butterfly house.

The Cecil B. Day Butterfly Center was definitely the highlight of the visit (which is quite a feat because the chapel is so beautiful). The lady who was working the entrance was very nice and told us a lot of very interesting facts about the building and the art inside – they had art by 2 different historic artists who had been explorers with the British Navy and Spanish explorers and both had documented the butterfly species they encountered with very detailed artwork. The coolest part of the visit was getting to see butterflies in all stages of their formation – some of them were literally coming out of their cocoons! We then walked through the butterfly area where they were all fluttering around – the long winged butterflies were still around since April was their month so most of them were black winged with red spots on their wings.

The center was named after the founder of the Days Inn and the aforementioned art was donated by his wife Deen Day. It is the largest glass enclosed tropical conservatory in North America and houses over a thousand butterflies; it also won the LEED certification in 2004 for its environmentally friendly design. You can’t really capture what it feels like to have a thousand butterflies fluttering around you without going to experience it yourself – there just isn’t really anything else like it. I was super excited to get to see a blue morpho butterfly – I was observing a large on that was getting nectar directly from a fruit whose wings were closed up until suddenly I saw a flash of blue. The butterfly never kept its wings open long enough for a picture but I did manage to capture the flash on video.

I spoke with the employee inside the butterfly area to learn some facts. She said they usually only live around 2 weeks max and I asked about monarch butterflies since I know they migrate. She said they are the exception and will live up to 9 months for the migration.

After the butterfly house, we headed to our next destination – High Falls State Park. It is the tallest cascading waterfall south of Atlanta and it was honestly very awe inspiring. The land was given to the Georgia State parks in 1966 and includes a 19th century industrial town turned ghost town in 1890 (we unfortunately didn’t get to hike the trail that takes you to it), the 135 foot waterfall, and a 650 acre lake.

Once we arrived, we checked into our yurt and ate lunch on the back deck overlooking the dam. We then went on the high falls hike and enjoyed the awesome (as in awe inspiring) views of the waterfall. It was well fed from the dam and you could easily tell why there were warnings about not going on the rocks/near the falls and that people had died. The hike was 2.02 mi and we had an elevation gain of 213 feet. On this hike we heard red-eyed vireo, Carolina wren, and an American crow.

Once we were done hiking, Thea worked on getting a fire started and I worked on finishing my Lucy Score book. Once I finished, I started Until Death Do Us Bard on my kindle and Thea started on dinner. We had Conecuh sausage, bell pepper, and pineapple skewers and then cheese, apples, and candy cotton grapes for dessert. Then it was time to shower and more reading before bed.