Wednesday, July 09, 2008

Boscobel Historic Site

On our first vacation outing we visited Boscobel, which is a gorgeous home of the federal period that sits on 45 acres, completed in 1808. We come here atleast once a year but this is the first time I was armed with my new, smaller digital camera and it was an absolute pleasure to take photos with it.

This is a view of the front of Boscobel, it has a very long and beautiful lawn leading down to the Hudson River....what a view.

This is a view of the Hudson River from the tip of the front yard. I live right across the river at West Point.

This is an overall view of the rose garden. Where you might ask are all the roses?? Well, it would appear we were out of luck in that department, I think we came at just the right time to catch everything inbetween blooming cycles. DRAT!!! Well, let me tell you, when it is in bloom, it is really lovely.
The nicest thing about this visit is that they recently opened a new art gallery in the bottom floor of the house, it has its entrance right off the non blooming rose garden. This summer Boscobel has assembled a collection of 29 of the most gorgeous paintings of the Hudson River School Artists. It was a very intimate, pleasant setting to view these gorgeous and famous paintings in. Some of the artists being shown were: Samuel Coleman, Jasper Cropsey, Thomas Rossiter and John Ferguson Weir, just to name a few. The work is absolutely gorgeous and is on loan here from private collections as well as from other galleries, until Oct 1st.

This is the fountain in the rose garden....even though the roses were not cooperating for me, the fountain looked beautiful.

This is a photo of the entrance to the large herb garden. As you can see, the walk way is lined with sweet smelling lavender.

The herb house as I like to call it. Seems a little too big to call a shed. There is a green house area on the other side that is currently undergoing restoration.

Each year, this walk way is filled with grapes. When we were here visiting last August, we were eating them right off the vine.

Some very lovely flowers were growing in the herb garden as well and they were attracting lots of bugs and butterflies.




All throughout the herb garden there are bee hives, in fact, they sell them in the gift shop as well. (they however, do not provide the bees, just the hive)
I hope you've enjoyed the tour of Boscobel.

14 comments:

Art by Ronda Juniper Ray said...

Wow! What a gorgeous home. I'd sure love to live there, but the winters would be verrrrry cold, because I'd yank the windows out to paint them.

Speaking of your ceiling tin collection -- I wish I had known before we moved last year! I sent four dozen beauties to auction with the other things we were getting rid of. :-(((

I simply found them too challenging to paint on, very rough and with rust leaching thru the paint, and I was totally NOT in the mood to strip and redo them. Not with all those windows I have! I kept the four footers; I'll either strip and paint, or my husband makes gorgeous frames for canvasses out of them. You know, all those canvasses I paint...... :-D Windows rule!

Catherine said...

Oh Ruth~I so enjoyed your beautiful photo's of Boscobel~what a lovely place to vacation!! I LOVE the shot of the Rose garden!!~My dream "ROSE GARDEN!"~:) And the walk with the grape arbor~fantastic!! Looks like a huge herb garden! Lovely photo's of this beautiful place~thanks for sharing Ruth!
Wishing you a beautiful week!
Hug's
Cat

Unknown said...

Hi Ruth! I can see that you are an artist with you camera as well! What Gorgeous photos. I have been to Oneida and Syracuse during winter. (It looked like Currier & Ives.) However, I have never seen New York without snow. What a glorious garden! I especially love the butterfly on the flower. That would make a sweet painting!

Have you ever tried Harney & Sons Christmas Tea or their yummy Chocolate Tea. I'm almost running to my cupboard! They make sensational products and I love the family feel. I haven't found anyone else who purchases from them, so this is a treat!

Have a blessed and wonderful day!

KJ

Charm and Grace said...

What utterly lovely pictures. I think the view is just stunning! That photo of the butterfly on the coneflower is amazing, too. What great shots you got...thanks for taking us along with you on your vacation. :-)

Blessings,
Christi

THE HOME THAT LOVE BUILT said...

Gorgeous pictures! Thanks for sharing all the beauty!

Blessings
Brook

Anonymous said...

Hi Ruth, Thanks for sharing. I loved going on the tour with you. :) Lynn

NeereAnDear said...

Ruth thanks for taking us along for the ride.... I can smell the lavender for miles and I love your photos.... feels like we were right there with you... that herb garden... fantabulous!!

CIAO FOR NOW!!

JO

Siobhan said...

Ruth, what an amazing place! I could walk around for hours and hours! Thanks for sharing this treasure with us all.

Siobhan xo

Anonymous said...

What an incredible place to visit! I adore your photos. I'm saving for a smaller camera too, what kind did you get? I adore the garden photos, the butterfly on the cone flower, and the bee hutch in the herb garden. I'm sure those will be wonderful inspiration for your beautiful work. I plan to do a herb set soon, and I'll definitely add a bee hutch. xoxo

Donna said...

Boscobel is a beautiful place! I would love to visit there sometime. I would enjoy the art gallery. The herb house is just perfect! Loved the tour.

Hugs,
Donna

Gail McCormack said...

Thankyou Ruth for the fabulous tour, after a freezing cold day here in Melbourne your lovely photos were a sight for sore eyes

Suzanne said...

What a gorgeous place, thanks for the tour! What a treat it must have been to view those painting too!

Mosaic*Queen said...

Thank you for the wonderful tour Ruth! Absolutely Gorgeous!!! I spent the weekend building a structure for my grapevine. It is not completed yet, but I hope to get my crazy vine up and over something, as it is covering everything and going into the pond. The hubby planted it in a hurry a few years ago. I had purchased it and then we had a death in the family, so we had to leave immediately so he planted it in a place I really didn't want it in. Oh well. Once I get the structure done, it should take care of my problem. I was plucking grapes from it as I was building the structure. :-)
Happy Vacationing!!!

Michelle

Robin Pedrero said...

Ruth,

You will love this video with my Max. Shih Tzu's ARE great!
This is the blog entry.

http://pocketfullofcolors.blogspot.com/2008/07/super-cow-featuring-max-million.html