Since we just celebrated Mother’s Day, it seems appropriate to share some beautiful flowers. The climate in our city is semi-tropical, so we regularly enjoy a wide variety of vibrant colors. Bougainvilleas abound:
These purple trees line a major street we walk down every week:
pink trees enhance the foreground of our apartment building:
and the city recently planted rose bushes along some downtown avenues:
In our apartment courtyard, this large, alien-looking flower sprouted:
and we saw this purple cluster in the park on Sunday afternoon:
It is interesting to see local people working among the flowers:
and foreigners sitting among them:
But of all the flowers we saw on Mother’s Day, one outshone them all. Because this year, on Mother’s Day, our beautiful new granddaughter was born:
We are so very thankful to welcome her into the world! Such a special blessing on a special day!
Beautiful pics but you saved the best for last. 🙂
🙂
You guys are doing what the asian tourists do here…take pictures of all the flowers. Im tearing up about that sweet little baby!!
Congratulations on your granddaughter. The large, alien-looking flower is Musella lasiocarpa, commonly known as Chinese dwarf banana, golden lotus banana or Chinese yellow banana. It’s the sole species in the genus Musella. It is thus a close relative of bananas, and also a member of the family Musaceae. The plant is native to the Yunnan province in China, where it grows high in the mountains up to an altitude of 2500 m. It is known for its yellow erect flower , generally appearing during the second year of cultivation, that can last a few months. Just before opening, the flower resembles a lotus – from which the plant gets one of its names.
Stephen D : It is good to hear from you (probably the only botanist looking at our blog)! It has been quite a while since you lived here, and you would enjoy Kunming even more now – we constantly remark about the variety of plants popping up. The local horticulturalists do an amazing job of planning, planting, and propagating.