A Visit To Brookgreen Gardens In Murrells Inlet, South Carolina

If you ever find yourself near Murrells Inlet, South Carolina, you should really stop to visit the splendid Brookgreen Gardens. This National Historic Landmark is part arboretum, part sculpture garden, part natural reserve, it offers an ever changing display of flowers as the seasons change.

Once the plantation of the Alston family,

The more than 9,000 acre garden were once the property of magnate Archer Milton Huntington and his artist wife Anna Hyatt Huntington who purchased four former rice plantations in 1929. The sculpture garden was opened to the public in 1932 and features works by Anne, her sister Harriet Hyatt and many other American sculptors. The art is displayed in various themed gardens and water fountains.

You may recognize the bronze "Aganippe" or "Fountain Of The Muses" by Swedish sculptor Carl Milles, which were commissioned by the trustees of the Metropolitan Museum and  once graced the museum's large first floor restaurant.  The five figures were sold and moved to Brookgreen Gardens in 1982.

Besides the beautify plantings and sculptures, Brookgreen Gardens is a wonderful nature preserve that exemplifies different ecosystems found throughout coastal South Carolina.  There  is also a small native wildlife zoo, complete with a rather impressive gator.

No visit to Brookgreen Gardens would be complete without walking along the Low Country Trail and a restored rice field of the former Brookgreen Plantation. Along the way, an audio tour informs about life for enslaved Africans on a rice plantation and aims to educate about their daily life, work and the culture. Their history and plight is deeply moving and highlighted beautiful by sculptures created artist by Babette Bloch. (see below)

Regular admission to Brookgreen Gardens in $16, but the ticket is good for seven consecutive days.
I have already been twice in the past two days and will probably go back once more before heading back North to Brooklyn.

Hope it s not too cold back home.  Here in South Carolina it is sunny and in the 60s.  There is not a cloud in the sky.