One of my favorite gardens. The 1857 plantation house at Afton Villa burned in 1963. The gardens were expanded to include plantings around the ruins of the house, making it a romantic and haunting setting.
I usually visited Afton Villa at least once a year, as it was included in the Audubon Pilgrimage, a spring tour of antebellum homes in St. Francisville, Louisiana. Last year the Audubon Pilgrimage was cancelled due to COVID, then cancelled permanently. Members of community came to believe that its depiction of antebellum plantation life ignored the realities of slavery. They are working to create an alternative event that tells the story of all the people who lived in the town.
Travel info: The town of Natchez, Mississippi continues to offer a traditional spring pilgrimage, although I'm not sure if the docents are still costumed in antebellum dresses. Whitney Plantation in Edgard, Louisiana offers a tour that depicts the reality of slavery, It is not for the faint-hearted; I have not taken my grandchildren there yet.
Scenery here is beautiful. I like the curve of the path, the azaleas in bloom and the sprawling trees! Your photo of it is fabulous and it would be an amazing place to visit.
I find it really sad that we as a nation only believe in the extremes of telling our history. I wish we were more balanced- able to talk about generals and plantations for their time period and what they believed then, able to show that life here was never perfect and people did wrong things we eventually corrected. Learning from our mistakes and using that knowledge to improve and do better is a much broader way to look at history but the powers that be are more interested in polarizing people than bringing them together. That's how they keep their power- which in turn is producing its own evils and rotten thinking.
All that being said- this shot is lovely and it must smell heavenly with all those flowers in bloom. Beautiful shot.
All that being said- this shot is lovely and it must smell heavenly with all those flowers in bloom. Beautiful shot.