These are my favorite rhododendrons — the great laurel. They bloom in July and are native to the mountains along the eastern U.S. from at least Pennsylvania down to North Carolina (and maybe farther in either direction). Both George Washington and Thomas Jefferson collected them and grew them in their own gardens. I did risk life and limb to get this picture as the last cluster was hanging over the road along a sharp curve with a steep edge on either side. No guts, no wildflowers photo, as they say.
Well worth the risk. I love these, too. Your July photos are reminding me of growing up in NJ, as we had rhododendrons, too. I miss them and sweet peas--as well as lilacs and the dogwoods we had in Virginia. But we have beautiful plants in Louisiana, too.
@eudora I love the flower pictures that you post! My July pictures are almost all from Erie, Pennsylvania, where my family lives. I usually spend three or four weeks there in the summer. We don’t have any lilacs near our house in Virginia, but I love driving through the neighborhood in the spring seeing all the dogwoods and the mountain laurel and wild azaleas. Do you have those? I think they’re called pinxter flower. I had never seen them before I moved to Virginia.
July 30th, 2019
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