If you love mysteries, don’t miss The Wicked Plants exhibit now at the NC Arboretem!
If you’ve been following me on FaceBook, you may know that I’ve been out gallivanting again. Last week my sister, Mary Ellen, and I made our annual trek to Hendersonville to get apples. I just eat them, but I’m looking forward to Mary Ellen’s baking with them. Within the coming weeks, I’ll be treated to apple pies, cakes, turnovers, crumbles, sauce, and who knows what other divine recipes she’ll come up with.
At the NC Arboretum, backed up by–you guessed it–a gorgeous Holly bush.
As much as I enjoyed that trip, I experienced triple the enjoyment on Wednesday when we took a bus tour with Mauldin’s Ray Hopkins Senior Center to the North Carolina Arboretum in Asheville, NC. The trip was originally announced months ago, and we signed up, not knowing exactly what to expect. You can bet, I didn’t expect something particularly beneficial to my cozy mystery writing.
Imagine my excitement when I checked on line just a few days before departure and learned that one of the exhibits at the arboretum was entitled Wicked Plants. Based on a book with the same name and sub-titled The Weed that Killed Lincoln’s Mother and Other Botanical Atrocities, the exhibit description intrigued me. When I read,
Entrance to the deceptively cozy Wicked Plants exhibit.
“Thought-provoking, entertaining and educational interactive displays are set inside a Victorian-era ramshackle home, where visitors travel from room to room and learn about various poisonous plants that may be lurking in their homes and backyards. History, medicine, science, legend and lore are brought together to present a compendium of bloodcurdling botany that will entertain, alarm and enlighten,”
I nearly swooned! Talk about serendipity. This exhibit could have been tailor-made for a mystery writer whose sleuths are gardeners. In one room, a murder victim lies face down on the table and clues are scattered about the room. Your job is to figure out the cause of death. In the dining room, each place setting has a written description of a food item on the table. Each item can, in certain instances, cause death. Using a shaded magnifying glass, you can find the name of the toxic food item embedded in the place mats. What a lot of fun!
I was dismayed, however, when I arrived at the gift shop only to find they were all out of copies of Wicked Plants, which I’d decided was going to become an essential part of my mystery writer library. Disappointed, I returned to the lobby to meet up with my tour group. More serendipity! As I passed the receptionist’s desk, I saw a lone copy of the book on the counter. Not being shy, I ran over and asked if it was for sale. After some checking, they told me, that yes, I could buy this display copy. What good fortune!
The Quilt Garden
The Wicked Plants Exhibit aside, I highly recommend visiting the NC Arboretum in the coming weeks. Especially since the temperature has dropped and it’s finally Fall, y’all. The Arboretum was developed on land the state of NC bought from the Biltmore estate that is now Pisgah National Forest.
We only had time to tour the area from the Baker Exhibit Center to the Education Center, but it was wonderful. The Quilt Garden made of yellow chrysanthemums used to form butterflies is not to be missed. And if you are a fan of bonsai, hurry. The bonsai specimens are amazing, but they’ll only be outside for a little while longer, before they get taken indoors for the winter.
So happy to be blogging again and sharing my serendipitous experiences with you. Please write and tell me about yours.
Holly and Ivy–oops!–Sally and Mary Ellen searching for clues.