The Garden of Eden--in Cornwall.

[Side note: I am in Spain! We're starting in Madrid and I'll be traveling throughout the country. Bear with me while I catch you up on the adventures I've already had.]

Our second day we spent at the Eden Project in Cornwall. It's a really cool concept that focuses on sustainability and public education. It's a huge garden and a series of large domes that contain jungle and mediterranean plants--and it's all in what used to be a quarry! Eden Trust just started planting and constructing in this barren quarry and turned it into something really beautiful! You begin at the top of the quarry, and then walk down through a series of paths, to the main domes with the Jungle biome and the Mediterranean biome. The walk down is filled with cool sculptures and patterns and colors of flowers and plants. The biomes themselves are really amazing. Plants from all over the world, and the jungle biome looks really convincing. Both of them explain what the plants are and explain important issues, like deforestation, biodiversity, cash crops, etc. They had some exhibits about what people's homes and gardens from that area would look like. They also had sustainability-related art, like sculpture and poetry.

View up the quarry from the base by the biomes

The biomes

Part of an exhibit of Malaysian home

Sculpture made from charred wood. Most of the sculptures were to re-use materials.

Try to get a sense of the maze of plants in the jungle.

Crazy flower!

Another crazy (and fuzzy) flower!

One of the main attractions of the Mediterranean biome was the masses of tulips.

The jungle was a mess of all kinds of plants--trees, shrubs, some flowers. The Mediterranean biome had a lot of trees and shrubs, but also lots of fruit trees--oranges, grapefruit, etc. They had an exhibit on Spanish huertas, or kitchen gardens. There was a huge Moorish influence, and they brought a lot of different herbs and fruits that really influenced Spanish cooking. Makes me excited to see Spain for myself!

Plus, a video of the pit-turned-garden, but not tonight because my Internet is picky. But soon!