“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul. ~John Muir”
In February my husband and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary with a cruise to the Bahamas. What a beautiful way to celebrate that many years of life and love together. It was our first cruise and proved to be pretty much all that I expected. We soaked up the sun, ate too much, parasailed and spent time at a private island, and toured the city of Nassau. In Nassau we had the opportunity to visit the Ardastra Gardens, Zoo, and Conservation Centre. I am sure you can anticipate what the highlight of my trip was!
The moment I stepped into the gardens, I felt as if I had just come home. My soul felt at rest as I took in the beauty of the tropical foliage and I found myself delighting in the details of every single plant and flower that I laid eyes on. It seemed as if those gardens had been there forever, the stones that held the water features were well-aged with moss abounding, exotic full trees and coconut palms towered over bromeliads, orchids, brilliantly colored bougainvillea, and hibiscus of every hue. Walking on the winding pathways, the gardens had an intimate and informal nature to them, which I liked very much, and held constant surprises, such as a footbridge over a pond where I got splendid pictures of Bahamian ducks sleeping after a hard morning of swimming and eating, a fresh water turtle on a fallen log, and archways of shrubs and exotic plant life.
I did some research on the gardens and mapsoftheworld.com gave a nice history of the park indicating that The Nassau Ardastra Gardens were opened in 1937 and that it was the idea of a Jamaican horticulturalist, Hedley Vivian Edwards. He wanted to create a luscious garden in the heart of Nassau. This garden was named after the Jamaican defense force motto, Ardastra. The name comes from Latin 'Ardua astrum' which literally means 'Striving for the stars'.
The park is home to hundreds of beautiful mammals, birds, and reptiles from around the world, including many endangered species from the Bahamas and the Greater Caribbean and is committed to the preservation and conservation of endangered species. The flamingos were breathtaking and marched on command in front of an awestruck audience.
I mentioned that I felt as though I had just come home when I entered the gardens. I know that this is because just a touch of heaven has been planted in my heart, and the beauty we experience here on earth is only a morsel, a grain of sand, microscopic in comparison to what we will experience in heaven. The splendor of the five acres that make up Ardastra Gardens are only a preview of what my Father has for me when I step into Heaven. I am so blessed. I have a Father in Heaven who paid the ultimate price of sacrificing His Son so that I can share eternity with Him, I have had 25 years on earth with a godly man who loves me more than I deserve, and I have a little bit of heaven right here on earth to remind that the best is yet to come.
“Jesus answered him, “Truly I tell you, today you will be with me in paradise.” Luke 23:43
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