I love the color blue in flowers. It’s extremely rare and my attempts to grow the blue poppy came to nothing in my Denver garden. Gardening is an extreme sport here in the semi-arid West. Likewise, the gorgeous blue-colored hydrangea doesn’t do will here. We can grow lovely white hydrangeas, but for the blue flowered versions I let my mind wander to those I saw in the Pacific Northwest during the years I enjoyed living there.

Years ago I discovered the fall-blooming perennial known around these parts as hardy plumbago, and in scientific communities as Ceratostigma plumbaginoides. I’ve grown it successfully in my garden and I love it.

Here is a current picture from my garden.

During the happy years I lived in Tuscany, I noticed a beautiful pale blue flower growing in pots on terraces and window boxes, as well as in more open spaces where it became a huge shrub. I asked around to find out its name and someone told me it’s plumbago. I was doubtful that was correct.

But, it was! They are known as Plumbago Auriculata.

Here’s an example of this tender perennial blooming in my Denver garden this past summer!

I admired the light-blue perennial all over Italy once I knew what it was, and grew it on my Florentine terrace in large pots.

When I returned to Denver in May of 2022, I assumed I wouldn’t see that pretty flower again until I return to Tuscany.

But, I couldn’t stop thinking about it, so I did some research and discovered that I could buy the plant by mail order, since Colorado is not a natural habitat for this incredible specimen. I bought 3 plants in the fall of 2022 and successfully nurtured them indoors through last winter. As soon as the weather was fine last spring, I set them outside in part sun and enjoyed their blossoms all summer.

As I write this in mid-October 2023, the 3 plants have been transplanted to pots and are sitting in a sunny window inside my house. I hope to get them through another winter and then set them outside again for another season of rare blooms in my Denver garden. In the meantime, I expect to get back to Tuscany, where they grow, literally like gorgeous weeds!

These are in a neighbor’s garden and I adore them!

This video tells the beautiful autumn story!

My young friend, Rudy, has been living in Tokyo now for about 6 months and he finally made his first trip to the Ginza area of the city. He shared some of his pictures with me from last weekend.

4-6-16 Mitsukoshi Ginza, Ginza, Chuo 104-0061 Tokyo Prefecture
Neighborhood: Ginza / Tokyo Nihonbashi
Ginza is famous for being a trendy hotspot, but it’s also a downtown area with shops that were founded over a hundred years ago. Department stores and luxury boutiques line the route from Nihonbashi to Ginza. It’s a long established tradition to shop and stroll while the road is closed to traffic. Luxury hotels, world class cuisine from talented chefs, and a collection of glitzy clubs will make this area popular with anyone looking for a night out. Daytime visits are also enjoyable!

Rudy said it took 1.5 hours by tram to get from his neighborhood to the Ginza and cost about $4 USD each way. What a worthwhile journey. If I were he, I would be traveling all around Tokyo every chance I had.

Kabosu is a type of citrus, which is being advertised above.

He stopped in the Minori Cafe and had both a tea (with fruit garnish) and a coffee! Thirsty boy!

Rudy and I met in Florence of all places and we both love fashion and anything Italian!

I gather the highlight of his Ginza visit was seeing the Art Aquarium exhibition.

Here’s a picture of Rudy in the space, which he really enjoyed.

The Art Aquarium’s permanent exhibition reopened in Ginza, where it has made a new home on the 8th and 9th floors of the Ginza Mitsukoshi New Building. The aquarium is headed by self-described ‘art aquarium producer’ Hidetomo Kimura, who sees goldfish as living pieces of art and wanted to create a space where people can admire and appreciate these mesmerising creatures.

You can view thousands of goldfish swimming in glass vessels of all shapes and sizes, and they are illuminated with moving projections and multi-colored lights. You’ll find both rare and common goldfish on display across the museum’s nine exhibition spaces including the Origamirium, the Goldfish Bamboo Grove and the Goldfish Corridor.

One can experience a colorful array of goldfish swimming through tanks of various shapes and colors at the Art Aquarium Museum, with more than 30,000 goldfish on display. The first Art Aquarium was a temporary exhibition in 2007, located in Tokyo, and ran for two months. Since then, the various inceptions of the art gallery-turned-aquarium have toured Japan and the world, visiting Milan in 2015 and Shanghai in 2018.

And last, but not least, Rudy is a young man about 6 foot tall and he has a voracious appetite. No journey would be complete for him without food, food, food. He enjoyed his first visit to the famous food court in the well-known department store, Mitsukoshi. The next photos tell that story!

Enjoy Japan and especially Tokyo, Rudy, my dear friend! Sayonara and arrividerci!

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Thank you for watching! :-))