Sierra Madra, a town a little east of Pasadena, held its annual Wistaria Festival on Saturday, so we drove over to check out their world-famous wistaria plant.

We arrived at our scheduled, ticketed time of 11:00 am and had to stand in line for about 45 minutes to get on the bus that takes people to the private property on which this 250-ton, 100+ year-old plant is found. The bus ride took approximately 5 minutes and went about 3 blocks. And it turned out that no tickets were needed to actually see the plant. They're just for the bus.

We walked back. Now that we know how to get there and how short the walk is, we will just avoid the bus next time!!! Sigh. Anyhow, this year the viewing wasn't so great because recent inclement weather has knocked the blooms off the plant. The two plants we have on our own patio had a lot more flowers than this huge one because of the wind and rain's effects on it.

Ah well. We enjoyed strolling around the numerous food and craft booths and got some cotton candy and cool flower pots.



Part of the Sierra Madre wistaria plant





One of our two wistaria plants