Canada Trip (Part 1): Butterfly Conservatory

CJ and I used our last weekday of Spring Break yesterday to take a trip to the Canada side of Niagra Falls and then visit some friends in Buffalo. We had a blast. While we were waiting to cross the border, CJ pointed out that it's the first time we've been out of the country together. Awwwww. It was so much fun and we didn't even get to do everything. We're talkiing about possibly spending our anniversary there next year.

First, we went to the butterfly conservatory. Almost as soon as we were in Canada, we saw a sign for the conservatory and decided on a whim to go. It was gorgeous. They had a lot more butterflies than either of the two butterfly gardens I've been to before (Rochester's Strong Museum and Cleveland's Botanical Gardens).

I wanted to get a good picture of a Blue Morpho so bad (they're my favorites), but they close their wings when they land, and the outside of their wings are nothing like the inside. With their wings closed they're all brown and spotted and you can't see the blue.

There was one settled on the edge of the walk with its wings fully open. I actually thought it was dead at first...but as soon as I walked over to try to get a picture of it, it closed up its wings! It was taunting me! CJ tried gently touching its antennae with his foot, trying to coax it to open up again for me, but I was nervous he'd accidentally crush it, so he stopped. But not before I caught a picture of it flashing some fleeting blue.

The only other "good" picture I could get of them was once while they were flying. (It's difficult to get butterfly action shots!)

And while the Blue Morphos decided to be teasing and elusive, some of the other species were more obliging and allowed me to take some beautiful shots of them.