The Antebellum South, one of our more popular tours, allows travelers to enter the history of Dixie as they ride through eight states on a train holiday. The rail journey takes them into the heart of the South’s charmingly lush plantations, sculptured gardens and historical landmarks. 

The South is complete with gardens of all styles: formal, walled, cottage, cutting, annual and perennial, herbs, water, and yes, even secret gardens. Typically, wide grass walks evenly divide gardens, with identical beds flanking the edges. As early spring arrives, visitors take in the beautiful full-bloom azaleas, camellias, dogwoods, lilies and roses, and beautiful magnolia-filled squares. 

The tour visits Monticello, the mountaintop home, gardens and plantation of Thomas Jefferson. The historic grounds contain an eight-acre fruit garden, designed romantic grottoes, garden temples, and ornamental groves.

Jefferson grew 170 fruit varieties, including apples, peaches and grapes, in Monticello's two orchards. He cultivated over 330 vegetable varieties in the plantation's 1,000-foot-long garden terrace and grew over 100 species of herbaceous flowers. Trees undoubtedly ranked at the top of his hierarchical chart of favorite garden plants, with hundreds being planted among the grounds.

The flower gardens almost disappeared after Jefferson's death in 1826, but were revived and restored by The Garden Club of Virginia over 100 years later by using original sketches of the Winding Walk Flower border and the oval bed plan. The restorers were able to view the hollows and dips of the Winding Walk Flower walk by shining the headlights of their automobiles across the West Lawn at night. The perennial bulbs were still flourishing and helped to outline its location. Considering the “tools of the trade” in use at the time, the restoration seems unusually accurate. 

Jefferson’s campus masterpiece

In Charlottesville, the tour visits the University of Virginia, the Jefferson-designed place that he described as a set of buildings "arranged around an open square of grass and trees." Jefferson wanted an "academical village" clustered around a tree-lined lawn that would provide an ideal setting in which to pursue higher education – it was our nation’s first “college campus.”   

The university’s Pavilion Gardens provide both a place in which to study and, a subject of study themselves. Jefferson’s main intent for the grounds was for the residents of the Pavilion to design, plant, and maintain their own gardens. The university’s landscape plays a large role in the plantings there, as the West Gardens are relatively flat while the East Gardens are terraced into the hillside.   

There are six gardens in all, divided in half by serpentine walls. The upper gardens are called Pavilion Gardens and are more formal and meditative. The Hotel Gardens are located in the lower areas and are named such as they relate to the former dining halls. They were intended as functional gardens and orchards – the fruits of which were used in the kitchens. The lawn and its gardens are one of the achievements of which Jefferson was proudest. 

In Charleston, riding in horse-drawn carriages, garden fanciers move over cobblestone streets and through charmingly restored neighborhoods to reach lovely Magnolia Plantation, home to America’s oldest garden.  A special treat Plantation is the Horticultural Maze, planted with over 500 large camellia bushes, alive with blooms of all colors.  

The original maze was copied from one designed by Henry VIII at his country estate in 16th-century England. Guests attempt to navigate almost ¼ mile of intricate pathways to discover the center square; and then turn back, hopefully to find their way out! It is a source of delightful frustration to visitors of all ages. . .just as it may have been to the maidens whom Henry VIII reportedly lured into his own maze.  

In the Biblical Garden, one may explore the plants and flowers of the New Testament. Horticulturists who were also biblical students began delving into the subject and found, among other things, that the "locusts" eaten by John the Baptist were not insects, but carob pods; the "bitter herbs" were pretty much what we use in our own salads today; and that frankincense and myrrh were horticultural perfumes – great efforts have been made to identify these as exactly as possible. Many of these plants are located in a special garden on the grounds of Magnolia Plantation. 

Other scenes at the plantation include grand bridges and beautiful natural marsh and swamp – the setting for many a Hollywood movie and sweet romance. While there are seven bridges of varying design on Magnolia Plantation, its famous "Long Bridge," has become the pictorial symbol of the plantation and its gardens. Built by the plantation owner in the 1840s, the bridge crosses what was once a rice field. The field had been deepened to form a lake that became a major feature of the plantation’s gardens.    

The gardens, marshes and swamps put guests in direct contact with the natural beauty of the grounds, enhanced by hundreds of species of colorful, blooming plants – local and foreign – all of which were planted with the refinement and elegance that have made Magnolia’s historic gardens world-famous. 

The city in a garden 

The port city of Savannah exemplifies antebellum grandeur, from its planned public squares with their azalea bushes brimming with vibrantly colored blooms, private courtyard gardens and ornate architectural details, to the sprawling live oaks draped with Spanish moss. Travelers love strolling downtown to River Street, where the paddle wheel boats are docked and the antique shops and cafes are bustling. They can visit the actual mansions and squares used during the filming of Forest Gump, The Legend of Bagger Vance and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. In the latter film, Savannah's proverbial "moss curtain" was parted introducing outsiders to the city's scandals, secrets and eccentricities.   

Springtime guests in Savannah are greeted by fabulous gardens and bursts of colorful blooms. Almost every home, courtyard and park is “dressed for spring and its wonderful visitors.” The history of Savannah is entwined with its gardening: One of General Oglethorpe's plans when he founded the city was to grow food and plants that could be sold to profit the local economy. As a result, Savannah was the site of the first experimental agricultural station America. For example, English botanists cultivated clusters of young Mulberry trees to feed the silkworm colonies. 

The original “Georgia Peach”, although known in the South, was not a widely accepted crop. Later, botanists improved its flavor and began sending them to nearby plantations. There they flourished and eventually helped make Georgia famous as peach cobbler became one of the South’s favorite desserts.  

With over 20 squares, Savannah's legacy as a garden city became legendary over the years. Everywhere you look boasts an abundance of trees, flowering bushes and lively colorful flowers.  Whether you’re a "green thumb" or a novice gardener, the gardens will bring pleasure and eye-popping delights. 

The Crescent City’s gardens 

Mark Twain, speaking of New Orleans’ Garden District, described it as a place where “mansions stand in the center of large grounds and rise, garlanded with roses, out of the midst of swelling masses of shining green foliage and many-colored blossoms.”  No locale embodies the glory of the Southern aristocracy of history and legend better than New Orleans and the Garden District. Where the French Quarter is vibrant and multi-textured, the Garden District is gracious and stately -- an elegantly adorned window to a bygone era.   

The District was created when the mighty Mississippi developed a break in her levee and inundated most of the area plantations. This left behind a thick layer of nutrient-rich alluvial silt deposits, which were used to create the luxuriant flora and fauna now seen all around New Orleans. The spacious home sites and rich, garden-ready soil immediately began attracting the wealthy from across the country. These new arrivals began building opulent mansions, and the Garden District was born. The name was created to describe the area as “a place of gracious living where wealthy, politically and socially important citizens built fabulous homes surrounded by exquisite gardens.” 

New Orleans always seems ready to show off her fanciest party wear. The city’s native flora includes iris, magnolia, roses, phlox, azalea; the heady scent of gardenia, gladiola, hibiscus and milkweed – treats to be seen in almost every yard, park and parkway. Travelers enjoy wisteria and honeysuckle dripping from trees and fences, listen for whispered secrets in the tall, swaying pines, dogwood, redbud and flowering crepe myrtle, and sense mystery in cypress trees, gray bearded with Spanish moss. As Lillian Hellman once said, “I envision. . . one of those lovely misty mornings of late spring when every flower in New Orleans seems to melt and mix with the air.”

While in New Orleans, travelers have a “must see” at the New Orleans Botanical Gardens, whose newest exhibit is “The New Orleans Historic Train Garden.” As jazz music plays, visitors are enticed into a historical replica of the city where G-gauge streetcars and freight trains clack through a model of the greater New Orleans area. The trains meander past New Orleans landmarks, such as the Old Absinthe House and the St. Louis Cathedral, and a Mississippi steamboat. Back in the gardens themselves, visitors enjoy carefully trimmed hedges and beautiful beds of flowers that create a maze of color, splendor and peace. Many statues and sculptures pepper the landscape and enhance the gardens.