Get an early look at Macy's Spring Flower Show bursting into bloom

Can't escape for spring break? There's a mini-getaway awaiting you in downtown Minneapolis, starting March 20.

Take the elevator to Macy's eighth-floor auditorium, stroll to the right, and you're in a lush Southern garden filled with tropical flowers and foliage, set against a moody bayou draped in Spanish moss.

Or wander left into an arid desert landscape of spiky cactuses and dramatic succulents.

If you're pining for a Colorado ski trip, you can still savor the craggy pines, ferns and columbine of a Rocky Mountain garden.

Those are just three of seven gardens, each with a regional flavor, that Bachman's has created for this year's annual flower show, "America the Beautiful."

Visit soon and you'll see magnolias in full flower — they bloomed early, thanks to our warm spring weather this year.

Return later, and you just might be rewarded with a peek at pink petals on the budding cherry trees, the same variety that herald spring in Washington, D.C.

"Hopefully they'll open," said Bachman's CEO Dale Bachman. "The gardens change over the run of the show," he noted, so it's worth visiting more than once.

No guarantees though, on those cherry blossoms. "It's nature," he said. "We can never control everything."