By Rob Byko, contributing photographer  | Approaching Magnolia Plantation at night through the gates along a winding drive, you can tell you’re in for a treat. Over the treetops and through the underbrush, you see your first glimpse of the brilliant lights in colors too numerous to mention. 

Entering the festival grounds, the evening explodes in color and sound. The lights’ reflections wash over joyful faces of patrons walking the garden paths. The light dances along ponds and through the eyes of children who seem lost in the fantasy.

An easy walking trail guides you first along a fairy tale of characters, followed by flowers and fauna taller than your head.  Then you meet huge butterflies and ladybugs, pandas and peacocks. Turn a corner and you find a kaleidoscope from the animal kingdom featuring playful lions, stoic zebras and tigers so vivid they seem real. 

Finally, the tour returns to fantasy, placing you face-to-face with a 200-foot-long dragon whose majestic head soars more than 45 feet in the air. …