It wasn’t my first time at Tokyo’s Meguro River once I arrived there on the final Thursday night in March—that had been again in 2018, across the similar time of the month. It felt prefer it, nonetheless, and never in the way in which the Foreigner music describes.
I used to be shocked, to make certain, by how authoritarian the environment was. Not solely have been coercive indicators current, discouraging folks from stopping alongside the bridges to take photos trying down them (which is actually your entire level of visiting Meguro-gawa throughout sakura season), however native volunteers (precise police might by no means be bothered with such a activity) have been making an attempt to implement this, blocking photographers with their our bodies.
Issues have been higher at my second vacation spot, Shikoku island’s Kochi. Properly, at the very least exterior of the town, the place I discovered fewer cherry bushes than I assumed I’d based mostly on my earlier go to (which, to be truthful, had taken place in the course of the center of winter).
Certainly, I discovered the agricultural reaches of the prefecture (specifically, the winding highway from Nikobuchi waterfall to Ehime’s Uwajima Fortress) to be spectacular, each when it comes to the variety of bushes, in addition to their superior state of bloom.
By the point I bought to Kintai Bridge, in Iwakuni, Yamaguchi, the flowers there had entered a state of mankai. This was each reassuring and stunning; I’d been there simply as soon as earlier than (round this similar time of yr, in 2017), however again then, the bushes have been practically barren.
The scene I noticed earlier than me this time hearkened again to a postcard I noticed whereas in Hiroshima in 2014, i.e. the episode that had planted the seed of me in the future coming right here. It was nothing wanting enchanting, the type of place you assume can be a fast cease, however the place you find yourself spending half the day.
So far as the opposite half of the day was involved? Properly, I deliberate to spend it driving alongside the Shimanami Kaido, a biking route that spans the Seto Inland Sea, which I’d beforehand biked in late 2023. There have been two issues with my plan, nonetheless.
The primary, after all, was that the sheer period of time I spent at Kintai-kyo (the place I’d must return my rental automobile within the night) left just a few spare hours to play with. This was additional lowered attributable to how intently I explored Kousan-ji, arguably the cultural spotlight of your entire Setouchi area.
The second was extra tragic: Imabari, the Shikoku-side terminus of the biking route, was experiencing horrible wildfires, which made the already cloudy scene (I by no means can appear to get a blue sky on this a part of Japan) even murkier as I regarded down on it from the Kiroran Observatory.
In contrast, I’m pleased to report that the sky was clear as a bell searching from Mt. Shiude (on the Shikoku facet of the naikai, albeit 100 km or so east of Imabari) two days later. After all, this was much less attributable to probability and extra as a result of I monitored each the climate and blooming forecasts obsessively, and moved my go to not as soon as however twice because of what they foretold.
Flexibility, not luck, is the important thing to a profitable Japan sakura journey, each when it comes to the flowers themselves and the skies above them.
Arriving the following day within the Samurai village of Hagi, I had the previous locked down, however not the latter. The sky was fully white, in truth, which was tolerable solely due to what a standout vacation spot Hagi (which I’d visited in 2019, however not intently sufficient) is.
And due to a beautiful dialog I had, with an aged passerby named Taiko. “It means stunning lady,” she’d defined playfully, after telling me about her private connection to the states, and asking me about mine to Japan. Seems, we each named the “weeping” shidarezakura as our favourite type of cherry blossom tree.
The solar got here again out the following day, once I was supposed to go instantly to Gunma prefecture, which regardless of being 5 hours away (and that’s by bullet practice), was my subsequent vacation spot.
Nonetheless, the attractive circumstances in Okayama (and an impromptu journey to its Koraku-en backyard, which was frankly rather more spectacular than I bear in mind it to be) let me to renting a automobile last-minute and driving it to Tsuyama Fortress to take pleasure in its 1,000+ cherry bushes, which have been all in full bloom.
By the point I lastly did get to Gunma-ken, the place I’d truly beforehand been simply three months earlier, evening had virtually fallen.
Fortunately, the solar was out in full drive the following day, which noticed me take pleasure in sakura in Tatebayashi, leek (negi) ice cream at a Michi-no-eki outlet in Okabe and daruma dolls on the Takahashi metropolis temple the place they might effectively have originated.
But it wasn’t till the final full day of my journey, a bit additional north in Fukushima prefecture, that I absolutely admire the splendor of cherry blossoms on this a part of Japan. This was as a result of I lastly ticked Hanamiyama, which greater than lives as much as the interpretation of its identify (“flower viewing mountain”), off my bucket checklist.
Climbing round its sprawling sq. footage (mileage, actually) referred to as to thoughts my time at Mt. Yoshino, in Nara prefecture, in 2021.
However surprisingly, this expertise was superior, each due to the higher number of flowers (fluorescent plum, peach and kawazu-zakura blossoms, along with pale somei yoshino and yellow rapeseed) and since the snow-capped Azuma Mountains offered a extra dramatic backdrop than the verdant hills of the Kii Peninsula had executed years earlier.
I used to be equally stunned, upon stopping again in Tokyo for a number of hours en path to Narita Airport the following day, to see that bushes in Ueno Park have been nonetheless largely intact, at the very least from a distance. Which was all that mattered, provided that I used to be truly sure for Nezu Shrine and its well-known tsutsuji, aka azaleas.
These flowers have been most likely a number of days shy of full bloom—this was simply as effectively. Considering again to the less-than-warm welcome I’d acquired on the Meguro River two weeks prior (which felt, in each the very best and worst methods, prefer it had taken place two months earlier as an alternative), I’m undecided I might’ve endured one other spherical of peak-season crowd management.
