Cherries in Japan

Wendy, now I understand what you thought, Thank you!

★My trip to Kyoto from March 31 to April 2, 2022. Day 2-2(1)

Daigo-ji Temple

It was a perfect day to visit Daigo-ji Temple. It was beautiful day and weeping cherries and Somei-yoshinos were in peak bloom.

Daigo-ji has known as a cherry temple since Toyotomi Hideyoshi had a Hamami Party there in 1598. Now there is a festival which replicate the parade for Hideyoshi’s Hanami Party.

Daigo-ji temple is a World Heritage Site and a very large area. It divided into 2 parts: Kami-daigo, upper Daigo and Shimo-daigo, lower parts. Kami-daigo is a mountain area. You have to walk 60 minutes on the mountain walk to get there. I haven’t visited there yet.

Shimo-daigo is still very large area. Itis famous for weeping cherries. I don’t know any other places which has so many Weeping cherries.
It is divided into 3 paid areas, Reihoukan (museum), Sanboin and Garan (a complex of the temple buildings), and a free area with a restaurant and stalls, and corridors.

There are some weeping cherries at the entrance gate but there are mostly Somei-yoshinos on the corridors.


Main area of the temple is Garan but we visited Reihokan.
Reihokan
Reihokan is a museum. Many large Sidare-zakuras and other single cherries are planted around the museum buildings.




There are some double cherries called Hakusan-O-temari. But they hadn’t started to bloom yet.
Also Yae-beni-shidare hadn't started yet.

 

★My trip to Kyoto from March 31 to April 2, 2022. Day 2-2(2)
Daigo-ji Temple 2
Garan
Garan is the main complex of the temple building. There are many Buddhism architectures scattered in a very wide area with a lot of cherries and other trees.

Garan part starts with the Nio-mon gate. There’s a corridor of Japanese maples inside the Nio-mon gate. It continues more than 100 meters. But they hadn’t started yet. Maples start a little after Somei-yoshinos. When Somei-yoshinos were falling, maples become beautiful with fresh green or red leaves.


Kondo (main temple building) area
You might not be able to see from my pictures but there are so many young weeping cherries in Kondo area and Goju-no-tou(five-story-pagoda) area.
In Daigo-ji, people donate weeping cherries for their wishes.


Seiryu-gu and Goju-no-tou (five-story-pagoda) area
There were some large beautiful shidare-zakuras and many small ones in this area.



Fudo-do, Soshi-do and etc. area


Benten-do and a pond garden area
There aren’t so many cherries in the garden area. It’s more famous for colored leaves in autumn.

There’s a Japanese style café restaurant” Ajariryo Juan” by the pond. We hoped to have lunch there but there were long waiting list. We should have come and booked before we saw Garan area. We gave up and went back to the free area near the entrance.

 

★My trip to Kyoto from March 31 to April 2, 2022. Day 2-2(3)
Daigo-ji (3)

Free Area
When we went back to the free area near the temple gate, all the Bento lunch boxes were sold out. We had snacks like a meat bun or a hot-dog.


Sanboin
Sanboin Temple is a house where the feudal archbishops stayed. The present buildings were built by Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 1598 for his Hanami Party, "Daigo no Hanami". He made the cherry garden using 700 cherries gathered from all over Kinki district.
There were some large Shidare-zakuras blooming near the entrance of the area.



First we went to the garden called Kanjinrin-en at the back left of the site. I have visited there March 23,2019 and posted about the early blooming cherries. (#217)
There sidare-zakuras were blooming beautifully and O-kan-zakuras were finishing, but still showing their colors. We had drinks there.


Then we entered the Sanboin building. At the entrance of the building, there was a small Yae-beni-shidare. Sanboin has beautiful Japanese gardens inside but there’s no cherry tree in the gardens. You can see large pictures of cherries and other plants on the Fusuma doors of the building. (Pictures are not permitted.)


Then we walked the corridor of Somei-yoshinos again to the parking lots and saw a small temple and large Sidare-zakuras.

Cherries in Daigo-ji was unbelievably wonderful on that day, so we decided to come back for the illumination. There’s still time before the illumination started, so we walked back to Daigo station and went back to Kyoto.

There’s wide pedestrian walk between the temple and Daigo Station and cherries are planted both side of the walk. But they are mostly double cherries and hadn’t started blooming yet.

 

Hi Mariko, I thought of your postings when reading this article this morning.

Climate crisis: Kyoto cherry blossom season shifted by global warming and urban development
Did you notice anything different on your visit ?

 

Japanese new school year starts in April. Until 20 years ago, Cherries were full bloom on the Entering School Ceremony Day. Students took pictures under cherry blossom But recently cherries beccame full bloom in March. Sometimes students take photos under cherry blossom on Graduation Ceremony.
I felt cherries were really quick in these 5 years.
You can see the change on the data of Japan Meteorological Agency.

Booming Date
Place 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022
Tokyo 3/28 3/31 3/16 3/25 3/23 3/21 3/21 3/17 3/21 3/14 3/14 3/20
Kyoto 3/28 4/ 3 3/22 3/27 3/27 3/23 3/31 3/22 3/27 3/22 3/16 3/24
Nara 3/31 4/ 3 3/22 3/27 3/27 3/23 4/ 3 3/24 3/29 3/26 3/21 3/25
Full Bloom Date
***** 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 2021 2022
Tokyo 4 /6 4/ 6 3/22 3/30 3/29 3/31 4/ 2 3/24 3/27 3/22 3/22 3/27
Kyoto 4/ 7 4 /9 3/30 4/ 2 4/ 1 4/ 2 4/ 7 3/28 4/ 6 3/30 3/26 3/30
Nara 4/ 8 4/ 9 3/29 4/ 1 3/31 4/ 2 4/ 8 3/29 4/ 5 4/ 3 3/30 3/30

 

So looking at your stats Mariko, in another 30 years they will be flowering in February. And that's if global warming doesn't accelerate faster. Good to hear from people, rather than a press release. Thank you.

 

Sorry, I’m writing so slowly and now it’s time for roses in Tokyo and around.
★My trip to Kyoto from March 31 to April 2, 2022. Day 2-3(1)
Kiyomizu-dera Temple to Maruyama Park and Yasaka Shrine (1)

Kiyomizu-dera Temple is always worth visiting. It is known for its butai, high wooden stage or terrace. It locates halfway up on Mt. Otowa, so you can see the view of the city of Kyoto from there. In the temple cherries were blooming but maple and other greeneries were not yet. It was a few days early for the best time.
There are many shops on the approach slopes to the temple. Now even under COVID-19, people came back to the temple.


Entrance gate and the area of temple buildings near the entrance



Main hall and the views from butai, wooden stage or terrace


Japanese Azaleas were blooming in the woods.


Three-story Pagoda called Koyasu-no-tō and the view from there


The view from the garden in the down in the middle


We enjoyed early spring of Kiyomizu Temple.

 

I'm not quite sure it is because of global warming or climate change of the earth, but I hope to have rather cool spring again and we can enjoy cherries longer. I wish to have cold winter and cool spring next year.
But I'm afraid the war in Ukraine cause not only tragedy to the people but worsen global warming.

 

★My trip to Kyoto from March 31 to April 2, 2022. Day 2-3(2)
Kiyomizu-dera Temple to Maruyama Park and Yasaka Shrine (2)

After we enjoyed cherries in Kiyomizu-dera, we didn’t go back to the bas stop we came and we walked San’nen-zaka slope, Ninen-zaka slope, Nene-no-michi to Maruyama Park and Yasaka shrine.
San’nen-zaka slope


Nene-no-michi means "Nene’s Path". Somei-yoshinos were planted on the one side of the road. Nene is the wife of Toyotomi Hideyoshi who had Daigo-no Hanami in 1598. After his death, she came to live near Kodai-ji Temple (I visited there in 2013 and posted) and commuted there to pray for her husband’s soul. So now the road there is called Nene-no michi.


Maruyama Park is known for cherries. There are more than 700 cherries in the park. There are large shidare-zakuras
there.


But Shidare-zakura called Gion-shidare is the most famous one. It was about 80 years old and a famous cherry gardener, Sano Toemon is taking care of it. He is 94 years old now.


It’s much better shape than I saw in 2013. It was wrong condition at that time because of droppings of crows. I think it’s the reason why they were burning bonfires around the tree.
2013


Then we went through Yasaka Shrine. But there aren’t many cherries.


We took a bus and a train to Daigo city.

 

First Posting of 2023

I’m sorry I didn’t post anything this year. I’m so disappointed and became lazy because when I realized that cherry blog stated again, my cherry season this year had already finished.

This year cherries bloomed very quickly almost all over Japan and now cherries are still blooming only in Hokkaido, the northern island.

Cherry Blossom Forecast 2023

In Tokyo, Somei-yoshinos started blooming on March 14, tie records as 2020 and 2021 and they were in full bloom from March 22 to March 28. We had very warm Mach all over Japan. Not only in Tokyo but even in suburbs and countryside Somei-yoshinos bloomed almost together and even in Tohoku, the notth part of main island and Nagano, the middle part with higher altitude, they started blooming at the end of March for the first time.

Now cherries are blooming only in Hokkaido.

I was working until the end of March, so I couldn’t enjoy cherries in Tokyo this year. But still I saw good cherries in Chiba prefecture, Kyoto and Hirosaki, in Aomori prefecture. I’ll write about them later.


But now I post the site of Japan Guide,　“Top 10 Cherry Blossom site in Kyoto”. I don’t agree with their choice, but I still think you can enjoy this site.

 

Maybe not your choice of order Mariko, but I enjoyed them very much indeed. So a big thanks for posting.

 

@eteinindia, Mariko, thanks for checking in! And thanks for recording here this year's early blooming season, and the japan-guide link.

 

First Posting of 2024

Blooming of Somei-yoshino in Tokyo

On March 29, 2024, Meteorological Agency finally declared the blooming of the sample tree of Somei-yoshino in Yasukuni Shrine. They said that 11 flowers were opened in the afternoon of March 29,2024. It is 5 days later than the average and 15 days later than last year. It is also the slowest bloom in decade.

We had a very very warm winter this year. It was too warm for dormancy breaking. Then from the beginning of March, rather clod weather came. The addition of the highest temperature from February 1 went over 600 degrees on March 18, 2024, but Somei-yoshino didn’t bloom more 10 days.

★Cherry Blossom Forecast 2024 by Weather Map


★Cherry Blossom Forecast 2024 by Japan-guide.com


My extremely busy job finished yesterday. Today I visited Koishikawa Botanical Garden after one and a half month. There weren’t many flowers blooming like usual spring. Warm winter weather made the early blooming cherries like Kan-zakura, Kawazu-zakura and O-Kamakura bloomed earlier than usual. Mume also bloomed as usual. So now Koishikawa Botanical Garden has flowerless spring yet.

Shidare-zakura in the woods was full bloom. Unknown red tall cherry was blooming.

O-Kan-zakuea and Hayazaki-Oshima finished and green leaves started.

Garden was very quiet and I saw some white birds.
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