Hokudai campus hanami

Oh boy, do I have pictures to share! Brace yourself, posts are coming!

Last weekend, we spent Saturday afternoon at a hanami party at the university. Kevin's department had a BBQ between the wings of their lab under two amazingly gorgeous cherry trees. 

The variety in the pictures before were called Somei Yoshino and are the early variety. The ones blooming now are the later variety Yaezakura. Personally, I find this latter variety more beautiful since the blooms are layered like roses and the color is more intense. To read more about cherry blossoms and varieties, click here.

We were told Sapporo and Hokkaido isn't the best for cherry blossoms and I guess, maybe compared to other more famous Japanese cities it's true, but I have NOT been disappointed and it's been a beautiful season to experience!

We left the hanami party, to run some errands and enjoy the weather. We stopped at this little pond on the campus for some pictures. 

 This avenue is pretty famous. At least if you google Hokkaido University it pops up. ;)

The campus and this road runs through town so lots of bike traffic coming and going.

Something unexpected and beautiful we've seen has been the Japanese maples in violent shades of crimson red.

Apparently some varieties open their leaves in this color instead of an ordinary green, then turn green for summer, then red again in fall. 

I can only imagine the beauty of fall here!

 

There was this massive weeping cherry tree on the campus too!

Amazing!

 

One of our neighbors shared her hanami experience with us. She rode her bike 300km to Hakodate in Southern Hokkaido and back. Hakodate is a coastal town famed for it's giant fortress and cherry blossoms. But she said, the variety of trees there aren't appealing to her because they look like "kaeru tamago" or frog eggs. What has been seen, cannot be unseen!

 

And yeah, I'm the person who stops in the middle of a sidewalk to crouch for a flower picture. You're not? ;)

Next: Mother's Day: Japan edition

Failed Hiraoka-koen adventure

Kevin had a 4 day weekend in honor of Golden week so we enjoyed lots of outside time this weekend. We puttered around our own little park here and enjoyed each other's company.

 The cherry blossom at our local Seishin riverside park had faded in the winds we had one night.. unfortunately. These were still hanging on though! :)

And there are some trees yet to bloom! Yay!

Tuesday, we set out to find Hiraoka koen/park. It's a trek when we googled it but walking has never scared us so off we set to the closest subway station and beyond. We had Kevin's map app to keep us on course...and we walked. 

Along the way, the flowers we passed were lovely. :)

 

Ok, so I really love daffodils and tulips! :)

Long story short, we got caught in this lovely whipping wind and rain storm. (note how far Mt Moiwa is, we were on the south side of it again...but faaaar)

 

Out of the blue, we found a little children's clothing store to wait out the rain in. Yay! Shopping! :) I could have bought the whole store but we only picked up a couple shirts for Elisabeth. 

Then we kept walking along our supposed route.. stopped and picked up lunch... kept walking... started wondering how far this park really is... sinking feeling we might be lost... omg where are we? ...well we might as well see what's out here... ok, there's seriously nothing out here anymore, just greenhouses and hills... uh oh. 

So yeah, long story short, we walked all together 4 hours that day, didn't find our park and missed it several kilometers in the wrong direction. OOOPS.

We ended up at a 711 and asked the cashier if she could call us a taxi (using our phrasebook since no one speaks English here) and then took a taxi to the subway station we came from. It was a 6 hour trek that day and we were exhausted by the time we came home. And bummed we missed our ume experience. 

Oh well. Perhaps next weekend. Bahahahhahhahahaha....

Maruyama Park Hanami

We did our little hanami adventure last Saturday at the famous Maruyama park here in Sapporo.

We knew it'd be a busy park since it's known as one of the better parks for cherry blossom and plum viewing... however, the packed subway train and station gave us a better idea of just how busy... and obviously, we got there and this is what we saw:

Under the assorted and sporadic cherry trees lots of people enjoy their Japanese BBQ. Lots of smoke hanging in the air... and I'm sure you can imagine how delicious it smelt!

It was mainly young people and reminded me of some Finnish celebrations like May Day and Midsummer (juhannus).

We found a spot on the outskirts but close to a big cherry tree and made camp. Kevin made onigiri (rice balls) the night before, so we had lunch and Kevin's friend brought sake that they enjoyed together. It was really nice to people watch and enjoy the action! 

This group above were sitting under the tree we were admiring and cooking yakisoba on their grill. A (news) camera crew ended up coming over and interviewing them and filmed them for a while. 

 

As with any party, there are always (uninvited) onlookers trying to get in on the celebration. ;)

After we ate and drank a little, we went on to the "festival" bit of the park and the shrine. Lots of yummy food vendors!

 

We found the cherry/pllum tree part of the park! 

 

Right before we found our second spot to camp out (this time under the trees in a much better location!), Muffin fell asleep :)

 

The blooms were so intense. It felt like every square inch in your view was covered! 

 

Lots of entertaining people out and about amongst the crowds. Like the bear. :)

We also saw a woman in kimono with a Japanese guitar playing and singing for groups of people. 

 

Kevin and his friends drinking sake and laughing about catching falling petals in their cups. Apparently, it's a thing you do. The petals falling in the breeze is amazingly beautiful by the way!

 

We sat right under where a pink tree met a white one. ♥

 

What a glorious day.

Glorious experience.

Something I'll never forget. :)

 

Sakura and Ume

Sakura = cherry blossoms

Ume = plum, or Japanese apricot

Unbeatable beauty. Like the magnolias, deserving of their own post. Be still my beating heart! 

Which one was your favorite? :)