The cherry blossoms are here and they are nice! This has been a strange year for them. They were predicted to arrive quite early this year, around the beginning of March, but then a cold spell pushed that back, and then they arrived a few days late. Weird. That is speaking of the Yoshino Cherry, which is the most popular kind. The first blooming kind, Kawazu Cherry, bloomed around the end of February and lasted much longer this year than usual.

I snapped a few photos with my wife's smartphone the other day when we were visiting her parent's house. We took a walk around the neighborhood and to a local school, so I'm going to include this in #wednesdaywalk by @tattoodjay.

These are unedited, straight from the phone. I don't think there is enough data put in the photos to really improve them much. Oh well. I just added a border. (And then I realized I forgot to save the version with a border. Go figure.) Next year I'll have to be more prepared with my good camera.

This is a small farming town, but you can see that even here they have enough cherry blossom trees to completely cover over the street. The trees are expensive and Yoshino Cherry only has a lifespan of about 50 years, but in many cities larger companies will donate the trees to the city so the taxpayers are spared. I'm going to guess that's the case here, but I don't know for sure.

The weather has been amazingly good. It is already starting to feel a bit humid. Humidity in Japan in summer is not fun. But humidity won't really kick into high gear until after rainy season around June. Anyway, otherwise it is really nice right now.

Not many people were out. Like I said, it's a small farming community, so I'm sure a lot of people were working. We didn't see anyone else out enjoying the blossoms. There are some more scattered here and there, but this street leading to the elementary school is one of the main places for them.

After we enjoyed the blossoms, we went to the school and let our youngest son fly his plane. My wife's cousin makes these things. He has an entire room of his house dedicated to making various planes and gliders. He gave this one to our son, who has been enjoying it nonstop. My wife took a video here you can watch.

After that, we went back. Our older son was too busy playing with his cousins to enjoy the walk with us, but when we got back we learned he had got to the school to look for us. Luckily it's a small town, so there is no getting lost. We just waited and he wandered back.

Anyway, it was a great day!

❦

David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. He blogs here and at laspina.org. Write him on Twitter or Mastodon.