Plum Blossoms in Japan
Mito City and Kairakuen Park
With the conclusion of our Australian Great Barrier Reef road trip, Yuki and I returned to Japan. It seems that we cannot get enough of Japan and we’d like to one day call it our homeland. This would be our third trip to Japan since we began our world tour, and would add another 90 days to our trip.
We spent our first week in Tokyo near Ueno station, but Yuki got sick so we didn’t do very much. With spring just around the corner, the flowers were beginning to bloom and the first to bloom were the “ume”, or plum, blossoms.
Yushima Tenmangu Shrine is well known for its plum blossoms, but we were a little too early in the year so I only got a picture of a nice covered bridge.
On the next week, we took the train to Mito. We seemed to have forgotten but Mito is home to Kairakuen Park, one of Japan’s three finest landscape gardens. The other two are Korakuen, which we got up at dawn to see last spring, and Kenrokuen, which we saw with Yuki’s parents last summer.
Unlike the other two gardens, Kairakuen has always been a public park and is free to enter. Kairakuen means “park to be enjoyed together”.
The park is famous for having over three thousand plum blossom trees, — and we arrived at the best time.
Several paths meander through the plum blossoms; benches are strategically placed in front of significant trees (which are those that are either especially pretty or unique). Together, the white, pink and red blossoms make for an impressive sight.
The park is edged by a small bamboo groove and an area of cedar trees that border a stream.
One of the highlights to the park was the Kobuntei House, which we paid to enter. It is a historic three-story wood building that was once the lord’s villa and evacuation centre, in case a fire broke out at the castle.
The house is surrounded by Japanese verandas, which are excellent places to sit and look over the garden because he building is situated on a small rise. I wanted to stay and sit, but we felt bad doing so since there were so many people coming through the building.
The Kairakuen Park extends to the other side of a highway, where there are many more plum blossoms. It makes it seem like the park extends far into the distance.
We found a few areas that were roped off and had tulips growing at the base of the trees. It was a very pretty scene and we ended up returning to the garden two more times, partially to eat the delicious plum-flavoured soft-serve ice cream.
Another point of interest in Mito is Kodokan Park. It used to be a school for academic and military arts. It also had nice verandas, but the garden scenes weren’t as attractive as those from Kobuntei House in Kairakuen. Still, we got to see more plum blossoms, which is never a bad thing.
Mito wasn’t a significant stop on our map of Japan, but we’re really glad we visited during the plum blossom season. It was this visit that made us excited to see the sakura (cherry blossoms) in Tokyo.
