Pureboy

Taken April 4- DC cherry trees have a Japanese origin story: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nation...ossom_Festival

NewbieRunner

Lucky you! I was there on 6th April last year and it was too late for sakura though tulips were at their best. Just one or two trees still in blossom.

LapLap

We just missed each other! We were at Showa Kinen Koen last year on the 4th April. As you said, just a couple of the Yoshino trees (there were some handsome shidarezakura-weepingsakura) still in bloom then. We managed to find one that still had a generous amount of candy cotton cover to have our hanami under, but it was nothing like today. The tulips were certainly resplendent though.
We will return to Showa Kinen Koen before we return to London as LapChild made us promise to do so. She didn’t get a chance to play in the amazing kids’ areas as we (understandably, having gone to bed after 1am) took it easy this morning and didn’t get a chance to visit them before Park kicking out time at 4:30pm. Tulips should be incredible then.

Was rather shocked today as we were herded out. There were a group of still teenaged Japanese who were rather the worse for wear having been at the hooch for their own hanami outing. One of them, in a particularly sorry state, managed to land a metre or so right into the tulips, absolutely crushing a great many of them as he fell and and then struggled out from behind the barrier. He at least managed to make it to a toilet before puking his guts out. At least some of his companions appeared to be thoroughly shamed by the incident. It turned out be a life lesson for LapChild though, she was genuinely appalled. I expect it will become one of those “do you remember when....?” incidents as she grows up.

LapLap

Just over a week or so ago I was a bit worried that the Sakura would be over by the time we arrived in Sendai. Turns out that a cold front delayed first bloom considerably.
Saigyo Modoshi no Matsu Park in Matsushima today.
We had a grandstand view of another teachable moment at this very spot. Hanami brings out the very worst in some people, and this time was the turn of a 19 year old boy racing down mountain curves in his brand new jeepish vehicle. Went too tight, too fast and flipped his car over. He was spectacularly lucky, he was fine. Hopefully he has shocked himself into driving more responsibly from now on.

The _Banking_Scot

Hi.

I was delighted by the large amount of blossoms in Shinjuku goyen on friday and around the New otani over the weekend

regards

tbs

LapLap

Absolutely perfect today in central Matsushima and at Shimogamo shrine.

shuigao

Do any of you have experience with older infants (say ~7mths old) w.r.t. risk of hay fever during Sakura season?

Just wondering if it's like a huge risk or a small one ...

abmj-jr

I suspect LapLap will have some answers for you on that but I can say that there are times during the spring when the pollen falls like snow - at times, heavy snow.

LapLap

Luckily for us we are unaffected by any of the tree pollens.
It would depend on what exactly the kids are allergic to. Plenty of red rim eyed people around sniffing and sneezing, so it’s a significant enough problem for a number of people.

shuigao

I take it that there's pretty much no way to know if they will be affected until after actually landing in Japan? We're based in SG so we don't have any pollen season ...

PAX_fips

Even if there are loaths of pollen.. hay fever is typically specific to certain kinds of. E.g. one could be suspectible for Oak and Maple; would be totally fine with Cherry. Also regional differences are possible; so in short it's not foreseeable.

Just watch your kids and if they're showing symptoms leave the park/area.