Working on the Cherry Blossom Festival in Philly gave me a bit of a sense of how serious the beauty of spring is here in Japan… I mean, I knew it was taken a bit more seriously than we do in the US — or at least taken a bit less for granted. Last weekend I went out and about a bit, and at times it really was just breathtaking. Especially in Fukui city, which I never really saw as all that beautiful before.

Hitomi and I went to the Hino river near my house, which is lined with cherry trees. It was just the right time to go — they were all in bloom. Next week would’ve been too late, I think. The river is a very pretty place to relax, with nice views of the bridge and the nearby mountains. That big one you can see is Hino-san, from which the Hino river gets its name (I can only assume…).

At night we went to Hitomi’s elementary school in rural Imadate. Apparently, this is the oldest cherry tree in Imadate, and probably in a bit larger radius than that. It’s absolutely huge and has a gorgeous shape to it. Unfortunately the camera had trouble capturing the beauty of the entire tree in the middle of the night, but you can get a good view of the underside of it here:

The biggest surprise for me by far was Fukui. I went there yesterday to meet Minako and really got lucky seeing all the cherry trees in town. (Actually, I didn’t see all of them — I didn’t even see the most famous ones, as it was pouring rain and I wasn’t able to travel across town. However, what I did see was breathtaking.) I went to this shrine with Minako to see the weeping sakura…

…but I was most impressed with the castle ruins. I’ve mocked Fukui city in the past because of how poorly they seem to have managed their cultural heritage. The city was firebombed in WW2, and instead of rebuilding the ruins, they build ugly cold-war style buildings on top of them that served the same purpose as the original, beautiful, ancient buildings. For example, the center of the government — the castle — was destroyed, and in its place was erected a monumental mud-yellowish brick compound which serves as a government and prefectural office of sorts. It’s hideous and a travesty to the culture of this place… but I digress.

Anyway, the cherry trees around the moat and castle grounds are absolutely gorgeous. Just amazing. And I think I was actually lucky to see them in the rain, as the raindrops turned the normally vomit-greenish moat into a beautiful, cool aquamarine with no reflections of the ugly buildings surrounding the castle foundation. Even more, I was totally shocked to see that, this being the 400th anniversary of the building of Fukui castle, a castle bridge had recently been rebuild. Not only is it just plain awesome on its own to see castle buildings, but to see them brand-spanking-new, just off the presses so to speak, is something special. The wood smelled so beautiful, and looked so squeaky clean I thought it was plastic from afar. The old wood buildings in Japan are generally so dark with age that they look near-black. They’re still beautiful, of course, but seeing a place like this makes you really think how majestic these giant buildings must have looked when they were brand new way back when…

So amazing! Anyway, I hope that they find the sense to tear down the crapfest built on top of the ruins and rebuilt the whole thing. That is one spectacular location for a castle.

Finally, on my way home I made a nice blunder… I made it to the station 1 minute late, and I was in a rush to get home, so rather than wait an hour and a half for the next local train, I paid a bit more money and took the express. Woops! I should have taken the Limited Express! So, instead of taking a 10 minute ride to Takefu, I took a 2 hour ride to Kyoto, waited for the next train home, and took a 2 hour ride back. So much for saving time… UGH!