Saturday, April 26, 2008

Sakura soh

Today Tetsu took me off on a "date" this morning. He's been doing this lately, taking me to places a couple hours away to enjoy the beautiful spring scenery and we realize how many interesting and lovely places are actually quite near to us. In all the years we've lived here we've never gone sightseeing and so now why this sudden activity?

"Well, you've got to show your blog friends something besides cats and dogs, quilts and rice fields so I thought you might take some nice pictures."

Ah, so that's why I've done more jaunting about than usual! Anyway, please enjoy while it lasts (next month gas prices are going up so we'll probably have to curtail our travels a bit.)

This morning's trip was supposed to be a surprise for me until we got lost and I had to start being navigator and follow the map. Just a couple of hours away from us boasts the largest "sakura soh" park on mainland Japan and this week it is in full bloom. I checked Google and sakura soh is called Siebold Primrose or Japanese Primrose in English and it is named sakura soh (cherry blossom grass) because the tiny flowers look like cherry blossoms. The gradations were wonderful and such a carpet of color spread out on the rolling hills. Loads and loads of people coming by the busloads but we got there early enough to find parking and take Choco with us on a long walk. I took at least 20 pictures but I guess they are all about the same so I'll just share a few.

As we walked around it was a bit difficult to stay out of the way of other people trying to snap pictures without walking into their picture (and vice versa I'm sure). I have no qualms at all about asking if someone would like me to take their pictures for them so I was photographer for 3 or 4 people. I offered to take a picture of a family with a little boy and just as they lined up to be snapped the little boy ran off yelling,

"Mommy, mommy! Look! There's a dandelion!"

I thought that was hilarious that with all these millions of sakura soh surrounding him the little boy should be so happy to find a dandelion!






"Even grasses have cherry blossom flowers in Japan, the country of cherry blossoms"

Japanese poet, Issei Kobayashi's haiku about sakura soh.

12 comments:

Tracey in CT said...

The pink fields look so pretty! I was kind of surprised at first by them!

Please tell Tetsu "Thank you for thinking of interesting things for the blog!" Enjoy the adventures with him and keep sharing them :-)

[michele] said...

The sakura soh is just gorgeous! I'm green (pink?) with envy!

Tetsu is such a sweetheart - tell him thank you! :)

Clare said...

Stunning!

Thank Tetsu for thinking of us.

dot said...

How pretty.

DomesticShorthair said...

That's really pretty! I'll have to look up sakura soh to see what the plant looks like. When the tulip fields are in bloom in my state, people are always jockeying for photo-ops, too. Who'd ever think flowers would be so important for pictures?

artfilstitch said...

Thanks so much for sharing your date with all of us! The sakura soh is so beautiful and what a wonderful job that our God did in creating the perfect color and value. Please give Tetsu some hugs for his kindness.
Thanks again,
Liz

jovaliquilts said...

Amazing! Thanks so much for sharing the photos, and thanks to your husband. That's really sweet.

anne bebbington said...

Those swathes of colour are so beautiful - nature is so clever

Shelina said...

Wow - it is absolutely beautiful. Please thank Tetsu for taking us there with you.

I think he must have been worried by the posts you did about your children's antics, and is doing a preemptive strike to gain some brownie points! He's won mine for sure.

Patti said...

Incredible! This must be really mind blowing to see in person. I've never heard of a flower like that. I wonder if we have them over here, and if so what they are called.

Guzzisue said...

WOW!!

Helen said...

Breathtaking!