Aomori Prefecture | Stowaway Travel Writing & Editorial Services

On my second day in Hirosaki, I looked at more cherry blossoms and some non-sakura things in town, and I made a new friend. The city itself isn’t much; it’s a modern Japanese town, clean and neat but not architecturally interesting. I walked back to my Couchsurfing hosts’ home from the castle a couple times, but most of the time I made the two-mile trip on a shuttle bus from the castle’s east gate to the train station’s front doors, a $1 one-way trip set up specially for domestic and international tourists in town for the sakura.

Hello, flowers!

One part of town used to be known for indigo dyes, and some of that work is still done here, so I walked to the indigo shop by the northern castle wall. Everything was a little pricey for me, but I did admire the deep blues and near purples of the dyed cloths. Then I took a side road to the streets behind, which my map claimed were lined with Edo-period samurai houses. I had trouble finding any, but finally stumbled upon one. I found it similar in layout to the Shirotas’ home in Shinrin-koen, set in an elaborate little garden. I apologized to a middle-aged Japanese woman who wanted to get past me on her way out of the house, but when she heard me speak in English, she struck up a conversation.

In the indigo dye shop

The samurai house

Some of the treasures of the house

Thatched roof

Her name was Kazumi, and she wanted to chat with me and show me the town. She lived close to Tokyo, but was visiting a friend here. Her friend was busy during the day, so she was taking in the sakura, although she was disappointed by how few trees were in bloom. She insisted I walk to the other side of the castle with her to look at a certain garden, and I was happy to comply.

The clean, uninteresting streets of the non-castle part of town

Kazumi is married and has one grown child. Her husband travels a lot for business, and he used to take her with him on trips. She’d found it difficult to understand tour guides, and her husband had urged her to learn English, but she’d resisted. Then, twelve years ago, at the age of 49, she decided she wanted to learn, and here she was, a few idioms away from fluency. I was impressed, and once again embarrassed by my pathetic “I find learning languages difficult” excuse for my mono-linguistic ways.

Plum blossoms

The garden she took me to was Fujita Memorial Garden, south of the castle. It was beautifully conceived, another meticulously laid out, peaceful place with a little waterfall and a red bridge (like all the red bridges around the castle) and a koi pond. I could see how it would be glorious in summer. Kazumi told me about the different plants I was seeing, including the plum trees in bloom. Usually, the plum trees bloom in early March, before the cherry trees, but because it’s colder than usual this spring, some plum trees were still in bloom while the cherry trees were just peeking out. The plum blossoms were a bright and beautiful pink, a lovely contrast to the white and pale pink of the cherry trees.

Following Kazumi, who set a fairly brisk pace

Following Kazumi through Fujita Memorial Garden. Kazumi set a fairly brisk pace.

One of the many plants Kazumi identified for me. I can’t remember its name, but I know it’s a mountain flower native to Japan.

The castle grounds and surrounding areas were dotted with signs like this. Apparently, there’s a popular TV melodrama with scenes set here, and the signs showed exactly where they were, so you could re-enact them or just point excitedly.

After we’d walked around the garden, Kazumi treated me to tea. We went to the little tea room overlooking a large weeping cherry tree and sat at a table laid with a white tablecloth. Kazumi ordered for us both: apple tea and an apple tart each. Hirosaki produces a lot of Fuji apples, and it becomes a tourist destination again in autumn, when apples are in season (and again in winter, when the nearby mountain is taken over by skiers and snowboarders). There was a live xylophone concert in the room next door, which we couldn’t see, only hear. We sat in a glassed-off porch, talking quietly about our travels, while a round, ringing sound reverberated throughout the room. It was lovely.

Apple tea & tart

Apples are so important that they’re made into public art

Kazumi was clearly a kind, generous person, but she also had clear ideas of how things should be, and she was eager to share those ideas; she had opinions on almost every arrangement of plants in the garden, and everything she said came with a note of authority. One of the first things she said to me, when we met at the samurai house, was, “This is just a middle or lower class samurai house, not very high.” It might be because she’s rich–she inherited three houses from her mother and her husband bought two more, and she goes to a Thai villa every spring for a vacation. Or it might be a cultural difference that I didn’t pick up from the other Japanese people I met. Either way, I didn’t necessarily agree with her on everything she said, or understand where she was coming from, but it didn’t matter. We were two women, fond of beautiful gardens and meeting new people, sharing tea and apple tarts in a room echoing with music.

Kazumi and me in the tea room

Hanami celebrates the ephemeral nature of life and the beauty of friendship and the natural world, but this year the few people I saw engaging in the custom were also celebrating hardiness and perseverance, whether they meant to or not. Hanami is the Japanese custom of having a picnic with friends under the blooming cherry trees in spring, but it was an especially cold and rainy spring in Hirosaki this year, so I was impressed by the few groups of people I saw laying out plastic sheeting and blankets, bundled as they were in raincoats and scarves.

Celebrating hanami despite the gloomy weather

I wasn’t upholding a national custom or family tradition by visiting Hirosaki for the sakura (cherry blossoms), but I did rearrange my schedule and endure the cold and rain for it. I was as determined as those chilly revelers to admire the beauty of the sakura in weather that did its best to mask it.

Sakura in bloom

Hirosaki is in Aomori Prefecture, the northernmost district on the main island of Japan. It’s 400 miles northwest of Tokyo, and part of my journey there was spent on the Shinkansen (bullet train). As expected, the trains were clean, comfortable, and on time. I covered 400 miles in about 5 hours, including changing trains. I’ll repeat what every American who’s ever traveled this way has likely said: Why aren’t we doing this in the States? They love cars in Japan, too, but they still put money, research, and time into the train infrastructure.

The nearby mountain is popular for winter sports

Anyway, sakura season was already over in most of the country by the time I arrived in Japan in late April, but I’d done my research and I knew that I could still catch the fleeting beauties if I went north. I saw patches of snow on the hills the closer the train got to Hirosaki, the first snow I’d seen since March of the previous year. Except for a few sunny hours the day I arrived, it was cold and rainy the whole three days I was in town, so I went everywhere in my fleece, raincoat, and scarf. It felt like New Zealand all over again.

Snow on the ground, blossoms in the trees

The park provided a couple of backgrounds like this, so you could take your picture with the sakura even if they weren’t actually in bloom.

Part of the appeal of the sakura is the setting, and Japanese towns go all out in creating the right atmosphere. In Hirosaki, it’s easy, because there used to be a castle there. One of the guard towers of the inner castle still remains, and there are some stone foundations and impressions in the grass that show where other parts of the castle used to be. It’s free to cross the moat and enter the outer walls of the castle, and then to cross the inner moat.

Foundations of a guard house in the inner castle grounds

The outer moat

Some concessions for English-language tourists

They only charge to enter the inner castle area and the guard tower. My excellent Couchsurfing hosts told me to save my money on the entrance fee, but I spent the $6 anyway. They were right about the guard tower. Steep stairs, half-hearted displays of samurai weaponry, unimpressive views through tiny windows more suited to the arrows of warriors past than the cameras of today’s tourists. But there was a gigantic weeping cherry tree in the courtyard, more in bloom than most of the non-weeping varieties outside, that I was glad I saw.

View from the guard tower of Hirosaki Castle

Another view from the guard tower

This weeping cherry tree, in front of the inner guard tower, is over 100 years old

The grounds are large, and several paths are lined with food and souvenir vendors. I had a pork bun, a sausage on a stick, a chocolate-dipped banana, and a donut that at first struck me as dry and only vaguely sweet, like communion bread, but about halfway through I realized it was delicious, and I wished I’d bought two! Do with that what you will for metaphors about trying new things, sticking it out, etc.

The donut of metaphors

These fences were actually made of hard plastic–it’s the most convincing fake wood fence I’ve ever seen!

The lamps along the paths were mostly photos of adorable children, like this one. Looks like people could buy the space to show off photos of their kids and support lighting the castle grounds.

Not everyone chose to put their kids’ photos up.

The blossoms were at 10% when I arrived, and maybe 30% when I left (the government issues sakura updates, so you can see what percentage of “open” the blooms are in which areas of the country–that’s how big a deal the sakura and accompanying hanami celebrations are).

My first day in Hirosaki--hardly any blossoms

My first day in Hirosaki–the trees are just starting to bloom

The trees exploded in bloom a few days after I left, but that’s how it goes sometimes. The admiration the Japanese have for the sakura is their perfect, delicate beauty and the fact that such beauty is only on display for a short time every year. Cherish the beauty you see in the world, and accept that it’s ephemeral.

My last day in Hirosaki–more blossoms

One of the serene bridges of the castle grounds

Seeing cherry blossoms hang over a red bridge reflected with a castle tower in placid water was still worth it, even if the blossoms were only barely open, even if rain drizzled down the back of my neck and my toes slowly numbed throughout the day, even if I spent a lot of extra money to travel north just for this rather than stay south. The weather did its best to dampen my spirits and dull the bright white blooms of the cherry trees. Nice try, weather, but the blossoms were still beautiful to behold, and I’m glad I went out of my way to see them.