Spring Flowers

I find it amazing that there seem to be always things flowering in Japan (at least so far).  In the winter, it was the rose bushes, then the ume, followed by sakura, now all sorts of bushes are starting to flower and there are flowers all over the place - very pretty!  We'll start with this nice tulip picture:

I love this picture! It looks like a painting!

Last weekend, I went to Meijo park (by the Nagoya castle) while biking around.  I found that there is a large tulip garden and they were blooming.

 A sea of red:

 There was quite a nice stretch of tulips near the main flower garden building:

 There were also all sorts of flowers planted in the main area by the windmill:

 In the back of the flower building there were more tulips:

 And some other flowers in between:

 Here is a selection:

 Black tulips looks pretty nice:

 Red tulips and small white and yellow flowers:

 Some of the tulips have a crown shape:

 Closeup:

 A lower closeup:

 more closer:

 A lonely flower:

 These tiny black ones were nice too:

Many green bushes throughout the city have new leaves that are red in colour, making them look quite interesting:

 Here is a tree with an interesting shape:

 In the park, just by the water moat that goes around the castle grounds, there were still flowering sakura:

 Closeup:

 small flowers and part of the castle walls:

 Hanging branches:

 In Hisaya-odori, the flowering sakura tree now looks like this:

 There are some nice sakura trees still blooming by OASIS21:

 In Central Park, there were these fish hanging from lines:

 And this beautiful sakura tree:

 Closeup of the flowers:

 This is interesting... it is basically a clock on the ground with flowers inside.  If you watch it closely, you will notice that the red (second) hand is moving.  I assume the others do too :P.

 Another nice sakura in the park:

And finally, I'll leave you with this... maybe a preview of upcoming post since these bushes with these flowers of various colours are all over the campus:

First Sakura Appears

Just wanted to let you know that a few days ago I spotted the first sakura tree blooming on campus.

   It is a white flower.

 The difference between sakura blossoms and ume blossoms is that ume petals are round and sakura ones have a crease in them (like the top of a heart).  Upon closer inspection, this is definitely sakura:

 A cat came to sit under the tree.  The tree was smelling quite nicely.  Cats look the same in Japan :P.

 There are a few sakura trees on campus I hear so this is just the first viewing - more to come!

Umemi - part 2: A Shrine

One day I was biking around the Ozone area and came upon this shrine which was filled with ume trees.  So naturally, I decided to visit.

The entrance torii gate (a nice recognizable characteristic of a Shinto shrine):

I parked my bike in a small car parking area - it was empty.

The white ume blossoms looks very nice:

Closeup:

There were lots of bad fortune papers tied around the tree.  If you get a bad fortune, you tie the fortune paper to leave it at the shrine and not take the bad luck back home.

Some smaller ume trees near the main building:

The main shrine building:

There was a set of cows along the path.

Plus, a lovely pink flower ume tree:

Closeup:

The other side of the main shrine building - you can see prayer boards hanging:

Pink tree against the white trees:

A sea of flowers:

A smaller ume tree with large flowers:

Some ume trees with finer flowers:

There was a place where they sold stuff and one of the things were little figurines that people placed near this cow:

So I bought a little cat.  (beer can only to show scale - did not come with the cat)

Thank you shrine - your trees were lovely!