Aomori

Aomori is the northernmost capital city on Honshu, Japan's main island. The port derives much of its beauty from the nearby Hakkoda Mountains and the area's apple orchards and cherry blossoms.

Our tour took us south to the city of Hirosaki, which is one of the most dramatic places to see the cherry blossoms at this time of year. We began with a brief tour of the Hirosaki Neputa-no-Yakata Museum. Each August, the people of Hirosaki have a festival during which 60 or more large lanterns are paraded down the street. We saw a few.

Musicians also played traditional Japanese music for us on a three-stringed instrument.

 Because the cherry blossoms only last for a few days, there are typically huge crowds that gather in Hirosaki to see them. I had seen the cherry blossoms in Washington, DC around the tidal basin, mall, and various of our monuments there. My understanding is that those trees were a gift from the people of Japan many years ago. The crowds reminded me of a football weekend near the University of Iowa campus.

The ancient Hirosaki Castle is surrounded by a beautiful park filled with cherry trees and other flowering plants.

We were standing here in front of Japan's oldest Somei Yoshino cherry tree (the light pink species)--one that dates back to 1882.

All of our Japanese tour guides have been delightful. Most speak English quite well. We liked the extra stories or information they shared with us during our drives to/from attractions.

This is the castle, of course, and you will note a different species of cherry trees here.

I feel like this is the best scenic shot I got. The mountain in the background has a similarity to Mt. Fuji, though it is not that mountain. This region of Japan gets more snow than almost anywhere else on earth each winter, and lots of it still adorned the mountains we saw.

Thought not the same musicians we saw earlier, who did not permit us to make videos, these two gentlemen were playing in the park.

I like my new iPhone X's portrait mode for photos. Here is an example of why I think that.

After I took this picture, I told M&M that they looked like the Blues Brothers.

Here is what all the fuss is about. An absolutely gorgeous place to visit--surely one of the top few highlights of our trip to Japan so far.