I spent the long weekend for Coming of Age Day (成年の日) in January in Osaka, then spent a day in Wakayama with a friend from school who works there now. While my town was buried in snow, Wakayama was pleasantly warm.
We drove by dozens of mikan groves to get to Shirasaki (白崎), the white cliffs on the southern sea.
Apparently Shirasaki is the subject of many Japanese poems, and one can see why. The views are breathtaking, and the entire landscape changes with the passing of clouds.
Under the clouds
And with the sun out.
Despite the sunny day, the winds were quite harsh near the sea.
Not too far from Shirasaki, we parked the car near a cliff-side bursting with narcissus flowers.
The narcissus is a daffodil-like flower that blooms from December to February.
If you know your birth flowers (like birth stones), the narcissus is December’s flower–and therefore mine, as well. Having never seen one before, I felt a kind of affinity with this flower that blooms in the midst of winter.
Roots stronger than the wind
The flower that blooms in winter
Welcomes the spring
冬の花
風より強い
春に向く
WOW at Shirasaki. How beautiful!
And I was wondering what those flowers were! I noticed some today, blooming where a JET who used to live here had a garden and where I have my compost bin.
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There are places south of my prefecture that have narcissus fields, but we’ve been buried in snow up here for a month up here. They’re called スイセン in Japanese.
Shirasaki and Wakayama are gorgeous–I definitely recommend checking them out! I also went to Kouya-san on the trip.
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[…] seeing Shirasaki, my friend drove us to Kôya-san (高野山) in […]
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[…] blossoms lies in their fleeting, delicate nature, but I prefer the plum blossom for its relative hardiness, brighter coloration, and intoxicating fragrance. They survive Kanazawa’s rainstorms and snow […]
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[…] still something mocking about it. The area may not be as poetic as the gleaming coast of Shirasaki, but there’s a mysterious beauty to the […]
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