It’s Cherry Blossom Time in Japan

To celebrate Mother Nature’s spectacular once-a-year cherry blossom ( sakura ) season we welcome the return of our Japanese Sencha Sakura tea. This sweetly perfumed tea is a delicious and satisfying blend of high-quality Japanese Sencha from Shizuoka Prefecture combined with tiny pink dried sakura blossoms.

In step with the fleeting nature of cherry blossoms, our Sencha Sakura tea cheers the transition from one year’s season to the next. Blended only once each year from carefully reserved tea leaves and dried sakura blossoms collected during the previous year’s harvest, the subtle fragrance of these tiny pink cherry blossoms yields a fragrant and alluring cup that is a perfect harbinger of the new season: fresh, vibrant and charmingly sweet.

Springtime in your teacup, sakura-style! Click here to view our Sencha Sakura. http://www.teatrekker.com/shop/sencha-sakura/

Cherry blossoms ( sakura ) are beloved in Japan, and hanami ( flower viewing ) pays homage to the Japanese tradition of appreciating the delicate beauty of flowers. During sakura season families and friends – and people of all ages – venture outdoors to celebrate the return of spring and more specifically, behold the magnificent but fleeting show of cherry blossoms that occurs across many regions in Japan. Hanami has held an annual place of importance for Japanese people since the 8th century in Japan.

Over the course of one month -from late March to May- cherry trees blossom into magnificent displays of pastel color ranging from dark pink to pale, delicate pink, to white-white, and ivory-toned white. Parks and walkways along river banks are especially lovely this time of year. Groups of cherry blossom ‘peepers’ travel in groups from one site to another, knotching as many viewings under their belts as possible.

We sincerely pray that this seasonal time of beauty and natural wonder will help to raise the national spirit in Japan and begin the healing from the devastating events brought on by the recent earthquake and tsunami. The situation in Japan is almost too much to contemplate, but we like to think that just as the delicate sakura blossoms return each spring, so too will the Japanese people will re-emerge from this challenge, strong, determined and with spirit intact.

Sakura season begins in March in southern Japan. The best viewing regions and locations are charted and reported by the media as the spring season progresses into northern Japan.

Below is a chart of approximate bloom time which is from the website http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2011.html. Regions in southern and central Japan that have begun to report sightings of cherry blossoms are listed with a pink blossom and marked with the seasonal starting date.

Location	Opening	Estimated Best Viewing
Tokyo	Opened March 28	April 5 to 13
Kyoto	Opened March 28	April 6 to 14
Kagoshima	Opened March 23	April 1 to 11
Kumamoto	Opened March 21	March 30 to April 10
Fukuoka	Opened March 22	April 2 to 11
Hiroshima	Opened April 1	April 6 to 13
Nara	Opened March 31	April 7 to 14
Osaka	Opened March 31	April 6 to 14
Nagoya	Opened March 27	April 6 to 13
Yokohama	Opened March 30	April 7 to 14
Kanazawa	Opened April 7	April 11 to 19
Matsumoto	April 11	April 16 to 23
Sendai	April 13	April 17 to 24
Kakunodate	April 27	May 2 to 9
Hirosaki	April 25	April 29 to May 6
Hakodate	April 29	May 3 to 10
Sapporo	May 3	May 6 to 13

Sencha Sakura – natural Cherry Blossom Green Tea

Sakura , as they are known in Japan, or cherry blossoms, as they are affectionately called here, are the first harbinger of spring. Each year, legions of  ‘bloom watchers’ eagerly travel to various locations in Japan in the hopes of arriving at just the right time to enjoy a spectacular show of delicate pink and white colors and inhale the soft, subtle fragrance during the annual Cherry Blossom Festival.

In North America, Washington DC, Philadelphia and Vancouver in British Columbia celebrate the flowering of their cherry trees, too, with annual Cherry Blossom Festivals. In 1912 Japan gave our nation’s capital a gift of 3,020 cherry trees, and another 3,800 trees in 1965. These graceful trees signal Washington’s right of spring with an explosion of white and pink color which is avidly witnessed by thousands of visitors from across the nation and around the world.  Each year the peak season of bloom in Washington DC varies with the weather – from mid-March to early April is the window of time.

The very idea of thousands of cherry trees all in blossom all the same time is, for me, the quintessence of spring fever.

To celebrate Mother Nature’s spectacular show, we are introducing our Sencha Sakura tea. This sweetly perfumed tea is a delicious and satisfying blend of green tea – Japanese Sencha - from Shizuoka Prefecture in Japan and tiny pink Sakura blossoms. The subtle fragrance of these tiny pink cherry blossoms makes a fragrant and alluring cup that is a perfect harbinger of the fresh new season.

Our Sencha Sakura tea is, like the cherry blossoms themselves, available for a fleeting time only once a year. Be sure to order now – Sencha Sakura is a lovely gift to tuck inside of an Easter basket for your favorite tea drinker !