Have you ever seen five million of one thing? I don’t think I have, at least not until Monday. In a far suburb of Tokyo there is a park planted with five million red spider lily plants. Latin name Lycoris radiata, in Japanese they are called higanbana 彼岸花。
Here’s a map of the park:
In the swoop of the river there is a lovely park, with cherry trees and maples trees and all the lilies. The little town is very organized. When we got off the train there was signage galore:
We had taken the subway, a train and then another train, and we had directions for the walk to the park. As it turns out the directions were not needed – everyone on the train was going where we were and there were banners the whole way along. The matsuri (festival) had been extended by a week as the flowers were still blooming. In many areas the were past their peak, but there were still lots to see. They were set up for a lot of people – the expectation was that some 200,000 would come during the festival. We were fortunate as it was not a madhouse.
The plants are quite tall – about 2feet or so. They don’t have the usual lily smell – not like Easter lilies or Stargazers. That would be rather much multiplied by the millions.
There was an assortment of vendors of both food and agricultural products. I may have had the best karaage ever – deep fried chicken so good!! And mango sorbet.
Wilf tracked down an online nursery and just before we came to Japan a box of red spider lily bulbs was delivered to our house. They have been planted and we are hopeful that we will have blooms next fall. Not a display like this, but something beautiful to enjoy in the fall and remember the drifts of lilies under the trees.
Where I'm At 