PHOTO SPOT GUIDE
Iwai Weir — Kawazu Cherries Ringing a Field of Yellow
Asahi, in Chiba. Deep in the countryside, where every trace of the city has fallen away, there is a colour that belongs to early spring alone. A whole field of yellow rape flowers, and around it, in a ring, the deep pink of Kawazu cherries. Beyond them, hills of evergreen broadleaf. I stood there unable to move on: I had not known the country spring held this much colour.
Yellow and pink, side by side
After walking several of Tokyo's riverbanks in pursuit of the Kawazu cherry, I made for Iwai Weir in Asahi, Chiba. When I got out of the car, every trace of the city was gone. What had taken its place was a whole field of yellow rape flowers — and around that yellow, ringing it, the deep pink of Kawazu cherries in bloom.
Deep pink and soft yellow. Two colours that would ordinarily quarrel, yet under the pale light of early spring they balance one another quite calmly. Behind them the evergreen hills hold their green low and heavy, and it is that darkness which lets the two colours in front stand up so vividly. I was surprised at how much colour the country spring holds. In the city, a cherry tree means something because it flowered early. Here, the tree is only complete when it blooms together with the rape flowers. The same Kawazu cherry, in an entirely different role.
The early-spring countryside, taken wide
I am always looking for the density that comes when a subject fills the frame. Here it was easy. Crouch down close to the rape flowers and the lower half of the frame fills with yellow. Send the eye on into the distance and there is a pink band of blossom, and above it the hills. Three layers stacking themselves, without any help from me. It felt like cutting out the very moment spring arrives in the Japanese countryside.
Cherry blossom rings the yellow of the field.
The country spring is full of colour.
Planning your visit — season
A country bloom that lasts a little longer than the Kawazu cherries of the city.
The city of Asahi gives late February to mid-March as the usual season for the Kawazu cherries and rape flowers at Iwai Weir. The city's own newsletter has described the scene as well: the Kawazu cherries and rape flowers had come into their best, a vivid contrast of pink and yellow spread across the whole field, and visitors were walking and taking photographs to mark the occasion, enjoying the arrival of spring. Blooming shifts from year to year, so please check the latest conditions before you set out. Flowering updates are posted on the Instagram account of the Asahi City Tourism and Products Association.
One thing the city of Asahi asks of visitors to Iwai Weir: there is a reservoir pond nearby, so please take great care, and if you have small children with you do not let them out of your sight — and never, under any circumstances, enter the pond. Entering the rape flower field, and picking the flowers or branches, are forbidden as well. That expanse of yellow is something somebody has taken trouble to grow. Please look at it quietly, from outside the field paths.
Getting there
The address given by the city of Asahi is 120 Iwai, Asahi. For access, it lists about five minutes on foot from the Iwai-Fudoshita stop on the Unakami route of the Asahi community bus. The city's guidance says nothing about parking or toilets, so if you are driving it is safest to ask the city's Commerce and Tourism Division, or the Asahi City Tourism and Products Association, in advance.
Tips for photographers
Contrast of colour is the subject here, so make certain the pink and the yellow sit next to one another in the frame. Let them separate and you are left with a photograph of cherry blossom and a photograph of rape flowers. Set up low and wide with plenty of the near rape flowers in shot, and the lower half of the frame fills with yellow while the band of blossom behind it floats clear.
The Kawazu cherry is a deep-coloured flower, and it loses the gradation in its petals easily if you photograph it bright. Hold the exposure down a little and that deep pink stays instead of washing out. Rape flowers do the opposite — drop them too dark and the yellow goes muddy — so decide which of the two colours you are serving before you set the exposure, and the frame comes together. The soft light of an overcast day renders both colours most honestly of all.
While you're in the area
The same Kawazu cherry wears an entirely different face by a river and out in the country. Back in Tokyo, the waterside of the Kyu-Nakagawa gives you blossom and the Skytree reflected in a February river, and at Tobu Bridge in Oshiage the deep pink flowers at the foot of the tower. The city cherry and the country cherry. See one season in two places and you begin to understand how much range this flower has. If you are exploring Boso further, Murakami Ryokuchi Park, where red spider lilies fill the floor of a coppice wood, is another place worth visiting in a different season.
Kawazu cherries ringing the yellow of a rape flower field — the moment spring arrives in the Japanese countryside. We deliver this photograph as a silver-halide print on FUJICOLOR's finest photographic paper, shipped worldwide.
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