‘Absolutely stunning’: B.C.’s Lower Mainland celebrates cherry blossoms this season | CBC News
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Pink buds are bursting off branches, as the vivid colours and floral aromas of cherry blossom season bloom throughout Metro Vancouver.
Some cities are now in the midst of preparations for their annual celebrations in honour of the flowers.
The Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival starts its 20th annual tribute to the blooms this Friday while the Richmond Cherry Blossom Festival will be held April 12.
Linda Poole, the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival’s founder and artistic director, said she’s thrilled that after two decades years the festival and cherry blossoms still bring joy to locals and “gets them out and looking up.”
Poole said she got the idea for the festival after returning to Vancouver after a long time.
“I felt that people were just taking the beauty all for granted. They weren’t even noticing it.”
She’s happy people now see the natural beauty and enjoy it beyond just taking a selfie.
She said she loves to see people appreciate the flowers.
She recently got in a cab at Blenheim Street and West First Avenue in Kitsilano, where she said there’s an “incredible display” of blossoms.
She said to the driver, “Look at the cherry blossoms!”
“He [went], ‘What, what?’ And when he did, he almost had a car accident because it blew him away.”
The Vancouver festival includes a number of events, including Blossoms After Dark, which illuminates David Lam Park, and “The Big Picnic,” which hosts a variety of crafts and art activities.
In Richmond, signs are up around Garry Point Park, home to 255 Akebono cherry trees donated by the local Japanese Canadian community, telling visitors to “be kind” to the trees.
Egan Davis, manager of parks operations for the City of Richmond, reminded park-goers to have respect for the trees.
“When you see something beautiful like these cherry trees, the instinct is to want to touch the flowers and pull them down to get a close camera shot, but the wood is brittle and they break really easily,” Davis said.
He praised the park, which he said is one of the best places in the region to see cherry blossoms blooming together.
Richmond’s festival will feature activities including folding origami animals and creatures, Japanese cultural demonstrations, as well as a variety of food trucks and vendors.
Nydia Binos of Vancouver came out to Garry Point Park just for the flowers on Monday.
A self-described nature lover, Binos said the fleeting nature of the pink blossoms is part of life.
“That’s nature. That’s how we have to enjoy nature. Respect and enjoy it.”
Andrea Arnot, director of the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival, suggested blossom seekers head to David Lam Park for “absolutely stunning” blooms or the “amazing old cherry trees at Vanier Park tucked in the back near the Museum of Vancouver.
The festival hosts an online cherry blossom map that shares the locations of cherry blossoms all over Metro Vancouver and beyond.