20260219_Japans_Cherry_Blossoms_Start_in_February_HERE_cAmJxKw-vjo

00:00:01 John Daub: Welcome to the city of Kazu, the town of Kawazu. It's not a big place, but we're here in Shizoka Prefecture on Izu Peninsula. This festival starts, the Japanese Cherry Blossom Festival. Believe it or not. I think a lot of you are maybe wondering why not in March or even April. February is when this variety of cherry blossom—listen to the birds.

00:00:38 John Daub: This is so special. Spring, I love it. We're gonna explore all around Kawazu in this live stream, and I'm going to take you in in this particular area. I'll show you the map where we are, but yeah, it's. It's a pretty incredible feeling. I haven't been here in a very long time. I'm really enjoying my trip so far.

00:01:10 John Daub: I've been here for about an hour, and without further ado, let's go and explore. This is where we are. In the map, you can see Tokyo is about three hours away by car. Once you get on the peninsula, the traffic moves a lot slower. There's no real highways on this part. But there's Kawazu, not kind of south of Atami.

00:01:43 John Daub: And this city very, very famous for the kawazu zakura. The reason why it was, I want to say, invented, it was found here in 1955. Just a resident was walking along, found this sprout on the ground. He took it into his garden and it turned into be a hybrid naturally that had occurred, creating this variety of cherry blossom, which is the emoji.

00:02:19 John Daub: It follows the Kawazu river quite a long ways. So the older, the biggest kawazu trees are going to be here. Because this is where this variety was found, I want to say invented, but it wasn't. It was like naturally occurring, which is such a cool story. And the great thing about the Kawazuzakura is this cherry blossom blooms throughout February, not March or April, which is surprising to so many people.

00:03:01 John Daub: How you doing? It's nice to see everybody here. Welcome aboard. I'll turn on the live stream here in a second, but let's take a look at some of these. What makes this cherry blossom very different than the white some Yoshino, which covers the entire of Japan. That's the one that comes out In March, around March 20th, they're saying in Tokyo.

00:03:36 John Daub: But like, once again, three hours from Tokyo, it looks like this, And there aren't really a lot of crowds here. Let's go. Let's go walk through here. We've got a pretty good signal. There really aren't a lot of crowds here. Not at least not yet. It's still kind of early in the morning, but you can see the Kawazu river on the left side there.

00:04:12 John Daub: Beautiful red bridge right here. We're gonna walk over there. There's street food all over the place. They certainly don't attract as many tourists as some of the bigger cherry blossom festivals. But this probably should. I also really love this color. This one hybrid between two different cherry blossom varieties that are well known.

00:04:47 John Daub: I can't remember what it is off the top of my head, but it creates a pink color which I think a lot of you know as the cherry blossom. That is the emoji on every smartphone. That's a pretty shot through the ones right in front of us too. Look at that.

00:05:17 John Daub: So I can focus the— these ones close by a little bit too close. I. I'm probably going to say the sakura mochi is my favorite Sakura food. Just. It has this nostalgic smell that I've known throughout my entire history in Japan. You smell sakura mochi. You just know that's Sakura mochi. Dango is also really good.

00:05:48 John Daub: The ice cream looks like they have some cherry blossom ice cream over there. So that might be worth going and checking out. I'm also trying to film a main channel episode. I'll see how it goes. Look at that. That's got to be cherry blossom ice cream, right? A lot of chocolate, bananas and frankfurters. Anything you can put on a stick.

00:06:20 John Daub: I gotta walk a long ways to really see all of the Kawazuzakura in this area. By the way, I drove here. It's about a three hour drive from Tokyo. I left at five in the morning. I got here at eight. Wow. It's so cool that the cherry blossom season has started.

00:06:50 John Daub: Look at that. So the festival officially starts time wise at— I mean nature is nature, right? But the festival officially starts at 9am that's when the food stands start to open up. So we've been looking at the nature. Look at that. That's. I was so happy to be outside of Tokyo. I'm so happy to be outside of Tokyo. This is great.

00:07:23 John Daub: Getting away from the city before the Tokyo Marathon as well, kind of reset a little bit here. Let's take a look at some of the street food. I want to show you the stands here. Here's— look at the— this one has some dango here. That's mochi. Look at steaming hot.

00:07:53 John Daub: Thank you. Let's see. Maybe we'll get some street food here. I'm kind of getting hungry. We're building up into it for sure. Let's see what they got. Sakura agapan. Deep fried sakura agipan. What is that? What is that? It's deep fried bread with sakura flavored— I guess they just put some kind of a powder on there.

00:08:26 John Daub: There's a lot of like curious stuff. It makes me really want to break my strict diet for the marathon and try it. Of course, you have to have skewered beef and all sorts of other meats. Oh, here it is. This one is very famous in the area too. This is the sakura taiyaki. Do you see that there?

00:08:57 John Daub: The sakura taiyaki. Sorry, there's a— the guy was driving here. So this is the sakura taiyaki with the cherry blossom sound. That's what sakura means in Japanese there. It's pink. They probably put some food coloring in there. Could be some dye. I don't know. But yeah, 100%. I'm gonna be trying that one.

00:09:29 John Daub: Wow. I had no idea how big this— the street food goes all the way down. What? Oh, my goodness. I didn't realize this festival was as big as it is. It's still early too. I'm starting to smell the grilled meat. And it's not even 10am. That's a good sign for all of us here. That's a good sign.

00:09:59 John Daub: All right, let's take a look and see what they got. Just walk down the street here. But I'm getting— I'm guessing this goes towards the train station because I see that the train platform— the train is up there. And I heard a train rolling by. You can— is that the buta kusa? Oh, my God. These are my enemy.

00:10:31 John Daub: These look like buttercups. Anybody put these under their chin when they were kids and make their chin look yellow? Used to have some weird teachers that did that. Look, look. I got yellow chin. Look at that. They're selling vegetables from this area, which is really, really delicious vegetables.

00:11:01 John Daub: You can see there's a lot of residences. This is residential. This is just a town. It's at this time you see the photographers come out and they really try to capture the cherry blossoms. You know what's famous in this area? Wasabi. They even have wasabi ice cream here. Look, this is wasabi country.

00:11:32 John Daub: So they have like a wasabi here as well. Here's Sanma. They're drying the fish here. Right in the front. Wow. Coming from the river here. Here's some dried fish as well. Look at that. Three for a thousand yen. Juliana, thank you. I can practically smell the foods all the way from Singapore.

00:12:03 John Daub: Absolutely. Here we got some mochi and dango. Oh, it smells so good. It is really, really a nice smell. The sweet sauce of the— and the grilling meat. The sakura, I believe this— this is not the best way to go. I think it's better to stick to the river, but— oh, here we go. And you have an omiyage shop that—

00:12:35 John Daub: This is all the package boxes here. I should see if there's something I can get for the Daimyo supporters. This one. This is probably quite famous. This is Anko, the sakura with anko red bean paste in there. You can get these croquet for 93 yen. That's cheap. That's like 50, what, 60 cents or something like that.

00:13:08 John Daub: Yeah. I don't want to go to the train station, so let's— let's swing back to the river here. I'll show you what, what this variety is. So the Soma Yoshino cherry blossoms are white. These are pink. Let's go back. I think the signal is much, much better at the riverside, too. This is also very famous for strawberries.

00:13:41 John Daub: I saw so many strawberry farms walking around. But the Somiyoshino are white. These are pink, and they're pink, purple, and they're way, way more vibrant. The thing with the Somayoshino, the white blossoms, it does look like snow. This definitely does not look like snow. And they're more flat, floral looking.

00:14:13 John Daub: Right. This— you don't see this variety when you come in March. But the great thing about the— this variety is that it blooms throughout the entire month of February. They'll start coming around, like February 6th or 7th, and they stick around for a long time, a lot longer than they do in March.

00:14:44 John Daub: February isn't as windy as March. It's cold, it's colder. Most of the time in February, there's still snow coming down. And that's another thing. If you do get this— this cherry blossom with the snow falling, it is really beautiful. All right. I probably should have stuck to the river. Let's go back to the river.

00:15:16 John Daub: All right. Signal should be stronger again. I don't know. When you go and going where the people are, the river is where you want to be with this festival. All right, we're back. I'm gonna— I'm gonna go to the— in a van down by the river. Yeah, I know that one. It's one of my favorites. The origin tree is in this direction.

00:15:50 John Daub: This is the one in 1955. That's why this is such an amazing story. And you heard it here first. So I did some research here. I did some research. Of course I do research. This festival didn't start until, I guess, the 1970s or 80s, around then. So it's a fairly new festival in the sense that this variety of cherry blossom—

00:16:24 John Daub: I mean, it started in 1955, post World War II, 10 years after the war. It's not like this is an ancient cherry blossom. This is a new one. That's why it's named after the city or the town. I found out that you need 50,000 people according to Japan's laws to be considered a city. And once you become a city, you can't un—

00:16:57 John Daub: Become a city, even with a declining population. So the city of Fujiyoshida has 48,000 people, but it used to have over 50,000. So it— when it was established in the 1950s, it was a city, and it will always be a city. That is some— that is some very interesting information. And this is the Kawazuzakura again.

00:17:29 John Daub: It's so much more beautiful, in my view. This is more beautiful than the some Yoshino. There's just something delicate about that really light pink color, that somewhat purplish look to the stem of it. You see, it's just so much more striking than the some Yoshino, but the white— some Yoshino ones, they look like snow, and you have so much more of them.

00:18:06 John Daub: But because this is where the Kawazuzakura is from in the city of Kawazu, of course, there are so many of them and they're so big. The Kawazuzakura that I see are not as big as the ones that I see right here. They're usually, you know, like maybe 20, 15, 20 years old. These are all going back to like the 1970s, 80s, so they've grown quite a bit over the last 40 years.

00:18:44 John Daub: Yeah, that's the— if you use the emoji— that's the one. That's the— that's this. This one. The Kawazuzakura. Let's walk along the river. Yakisoba over there. Restroom over here. Very convenient. Somebody said that the facilities in Japan are not good enough. It's like, what are you talking about?

00:19:15 John Daub: The facilities in Japan are— tell me a country that maybe is better. Singapore. Okay, that's a small country, some incredible people, but it's not that big. The facilities are pretty good in Singapore, but they're pretty good in Japan too. Even in the countryside, we have really clean public restrooms.

00:19:47 John Daub: You have food vending machines every 100 meters. This is no exception. There's a train line that goes by not often. There aren't that many trains. That also makes it difficult at this time. I visited Kawazu nine years ago. Wrightson Kwan. Yes. It's changed just a little bit. The trees are bigger.

00:20:18 John Daub: A lot of street food right there. Oh, there's the sakura taiyaki. In English. All right. We're gonna have to go down and try one. But there's a line. Let's just— okay, let's— let's go see if the signal holds. There's got to be more. It's— let's see what we got here. Gonna pull out 300 yen.

00:20:48 John Daub: I have a— God bless America. Land that I love. Stand beside her and guide her through the night with the light from above. You guys know that song? It's a great one. From the mountains to the prairies to the oceans white with foam. God bless America. 250 years this year. Incredible. It's a handsome man.

00:21:19 John Daub: Looks like I have to wait a little bit. Also, the alm butter is 50 and more, but it's— all of it is pink. Wow. He's got to be good, right? I guess. Now that they put in the uncle red bean paste— now— it's going to take a little while. You can see behind me. Very nice. There's the finished product.

00:21:50 John Daub: Oh, wow. Do you see that? So when we get to Mankai, it gets even pinker. So they keep adding the pink color until you get to Mankai. So when it starts, it's that color. And then maybe February 10th, it's that color. And then February 20th, which is tomorrow, it's that color. That's pretty cool.

00:22:21 John Daub: Do they really do that? The different shades of pink are based on the— on the— the time and how bloomed the cherry blossom. The— right now, I think we're at full bloom, so I believe they got candy over there. Here we go with the uncle. I can smell the cherry blossom. It— that's a lot of azuki booms.

00:22:52 John Daub: You're getting your money's worth. That's overflowing with red bean paste. Oh, that— that— that's a— feels like I should get two. They just flipped it. Look at the heat coming off of it. Sorry. There's a train. Empty. It's coming from Shimoda. It— the gimbal's gone. The gimbal's gone crazy.

00:23:22 John Daub: Okay. All right. We're gonna eat it underneath this— this beautiful tree right here. Look at this. We got to give you the— the full the full experience here. Sakura taiyaki from Kawazu. Another train going by. There it goes. That one was empty, too. All right, this is the— the sakura. I gotta put the—

00:23:54 John Daub: Put the camera down here. Hold on. The great thing about this gimbal is it turns into— oh, there's a bench here, sort of. Hey, this is made for people like me. Let's have a seat, shall we? Wow. What a view. What a view. How are we going to do this here? That's not going to work. It's kind of not the best.

00:24:25 John Daub: Let's just first take a look at the taiyaki here before it starts melting butter everywhere. The great thing with sitting down is I get a chance to take off my gear for a second. All right. You still there? Michael, welcome. All right. Check it out. Look at him eating the butter. That's the way it's supposed to be.

00:24:58 John Daub: He's the same color as the blossoms up here, but I think we're— I think it gets even more pink again. They make this pinker as the blossoms get closer to full bloom. I think we're at full bloom. It's the 19th. Maybe they make it add in some more dye on the 20th. I'm okay. Oh, look at the uncle.

00:25:29 John Daub: This— this fish really gotta go. Look at this. All right. Itadakimasu. Let's try it. Hold on a second. It's still warm. It's still warm. I go tail first, usually, but the butter's in the mouth, so it's a kind of a conundrum. I'm gonna push the butter in. It's melting. Oh, my God. The butter's melting.

00:26:00 John Daub: All right. It's an akimasuh. That's so nice. I'm glad I got the butter, but it is melting fast. Oh, wow. Do you see that? It's mochi. It's mochi in there. Mochi. That's awesome. It's nice and chewy. Well, Leo would love this. Hey, Nightshade. Giggles. Nice to see you here. Hold up. Announcement.

00:26:31 John Daub: This is really good. I think the butter— I think you got to go— butter. Nicolette. 6460 writes in here. Thank you for the live stream, John. Have a lovely week, everyone. Thank you so much. This is brought to you by all everyone who's supporting with the— the channel. I'm really grateful.

00:27:01 John Daub: We'll see what else we can find. Our cherry blossoms always pink. No, Ray, wait. Thanks for joining. This is called the Kawazu Zakura. Just to sum up, for those that are joining us, I'll show you where we are on the map one last time. Hey, Ellis. I promised you and David I would bring you out here.

00:27:32 John Daub: Here's the Tokyo's number one runner, man. Maybe Glico will put up a billboard like you of you, like the one Osaka. I hope not. So we're about three hours from Tokyo. I got up at 5am to get out here. This is the Kwazi River. I haven't been here in decades. I went by here last year when I went to Shimoda for the John Manjiro episode.

00:28:06 John Daub: And I said, gosh, I wish I could stop, but the trains are very infrequent. That's why I brought a rent a car this time. Michael Sasana is in the house too. Thank you. Mahalo, Michael. The Kawazi River. Along here, this variety of cherry blossom is blooming in February. Not March, not April, but February.

00:28:38 John Daub: That's the beauty of the Kawazuzakura. This is the first cherry blossom festival in Japan. Now it follows the river. There are hundreds and hundreds, maybe even thousands and thousands. Now mind you, the Umay blossoms are blooming in Mitong and in Tokyo. There's a beautiful spot near Ueno, which I go to quite a lot.

00:29:11 John Daub: Well, I got butter hands. Anyone ever shaved with butter? After seeing Seinfeld, I always wondered what other applications butter could be used. It's a natural lubricant. And now it's on my shirt. But let me bring, let me bring you down here. But yeah, I always wanted to come out here. The Somi Yoshino variety is the white flowers.

00:29:46 John Daub: The white blossoms. This is the one that covers like 90% of the cherry blossom festivals or probably some Yoshino. These are not that, this is Kawazu. This is the Kawazu zakura. This special variety was again, I, I, I started by saying, I wanted to say invented, but it was— oh, hello there.

00:30:16 John Daub: It was found by a local, local resident who was just strolling on the river like I am right now. He looked down and he found a sprout. He picked the sprout up and planted it in his garden. It turned out to be a completely unique cherry blossom, a hybrid of two of the ones that were on the river at the time.

00:30:48 John Daub: And in the 1915 years after he found it and planted it in the garden, he found out that it was a brand new variety of cherry blossom. So of course they named it after the town Kawazu and became the Kawazu Zakura. The original tree is actually here. And that's where I'm going to go and find right now, Japan is just so well marked.

00:31:22 John Daub: I believe it's in this direction. I'm carrying quite a load of camera gear to try to film it with for a main channel episode. But we'll see how it goes. It turned out to be a beautiful day. It was really nasty this morning. Actually, there's a— you can fly your drone out on the coast. This is a drone—

00:31:53 John Daub: Drone friendly area. Not during the festival, but I did it in the morning and I lost the drone. It fell in the water. That's the first time I've ever lost a drone. And I'm really, really upset because I got some beautiful shots from out— out in the ocean. The event put out a map where you can fly the drone.

00:32:25 John Daub: You can't do it over this area, but you could do it over the ocean. And I lost the drone. That's an expensive mistake. It was like a five year old drone, but still. I got the money's worth out of it. But still— that hurts. It was almost home too. The drone was almost home. Maybe it'll— it'll—

00:32:56 John Daub: It'll— I'm gonna go check the beach and see if it's there. But I— you— I would never fly over here around people. But you could fly it out over the sea. I just— you know, just one of those things. All right, let's get a closer look at this because you've been looking at me for too long. Maui Mist is here.

00:33:28 John Daub: Thanks for showing us the place. I never visited while there. Maybe on my next trip I'll venture from Tokyo. You definitely should, but I— I don't blame you because not a lot of Tokyoites actually make it out here. It's far. It's like close, but far. Because it's a three hour drive. It's three hours on the train.

00:34:00 John Daub: The trains are infrequent, so you have to— if you take the train, you have to build your whole trip around it. Yeah, it really hurts that to lose my— it was a Mavic 3, an old one, but still. Like you don't want to lose any equipment. I'm really careful. I checked the— check the blades. I make sure the connection's strong.

00:34:34 John Daub: I think it just— it was really windy over the sea. It didn't say there were any wind issues, but August must have gotten it and it just blew over and there it was in the sea. And I was like, oh, gosh. I just want that footage, thankfully. And you know what hurts me more? I think there's a really nice micro SD card in there that I wish I could have back too.

00:35:11 John Daub: And that happens. This is how most of you would get here. Most of you would get here with that train. I see— more frequent now. There's a— a couple of express trains that have big windows. I think you can get here under three hours, but I don't know. It's really infrequent. Thank you guys for buying me that taiyaki.

00:35:44 John Daub: I really, really, really appreciate it. I was hungry. I drove straight here without stopping. So next after I end this stream is to find a restroom. It was a good drive. Look at that. Instead of— there's the emoji right there. I heart Kawazu. Look at that again. The cherry blossom emoji that's on every single smartphone.

00:36:17 John Daub: I think it's on it— that's the Kawazuzakura. So the one that you see is from this festival, which is really awesome. All the emoji came from Japan. The emoji is a Japanese thing. So a lot of Japanese cultures in the emojis, which is pretty cool. It's like grilled beef, the long potatoes— Leo loves those.

00:36:49 John Daub: Wish he could be here. I'm glad you guys are. He's at school. Kanai's at work. So am I. Believe it or not, this is what I do. I bring you guys all across the country, which is what you guys subscribe for. I'm really grateful for that. Any questions while we walk to this next bridge here? Oh, the smells smell something good.

00:37:23 John Daub: Yeah. A week till— a week till March and a week till the Tokyo Marathon. I think we're about 10 days out. I'm feeling good. My legs are tired. I just did a 25 kilometer run a few days ago. Oh, here we go. Roasted chestnuts. Every time they do that, it makes people stop and tickle. Oh, that smells so good.

00:37:54 John Daub: They let out the steam. It's roasting inside of there. And then they'll drop it into the basket here. Here it— this is pumping out good smells of the streets. That smells really good. Yeah. People live right on the riverside here. This is a place I'd say 50, 49 out of 52 weeks, people are just living here.

00:38:26 John Daub: Normally there's no festival, but those three weeks are really special. They make a lot of money. Walk over here to the crosswalk. You know, if the camera work was— was immaculate and perfect, it wouldn't be a live stream. It wouldn't feel the same. There's something, you know— something authentic by—

00:38:58 John Daub: By having a messy camera angle sometimes. Showing the ground, showing your shadow. That's what makes this an interesting journey, I think, because it's sort of looking around, showing you the things that you probably wouldn't see in an edited video because you want to cut that stuff out. But this is live—

00:39:29 John Daub: You don't want to cut it out. You know, sometimes you just want to see everything. One centama go. Really famous here. Wow. All these food stands are family run. This feels like a festival. I love it. I love this. There's some dango and fried chicken. Wow. Smells good. Even my nose is a little blocked up from the pollen.

00:40:03 John Daub: It's somehow— it's so strong smelling. It makes it through that. There's more cherry blossoms. There's chocolate, bananas, strawberries, which is also famous in this area. All right. Ellis David would love that. There's some sakura manju up there. 400 yen for a Sakura manju. Some— some— is that IU some—

00:40:34 John Daub: Ayou fish grilling. And we're all here to celebrate this— this is— these are the stars. These trees for. And I said this earlier, but the Kawazuzakura actually bloom and stay longer than the some Yoshino, which are even more delicate. This variety of cherry blossom just sticks for I'd say like a week longer than usual.

00:41:08 John Daub: This is definitely full bloom already. The green sprouts are coming out. Yeah. Hey, Romy Blue 1833, when you're done, have a warm sake on me. I'll have to do that tonight because I'm driving, but I will absolutely get a bottle. Sake is not that expensive. You don't have to drink it to Psy 23—

00:41:38 John Daub: I said— this all looks really good too. Sakura mochi. I love the boxes too. Right? It's discounted. Look at that. Sakura soba. It's discounted. 70 again— off— 10 off. Look at that. Here's the taco senbe that's popular in ski in at Tsukiji Market. No line here. I don't know why people wait in line for that—

00:42:10 John Daub: Tacos. Sakura amazake. I guess I can try that. It's alcohol free. It's made by this lady here. Oh, no, no— she was on TV with it. Shizuoka, I can try that sakura amazake. What do you guys think? Should I get it? Should I get it? Where is it? Trying to find the sakura. Maybe it's over here.

00:42:40 John Daub: Oh, there it is. Over here. Okay, there it is. Okay, let's go. Let's go try it. We're here to try stuff, you know. All right. So they have sticks of wagyu beef for 1500 yen. That's that's interesting to know that. Oh, they have sakura ice cream over there. So they have— I'm pretty sure this is copyrighted music, so I have to talk over the copyrighted music a little bit here, just to break up—

00:43:21 John Daub: It is what it is. Wow, look, it's— it actually is pink. It's the same color as the blossoms. Look, look. That's awesome. That's awesome. Okay, let's go try it over here. I love the sound you hear in the background. I know you're in Japan. All right, let's try this with the Yuzakura in the background.

00:43:52 John Daub: Michael, to all of you guys, I like Amazaki. If there's alcohol, you would say kanpai. If not, you just say itadakimasu. So itadakimasu. A little bit— little bit sweet. I mean— yeah, you knew they were gonna do that. No, there's no alcohol in this amazake. It's fermented, so it's really good for you—

00:44:24 John Daub: There was a— like an amazake Boom. Fermented foods— Hakuryori. Fermented foods is a big thing now growing in the US it's really good for your gut— but when they add a lot of sugar in it, I don't know how much— how good it is, but it's really good. I'm gonna— I'm gonna take you inside there—

00:44:54 John Daub: You can see the pieces of the rice bits— fermented, doesn't have alcohol. Yeah, they— they stop it before the alcohol process begins. So the— these are Amazaki, usually made by sake companies. Hold on, I can take you— yeah, a little bit closer. Usually made by sake, but it's very good for you.

00:45:24 John Daub: The Amazake that's supposed to— in Japan, you're supposed to walk and festival has kind of an exception. You're supposed to walk and drink, but— the reason you don't walk and eat is because you spill the food everywhere and you get it all over the place. And you also walk into people. It's just dirty—

00:45:56 John Daub: That's one of the reasons why you don't walk and eat in Japan, probably the main reason. But in general, at festivals, the rules get broken quite a bit because it's food on a stick and it's socially acceptable out here because look where we are, for crying out loud. If you drop a crumb, the birds are going to get it, or the ants or the spiders.

00:46:31 John Daub: You're supporting the local infrastructure of microbes. So look how beautiful these cherry blossoms are. Gosh, I wish I didn't lose my drone or I had a permit to fly here. There's some photographers on the river, getting some shots from the water. Looking up here. I might do that as well—

00:47:02 John Daub: Going to be here till about 1:30 because it takes three hours to get home. I don't want to be here too, too long. Beautiful, right? Parking is a thousand yen. I parked way down by the beach too. Look at the line for the toilet— for the women, that's quite a queue. Men go right in because we have the—

00:47:33 John Daub: We stand. It's not fair. There is a movement— I'm not joking. I gotta put my bag— it's getting heavy. Hold on a second. Okay. There was a movement in the 1964— I'm not joking about this. 1964 Summer Games Tokyo. The old stadium had female urinals. And before I could film it, it was destroyed—

00:48:03 John Daub: There's some pictures online. Very few. It's a story that's— that's gone under the radar because you have to have lived here long enough to remember or to know about it or be told about it. But they wanted to get rid of lines and they wanted to make like what you just saw there. So they put these female urinals and the—

00:48:36 John Daub: The lip of the urinal like jutted out like 10 times longer than the male ones. And so the women would straddle it and then go— and they seemed to work, but they were extraordinarily unpopular. I can't imagine why. And the idea never took off. I don't know if Toto was involved. They wouldn't admit it to me—

00:49:08 John Daub: I think I might have brought it up when I filmed with them years ago. It's one of their stories. I gotta take you somewhere dirty in order to— to balance out the beauty that's around me. Let's be honest. It's a true story. You won't find any, any of that stuff at any more Olympic stadiums.

00:49:38 John Daub: Nicolette, thank you for being here too. I'm glad you're— I know a lot of stuff because I've just been here for a long time. I know a lot of legends. There's a lot of stuff that was so bizarre, that was here before, but it's gone before the YouTube era. Oh my goodness. I got so many stories.

00:50:09 John Daub: You have no idea. Hope that guy feels better. This is the time of the live stream. If you're watching live, you can— you can chime in, say, where you're from. Become a part of the history of this channel. Actually, by sharing where's your hometown? You're going to be surprised at how— how— how far the viewers of this channel are go from all over the world.

00:50:46 John Daub: So there's the chance where you— you guys are here and there. Whoa. New York City, representing Dominican Republic. Well, we're all over the place now. Singapore. Hey, this is a time— it's still early— where we got Las Vegas, Connecticut, San Diego— Canberra, Australia— Manila, Minnesota, Netherlands, Philippines—

00:51:19 John Daub: Awesome. Look at this. See Laredo, Texas. Look at that. Land of 10,000 Lakes. Georgia by way of Boston. Awesome. New Jersey, Bay area, San Francisco, Singapore, Maryland, Saitama. That's not too far away. It sort of is. That'd be a four hour drive to get here. Dallas, Texas, Malaysia, Toronto—

00:51:49 John Daub: We are really global. This is such a global community. We have— I send postcards. This is this month's postcard. I send postcards. I haven't sent one to Antarctica, but we have Nico in Greenland. And Nico, thank you. Every time I send a postcards, I send one to Greenland and it always makes the Japan post guy do a double take—

00:52:23 John Daub: Like then he checks to see if they deliver to Greenland and they do. And then he looks back at me. Okay, we have Cantor in Aruba, which is awesome. He sent me pictures of the postcard with the beach in the background. So these things— and we had Argentina, South Africa. I had somebody in Zimbabwe, several from Egypt—

00:52:56 John Daub: We have a couple in Saudi Arabia, which is pretty— pretty amazing. All over Europe. Slovakia, representing Czech Republic too. Even— even Denmark, despite the fact that Denmark doesn't send postcards, doesn't do the mail anymore. Somehow they're going to get there, guys— I resent them. They got lost—

00:53:27 John Daub: Just Denmark got lost. But it is a very small world and we're all connected through the cherry blossoms, through Japan, which is pretty amazing. What? Wow. We got a little— got a little bit of a traffic jam here. Let's wait. Usually a traffic light really does change and our train comes in and there's a crowd of people—

00:54:01 John Daub: You wait five or six seconds and they're all gone. Look, it's nice and relaxed. Look how— look at the colors here. You feel so alive when you see sights like this, right? This is what's great about the cherry blossoms. Why— why you come. And you don't have to come in March or April. You know what the great thing about this is?

00:54:35 John Daub: The great thing about this cherry blossom in February— this is low season. Hotel prices are so cheap. This is the time when you want to be in— in coming to the city and you can get the best of both worlds. You can get the cherry blossoms in the— in February 20th with the plum blossoms as well—

00:55:05 John Daub: And get the lower prices for the hotels and not have all of the crowds. Now it is— it's starting to get a little bit crowded around here. But this is nothing— really, if you compare to Kyoto. Oh, my goodness. You can see the asphalt here. Look— can't do that— well, you probably could in Kyoto, but the point is— it's crowded, but it's not really that crowded—

00:55:43 John Daub: You know, compared to— like— Ueno Park. Ueno park, this is a completely different— all right, we're getting into a tunnel here. So according to legend, they started planting these back in the 1970s and 80s when they found out that Kawazu had its own— oh, that amazake is 100 yen. What? Maybe it's not Sakura amazake—

00:56:15 John Daub: I paid 300 for mine. But after they found out in the 1970s that they had their own variety, they started to make off of the original tree. They started to take sprouts off of it and grow more and more and more and more. And the Kawazuzakura, like Johnny Appleseed, started to spread across the entire country.

00:56:48 John Daub: But this is the homeland. This is where the Kawazu sakura are from. And that color is again— that's the emoji that you have on your smartphone. This particular cherry blossom— it's not the Somiyoshino which are the most popular. It's this one. And that's what makes it kind of a magical place that most of you have never heard about.

00:57:22 John Daub: This is the one that's on your— this is the blossom on your smartphone. Pull it up— let's see. Some love in the chat, right? If I can pull up here— compare— look— See? Boom. That's this one. You guys are seeing it. That's why this is such an important festival here. It's on your smartphone already.

00:57:53 John Daub: You just don't know it. I'm also scouting this— I'll probably come back here next— next spring and spend the night in Kwazu. There's another reason why I'm coming back here probably at the end of March for another episode. This— this part of Japan is absolutely— has a declining population—

00:58:23 John Daub: I don't know why it's such a beautiful place to say— look at this coffee shop right off of the river. Imagine coming here where there are when there are no tourists and just chilling in somebody's courtyard there. Reminds me of my friend Greg in Nikko. He's built his own hotel, but he's got such an amazing— like— deck and area—

00:58:57 John Daub: He should build— like— a cafe or something there, I think Greg Glam— who's life where I'm from. Amazing channel. Amazing storyteller. He's— he's built a hotel. I'm so proud of him. So there's a mix— I— I heard a lot of— I heard a lot of Chinese being spoken. So I asked where are you from? Taiwan—

00:59:28 John Daub: Almost all of them are from Taiwan. And one couple from Hong Kong. I haven't met anybody from Singapore here yet. Look at that. Oh my goodness. Look at the ducky down there. I saw me— notice me— should I say I have amma's like— told him I had amazake. Totally ignored me. Must be a different dialect—

00:59:59 John Daub: I've been known to talk to the wildlife with great success. I— I must say cats and dogs— and my dog— I noticed that the dog language is universal. The barks that you get in Japan are the same as the ones in the US— so— but ducks might be different. Ducks might be different. There you go. That's a picture—

01:00:31 John Daub: Let me see if I zoom. We should go right through— that's so clean— the water here. It's beautiful. There's Ramen Shack here. B52 should sing a song called Ramen Shack. I'm not sure that would go down quite as the same as— there's another variety of cherry blossom called the Ju Gatsu Zakura which blooms in January—

01:01:03 John Daub: You don't see many of those. There's some in Toyosu I found in Tokyo. But— oh, look at this tunnel. We're coming upon a tunnel. Wow. Don't drink the water up upstream— there could be like a— inoshishi— which are like hogs. What do you call them? Inoshishi in English. I forget. There's a lot of wildlife that might do in doing the pee pee in there—

01:01:39 John Daub: And they said that— it's— it's not 100% pure water. And it's not spring yet. So it's not really— it could be melting— but— I gotta be honest with you. Driving here you could smell the— the cattle ranches— put my cup away. I got butter on the screen. You can smell inoshishi— not wild boars—

01:02:09 John Daub: There you go. Wild boars. That is beautiful. Look at that. Wow. All right. Looks like we're— we're getting closer to the end here. But— but not really. It just— it just keeps going on and on. Kawazu. You guys are live in Tokyo— sorry— not Tokyo. In Kawazu. In Kawazu here. I try to do this every 20 minutes or so—

01:02:42 John Daub: There's Tokyo three hours north east of here. I had to take a left at Atami. Actually, I went past Mishima on the highway most of the way, but it's slow going. Takes three hours to drive in the morning, three and a half during the day. The Kawazu river— starting from the sea all the way down to where we're walking—

01:03:15 John Daub: We're just following the river, folks. There's lots of street food here. Tons and tons of Kawazuzakura, which is what is famous in this area. The first cherry blossom festival in Japan is here, believe it or not— starts in February. And there's not a lot of international tourists here, except from Taiwan and Hong Kong, who know about this a lot more—

01:03:51 John Daub: I've seen very few of my countrymen. You just don't know about it because you think cherry blossoms bloom on March 20th. Not true. There's dozens and dozens of varieties— cultivars of cherry blossoms that bloom at different times. I've made it my mission on this channel to show you all the different cultivars because I'm learning them myself—

01:04:27 John Daub: You can see we were on the sea and I could smell the grilling seafood. It is so pleasant as we go right past the— look at that. Cherry blossoms are right on the road here. That's grilled— grilling— shrimp and crab. Oh, my gosh, that smells so good. Look— you can get Wagyu— I highly recommend though—

01:04:58 John Daub: And when you're here in Izu, you get go for the seafood. I would go for the seafood over the Wagyu. Wagyu beef Shizuoka— this part, the peninsula is much more famous for the seafood— much, much, much, much more famous. Oh, there's a Sakura ice cream place right there. So I hope that this is—

01:05:28 John Daub: This is a vibe— is educational and informational for you guys. Cherry blossoms will officially start in Tokyo according to the schedule. There's an official countryside announcement. What is that music? You get random sounds out in the countryside breaking up the monotony of everyday life, which is awesome—

01:06:00 John Daub: Have a good day, guys. John Lopez. I'm gonna tune off in a couple of minutes. I'll take you around a little bit longer. Get the end of the bridge here. Moments by Shuba hey— thank you for showing us Sakura. I don't know if I'll get to see in April when I visit— maybe you can see this. The best sakura festival is April 20th—

01:06:34 John Daub: Around that time and in Hirosaki and Aomori is my favorite with the Some Yoshino trees. But I'm telling you, even in January you can see cherry blossoms. So there's— you can even take them home— look at this. They got little teeny varieties of them here. Wow. That's $50 for one. They're in bloom now—

01:07:05 John Daub: They're gonna be gone, and the blossoms will be gone in— like— four days. But they come back next year. And if you— and if you can keep them going for 50 years, it's gonna look like this. I could conceivably buy one and take it in the car back with me. I don't think I'm gonna do it, though—

01:07:35 John Daub: I'm not sure— can I be like— you spent $50 on what? Because neither of us have a green thumb. All right— people are lined up on the bridge. There's got to be a reason why. Okay, I see. Okay, that's nice. Now I know why. That's— that's really nice. Pan for— don't need to talk. Don't ruin the moment with words—

01:08:08 John Daub: Just kind of soak up the view. Don't ruin it. Let people enjoy the bird sounds and just stay quiet. John. Don't say anything. Let the pictures do all the speaking. You can stop talking now. Stop talking. Yeah. And then an ambulance goes by. Oh, that's wonderful. I hope you're— you're okay. Now I can stop talking. And who's laughing with all—

01:08:38 John Daub: All those jokes yelling in my ear? Thank you. That's the perfect way to— that's the perfect way to end that one. I gotta go to the original tree. Kwazu station— 1.2 km. Have I walked that far? I'm almost at mine Onsen. What? My bag's getting heavy too. I still got a six kilometer run. I'm supposed to be on my turn down, so to speak, for the marathon training— the next 10 days, I kind of taper down. I would love— I'll check the sea and see if I can find my drone again. But it's not— yeah, it's— it just flipped and went under—

01:09:40 John Daub: I'd never seen anything like it. I don't think it hit a bird because I was— I was visually watching the drone. I didn't let the drone get out of my sight. It just flipped and went in— in the dip. And I waited around for about 10 minutes to see if the waves would bring it in, but I think it sunk—

01:10:10 John Daub: Maybe it'll come in. I don't know— depends how the tide. Thanks, guys. If you are on— on March 1st in Tokyo, we have a Discord server. Get in touch there or write to me. I'd love to share with you my live— I have a— you'll be able to track me live and find where I am on the course. And you guys can— you can yell and maybe I'll come over for a picture—

01:10:47 John Daub: Say hi. At least wave. Kanai and Leo will be out there too, cheering me on. I think Kanai said she's gonna make a sign. Wow, that is a beautiful tree. You guys feeling the vibe now that Kawazu is a special place. It really is. There's a tunnel coming. Daisy— Daisy— 1034. I may go there in early June—

01:11:18 John Daub: Will there be blossoms? Yeah, up in Wakanai in the very— very— very— very north of Japan. They're said to bloom in the— the first week of June there, but I can't be for certain. That's kind of late up at elevation. If there's cherry blossoms up on the top of Mount Fuji somewhere, there's not many trees, but if there was, it would be blooming in June—

01:11:55 John Daub: Put it like that. It's about 50 degrees Fahrenheit right now, I have to be honest. It's warmed up with the sun coming out. It was really chilly this morning. Most people are locals. I'd say 80% Japanese, 20% foreign tourists. Of the foreign tourists, I'd say majority are from Taiwan, which is incredible—

01:12:26 John Daub: There are— there are some places that only the Taiwanese tourists know about. Locals and the Taiwanese. I guess it's a Taiwanese guidebooks in Chinese. But— I've had a lot of people from Taiwan stop and ask me what camera I'm using or say— hi— that was real nice. You're blocking the— blocking the road—

01:12:58 John Daub: Strawberry daifuku and grilling maitake— matsutake mushroom— no, no, I can see the variety— grilling mushrooms— do you hear the birds chirping? That's such a beautiful sound. Get the food stands on one side, the cherry blossoms on the other. And you see— you can see across the river there are more cherry blossoms—

01:13:30 John Daub: So the pink— it's kind of sparse— these look like younger trees, but across the river they're much more mature and they're certainly at full bloom. That's just spectacular. That is just spectacular. Look at the oranges too— Shizuoka is famous for the greenhouse grown oranges. There's a lot of sun in this area—

01:14:03 John Daub: As you can see. It's beautiful blue sky today. This place is called Kawazu. This cherry blossom variety is called Kawazu Zakura. This is where it's from. And speak of the devil, there's an orange tree right there. Boom. Do not pick oranges off the tree— if you're a tourist— they're not yours—

01:14:33 John Daub: Just let you know— that is considered theft, and you could go to jail. I'm not joking. If you will be— if the police do detain you, you will be detained for— like— a day or maybe even longer. They make you just sit there and think about what you've done. Wasting your time is the worst punishment— you can say— oh, I just want to pay the fine—

01:15:09 John Daub: Just give me the fine. No. They'll waste your entire day. Don't do it. It's not worth it. Fruit theft. I'm serious. Fruit theft is a big— big issue in Japan. They're cracking down. You walk by an apple tree and you pick one— fruit theft. They're cracking— okay, I think that's as far as we're gonna go—

01:15:40 John Daub: There's more food— what's incredible is the lot— the signal has really been pretty strong. Look at the color of the water. It's got this beautiful emerald green to it. Wow. And on the river— the Kawazu river, you can see some of the cherry blossom petals are starting to fall. So we are— we've hit the—

01:16:11 John Daub: You can see right to the bottom. This isn't the variety that they pickle— this— this one, that's the Yaaizakura. But you probably could eat it— it is organic. I wouldn't do it because it's beautiful. I want to appreciate it. I don't want to eat it. You don't have to eat everything. Sometimes you can just let it be and not put it in your mouth—

01:16:47 John Daub: That's what I tell Leo. He's four. Sometimes you have to remind the people watching— you don't have to eat everything. You eat a lot of stuff, though. Like— if there was a zombie apocalypse and all you had was cherry blossoms, I probably eat it. But we have— we have— like— you know— real food over there, so you don't need to eat the blossoms—

01:17:23 John Daub: Don't do it— don't— don't climb cherry blossom trees. Don't climb the sakura trees, please. I know it looks like it's inviting. Don't do that. You want to make Japan really angry? Climb a cherry blossom tree at a festival. All right? Oh, my Lord— for a picture for TikTok to show everyone how dumb you are—

01:17:54 John Daub: Don't do it. I know it seems like it would be something you should do at your house— at your home. This is Japan, okay? This is not— this is land of don't climb tree, okay? Don't climb Torii gates. Don't climb anything unless it's a— you know— you supposed to climb it. This isn't Mount Fuji, where you have to conquer it—

01:18:28 John Daub: Okay? It's a tree— a beauty. You know what I'm talking about. Look over there. All right, guys. Oh, look— see— you don't have to pick it up the tree. Sometimes the blossoms just fall themselves. They fall themselves, but then— oh, see— it's gone. That's— that looked great in Kanai's ear— Blossom Girl—

01:18:59 John Daub: So that's all I have for you. This is quite an adventure. An hour and 20 minutes. That's longer than I thought we were going to go. I have a three and a half hour drive back. I'll probably stop at the Ebina service area— anyone who's ever driven on the Tome Expressway, you know what I'm talking about—

01:19:30 John Daub: Probably stop at Ebina to get a melon pond. And then I'll probably be home tonight at 4 o'clock. But this has been a lot of fun. I hope you have some questions— you learned a little bit about it. Leave them in the comments below. Thank you for joining as a member— Kawai ona4 thank you for becoming a traveler, guys—

01:20:03 John Daub: I appreciate— it's like 99 cents here. I kept at the base level. But you get a couple of emojis that you can use here. See here. What's some of my favorites? I'm not sure. But yeah, if you become a traveler, you get some special emoji that you can use. It's kind of cool. And you get a little badge as well, which is nice—

01:20:37 John Daub: There. Now you got a badge, right? Like Daisy. Daisy has been around for a while. He got a red badge. All right, guys, take care. I'll see you in another live stream probably tomorrow. I'm taking you to Gifu again. So I'll be in Gifu and you're coming with me. I gotta go through Nagoya and— yeah, this weekend probably some Tokyo—

01:21:11 John Daub: But yeah, we're gonna have some fun this month for the marathon. Kawazu. If you're in Tokyo now, you're in Japan now. I say this weekend's gonna be pretty crazy. But if you get a chance, jump out here and take a look at this— at the first cherry blossom festival— you feel nature can have some street food—

01:21:43 John Daub: Just soak it up and enjoy it and then you go home. So relax. I'm super glad that I came out this this year and I'll probably come back again next year with the family because this is truly something special. You're sitting inside all winter long and you come outside to a day like this and you have— you know— these blossoms out, and you just don't expect it in February—

01:22:21 John Daub: Maybe we should— beautiful things can happen in the dead of winter. It's pretty amazing. All right, guys, I'll see you again real soon. Matane.