Ishiwari-zakura (The Rock-Splitting Cherry)

In 1932, fire tore through part of the Morioka District Court, and it looked as though it would take the cherry tree growing in the boulder in front of the building with it. A gardener named Fujimura Jitaro wrapped the trunk in his own wet coat rather than let it burn. It bloomed again the following spring. The tree was already unusual before the fire. Legend says lightning split the granite boulder it grows from, and a cherry seed caught in the crack afterward, though nobody knows for certain how a tree ended up rooted half inside solid rock. What is certain is the result: a trunk about 4.3 metres round at the point where it meets the stone, forcing its way out of a fissure that offers it almost no soil. Japan designated it a National Natural Monument in 1923, one of the earliest trees to receive that status, and the courthouse still keeps the grounds open daily so the public can walk up and see it, dogs excepted. It is judged to be somewhere between 350 and 420 years old, and every April, for the roughly ten days it is in bloom, the court adds bus parking for the crowds. A functioning court of law that also runs a car park for cherry blossoms is not a common combination, and it says something about how seriously the tree is taken here.