Okkazuma no Shidarezakura (the Weeping Cherry of Okkazuma)
Seasons1 of 4
At 8.7 metres tall this is a small tree, and people drive a mountain road to stand in front of it anyway. The weeping cherry of Okkazuma holds a hilltop clearing on its own at about 680 metres, on ground the hamlet calls Yama no Ue, with the Kofu Basin dropping away below it and Mt Fuji across the far side. Nothing else is in the frame. That is the whole of why it is famous. The measurements are human scale: 3.8 metres round at chest height, 4.6 at the root collar, a crown about 8.5 metres across. Its age was put at 150 to 200 years when the old town of Makioka made it a natural monument on 30 March 1976. Yamanashi City inherited the designation in the municipal merger and still lists it today. The hilltop is a local family's field, kept open to anyone who walks up, with no conditions attached. Two small shrines, Akihasan and Tenjingu, share the clearing, and the households of Okkazuma hold their own hanami up here when the tree opens in early April. It is lit after dark through the flowering week. Every source calls it simply a shidarezakura and none of them names the parentage, so which weeping cherry this actually is has never been settled. If you know, tell us. Come by car; the parking below the hill takes about ten vehicles and no buses at all.
From people who stood here
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Getting there
Okkazuma district, Murofuse, Makioka-cho, Yamanashi City, Yamanashi Prefecture, on a hilltop known locally as 'Yama no Ue' at approx. 680m elevation
You can recognise it as the small weeping cherry standing alone on a hilltop clearing, the Kofu Basin dropping away below and Mt Fuji across the valley. It stands at Yama no Ue in Okkazuma.
Free. Stands on privately owned land (a local resident's hilltop field), kept open to the public and freely visited. Small shrines (Akihasan, Tenjingu) share the hilltop clearing, where Okkazuma residents hold their own hanami gatherings.
Car only; no public transport route found. About 20 minutes' drive from JR Chuo Line's Enzan Station, or about 30 minutes from the Katsunuma IC on the Chuo Expressway. Parking at the Okkazuma community hall and nearby (roughly 5 to 10 cars; no space for large buses).
In bloom
early April, when it flowers alone on the hilltop and is lit after dark
The line is our estimate of how much there is to see, not a measurement. Typical for this species where this tree stands; exact weeks shift with the year.
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from. The story was written with AI from these sources, and readers who know the tree correct it.