Photo Gallery: Flowers From Michigan’s Upper Peninsula


Michigan’s Upper Peninsula is lined with beaches along Lake Superior to the north and Lake Michigan to the south. The Keweenaw Peninsula in the greater U.P. is also lined with Lake Superior beaches to the east and west. Views from each side vary, but are beautiful across the board. I spent the afternoon at a small beach on Lake Superior called Betsy Beach. Aside from a kayaking pair, we had the sandstone beach to ourselves and I did what anyone with a camera in the summer on a beautiful beach would do: took photos of pretty flowers. Enjoy.

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[Photo Credit: Elizabeth Seward]

The Kimchi-ite: The End Of Cherry Blossom Season On Yeouido

Cherry blossoms mark the true beginning of spring, along with the arrival of glorious sunshine, refreshing breezes and all around spectacular picnic weather. Within Seoul, the most talked about place to see the blossoms is on Yeouido, a large island on the Han River where many of the tallest skyscrapers in Korea are located.

Yeouido’s Spring Flower Festival, which centers around the cherry blossoms, provides great views of the river, with streets closed off to car traffic, an impressive amount of food vendors and over 1,400 cherry blossom trees in less than a 4-mile stretch.

Sunset is the absolute perfect time to view cherry blossoms.

An entire evening can be set aside during cherry blossom season just to walk amongst the trees. It makes for a calmingly beautiful after-dinner treat and hardly gets boring, not even for those that never pay flowers any attention during the rest of the year, like myself.

While up close they aren’t remarkable; all together they make for an amazing sight.

Cherry blossoms are definitely worth planning a trip around, and crops like these aren’t only limited to Asia and Washington D.C. In Korea, the season typically runs from the end of March through almost all of April and there are numerous festivals built around them all over the country.

Streets all around Seoul are lined with beautiful rows of cherry blossoms.

After night falls on Yeouido, the trees are bathed in colored lights, heightening their light pink hues. It’s no wonder why so many photos are taken.

Yeouido lights up the trees at night, giving the flowers surreal colors.

As with most things even mildly popular in Seoul, there is always an enormous crowd on Yeouido during the peak blooming times.

Cherry blossoms are endlessly photogenic.

Unfortunately, cherry blossoms are incredibly fleeting and are now disappearing throughout Korea. No longer are the streets lined with gorgeous white flowers nor the light falling of its petals, marking the one time of year when gutters are actually beautiful.

A picnic under a cherry blossom tree is the perfect way to spend a spring afternoon.

As always, for more on Korean culture, food and oddities, read more from the Kimchi-ite here.

[All photos by Jonathan Kramer]

Photo Of The Day: The Cherry Blossoms Are Here

Each spring, Washington, D.C., transforms from a city of grey to a city of pink during the National Cherry Blossom Festival, an annual springtime celebration of the capital’s most famous flower. This year’s “Peak Bloom Date” fell on April 9; today’s Photo of the Day, from Flickr user Christopher Skillman, was taken a day later.Do you have any great travel photos? You now have two options to enter your snapshots into the running for Gadling’s Photo of the Day. Upload your shots to the Gadling Flickr Pool, or mention @GadlingTravel and use hashtag #gadling in the caption or comments for your post on Instagram. Don’t forget to give us a follow too!

[Photo Credit: Flickr user Christopher Skillman]

#OnTheRoad On Instagram: Seoul, South Korea

Cherry blossoms get me ridiculously excited. The gorgeous pinkish-white flowers last for only a couple of weeks, making them truly special. They are the one true indication that spring has started here in South Korea, where cherry blossoms line many streets and park walkways. Numerous festivals around the country are held in order to take full advantage or their limited blooming period. Over the next week, I’ll be sharing their wonderful colors on Instagram on @GadlingTravel as well as providing a window into the day-to-day lives of the people living in a country that has been in the news so much lately. Follow along and enjoy the flowers.

[Photo Credit: Jonathan Kramer]

Photo Of The Day: Sakura In Tokyo

Cherry blossom season is in full effect in Tokyo. The beautiful, pinkish flowers, sakura in Japanese, are in many ways intertwined with the country’s culture. The start of the fiscal and school years falls in line with the blossom season. Virtually all public schools and major company buildings will have at least one sakura tree out front and group pictures are taken at the start of a new session, taking full advantage of the fantastic colors.

It’s wildly popular to picnic underneath the trees; it’s so significant that the activity even has its own dedicated word in Japanese, hanami. Families will gather, eat and drink together, taking advantage of the fresh spring weather. As seen in this shot by Flickr user whitefield_d, many streets all over Japan are lined with cherry blossom trees, making for amazingly picturesque scenes during the brief two-week flowering season.

Share your own travel photos with us in our Gadling Flickr Pool and we may choose it to be our Photo of the Day. You can also do so via Instagram by mentioning us, @gadlingtravel, as well as tagging your photos with #gadling.

[Photo Credit: Flickr user whitefield_d]