Adonis habitat at Numanodaira, Kitakata, March 20, 2019. （福寿草広がる 沼ノ平の丘に 喜多方 ２０１９年３月２０日）
Today I visited Adonis Festival at Numanodaira, Kitakata City, where one of the largest natural habitats of Adonis plant in Japan spread out. Adonis is one of the earliest flowers to bloom in early spring, together with ume blossoms, ahead of all the cherry blossoms. Most usually it appears in small to medium scale groups on the sunny banks or in your backyards across Japan. But this habitat at Numanodaira stretched across vast area in the neighborhood. Only a fraction of it was shown in the picture above. Today was the second time I visited here. Last time, five years ago, it was on April 1st. So today it was 10 days earlier than before due to recent warm weather.
本日は、沼ノ平（喜多方市）の福寿草まつりに行きました。全国でも有数の群生地です。福寿草は、冬から初春にかけて梅などと共に最初に咲く花で、桜の前座を飾ります。普通は、日当たりの良い土手や裏庭に小～中規模に全国どこにも咲きますが、沼ノ平は、周辺の丘一帯に大規模に群生します。写真は、そのごく一例です。今回は２度目で、前回の５年前は４月１日に来ています。暖冬の影響で、１０日も早くなりました。
Photo above shows a map on site which shows the whole habitat area.
写真は、現地に立つ群生地全体の地図です。
Some other views of today are shown above. Also, they had a small soba or buckwheat noodle restaurant on site and it was the best kind. This area in Kitakata City is called Yamato district which is very popular with excellent soba noodles.
写真は、今日のその他の光景です。現地には、そば屋もあり大変おいしいです。喜多方市のこの山都（やまと）地区は、そばの郷として有名です。
The nearest JR station to the location is Yamato Station of Ban-etsu West Line. They have a local public demand bus service between the station and the habitat site in weekdays. The fare is reasonable 400 yen for one way (800 yen for round trip) and it takes about 20 minutes. This is very convenient for travelers without cars.
最寄りのＪＲ駅は、磐越西線の山都駅です。そこから自生地までは、地元の公共交通のデマンドバス（みんべえ号）が週日に走っています。片道４００円（往復８００円）で乗れて、大変便利です。
The exact route and locations are shown in the map below. The map can be scaled up and down with a click and scroll.
ルートと場所は、下の地図を参照ください。地図は、クリックとスクロールで、拡大・縮小が可能です。
