"One day in my town" Contest Week 7 || Awaji, Japan Flower Park - Akashi Kaikyo National Government Park @mercy11

Awaji Island is an island in Hyogo Prefecture, a large island which has about the same size as Singapore. Since I heard that it is a very beautiful island in which various kinds of flowers bloom in every season, I’d been wondering to visit there someday. So last May we went to visit the Island to witness the beautiful flowers.

The Akashi Kaikyo National Government Park was based with the concept of 'a leisurely garden by the seaside'. The natural surroundings of the 100-hectare area were restored after they were dug up to provide soil for the construction of Kansai International Airport. At present, 40 hectares are open to the public as part of the parklands. Here you can enjoy flowers, the ocean, and the island. During 2000, the park was host to an international gardening and landscaping exhibition: The Japan Flora 2000. And in 2015, it was the main venue for the 2015 Awaji Flower Exhibition: The Flower and Greenery Fair, an exhibition which was held throughout the Awaji region.

The garden is filled with different seasonal flowers for you to enjoy at different times of the year. Here are the seasonal flowers throughout the year at Akashi Kaikyo National Government Park in Awaji Island, Hyogo Prefecture. In the spring you'll find tulips and hydrangeas while in the summer season, impatiens, dahlias and sunflowers are in full bloom, creating a lot of enjoyment for people visiting. We visited here during Spring season but unfortunately we didn't witnessed the Tulips flowers because we're too late. Tulips flowers usually blooms around last week of April but we visited here first week of May during Golden week the long holiday in Japan.

This is the main entrance of the garden and you will pay 450 yen for the ticket entrance. Just after entering through the Higashiura-guchi gate, you are greeted by an amusing display, the Octopus Topiary using in-season flowers to recreate a large octopus. It’s gaining popularity with visitors who want to take commemorative photos.

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Along the border of the park you'll also find the Hanahidori, a giant 4 meter tall and 30 meter long gorgeous phoenix sculpture made with flowers that are created in thoughts of the recovery of the area from the Great Hanshin Earthquake of 1995. It's a beautiful place to take photographs when visiting with family and friends.

If you like flowers, Awaji Island comes highly recommended. Daichi-no-niji and Hana-no-shima are some of the many great places to enjoy the seasonal flowers at the park. You can also witness the beautiful view of the mountain and the fresh air on the face as you take beautiful pictures in the beautiful view.

Beside on this park you can also find varies restaurant to choose where to full your tummy after taking lot of time taking the beautiful pictures in the garden. People who visit here for the first time will get lost if they do not look carefully at the information board. Because this building was big and really confusing. The information board was written in Japanese language but thanks to google because it makes us feel easy. Even if we follow the information board we we're still got lost because the first restaurants that we went was full so we need to find another restaurant. After walking around and finding restaurants we finally found other that offers Yakiniku style.

If you look at outside its just a small restaurant but when you go inside through a large curtain, the inside of the restaurant is surprisingly large and one side is covered with glass and you can see the outside scenery.

You will really admire the beauty of the seasonal flowers. What are you waiting for? Visit Japan and have an experience in their beautiful flowers.

I would like to invite @ikur14, @heartmich and @marzyoung22 to share the beauty of their towns.