Beyond horrible photography habits, the run of the mill photo agencies create their itineraries based on a rough estimate of ‘inside’ information from their own tourist brochures printed a year or two ago.  Cherry Blossom viewing forecasts are released by the Japan meteorological agency around December or January, and this is the same time I make my final decisions regarding my annual cherry blossom photo workshops, as I go out and check the cherry blossom budding on the trees, and I don’t use a magic 8-ball or Ouija board to make my final route.  I use my over 25 years experience, and the routes I know will 100% guarantee clients the opportunity to experience the perfect cherry blossoms almost every day on my 12-day cross country cherry blossom photo tour adventure.  My annual cherry blossom photo tour and my autumn leaves photo tour take us from the lowlands to the foothills to the highlands.   The key to my successful photo workshops and me guaranteeing the perfect blossoms is we traverse through various elevations, and though several ecological lines, such as the Blakiston’s and the Watase line, which are one factor that dictate seasons, the other is the amount of sunlight a region receives, along with rainfall, and daily temperature. So we are a win-win as these factors let the the flora and fauna know the season has changed and colors bloom, it’s as simple as that.  But actually it’s not, I have to add in seasonal abnormalities, simply I cannot 100% trust average weather predictions, and to be honest I never did, what I do trust is inside info from local friends, and weather charts where I can roughly know the weather 24 to 48hrs out, and that usually gives me enough time to pick our daily route.  And if our lodgings are in the highlands I can easy adjust our itinerary to get to the lowlands and vice-versa.  But if I am in the Mt. Fuji region, and we are going for a morning golden at one of the Fuji five lakes, I will not make my final decision on which lake, until just before we depart from our lodgings, and even then I am constantly checking weather charts and may make a change while driving.  Mt. Fuji is famous for fog banks rolling in, one lake could be totally overcast, while another lake is perfectly clear.  I have been leading Mt. Fuji cheery blossom photo tours as well as Autumn leaves photo tours and winter tours for over 25 years, and I know the regions topography and weather patterns well.
If I did what the run of the mill tour companies did, I would have been out of business 10 years ago. These agencies run cherry blossom tours for up to seven weeks using the same locations, but only participants for one of those weeks will actually be lucky enough to see cherry blossoms in full bloom.  WoW!  I do not want any part of that world!  These agencies schedule everything by dates rather than building any flexibility into their cherry blossom workshop itineraries and only adding one perhaps two locations for the entire workshop!  Anyone with any experience in leading photography workshops knows that cherry blossoms don’t suddenly burst into full bloom at the moment of your arrival.  Mother Nature has her own timing and probably will not coincide with your timing.  The entire country’s sakura reaches full bloom at different times, and many other factors contribute to when the sakura is at its peak for being spotted and photographed.