The National Cherry Blossom Festival starts on March 20 in Washington. Every year millions of pink petals transform the city's landscape, beckoning the start of spring. If you can't make a trip to the capital to see these delicate flowers bloom, enjoy their beauty through these photos taken over the years by CNN iReporters.
Courtesy Neal Piper
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New York resident Navid Baraty visited D.C. to see the cherry blossoms bloom in 2012. This was his first time at the festival and he says it was spectacular.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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The National Cherry Blossom Festival grew from humble beginnings, but now it's one of the largest springtime celebrations in the United States.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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Baraty, a photographer by trade, rarely shoots images of flowers, but he made an exception while at the festival. "I knew it was going to be gorgeous, but wasn't quite prepared for how stunning of a show it really was," he said.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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More than 1.5 million people travel to the capital to see these blooming flowers, according to the National Cherry Blossom Festival's website.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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A crowd walks under blooming cherry blossoms.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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D.C.'s cherry trees have hit their peak as early as March 15 in 1990 to as late as April 18 in 1958. After a brutal winter, they're expected to be at their peak in April this year.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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The cherry blossom festival commemorates the gift of 3,000 cherry trees Japan gave to Washington in 1912.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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2014 marks the 102nd anniversary of the cherry blossom gift from the Japanese.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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The cherry trees' peak bloom, which is when 70% of the trees are blooming, is very much dependent on the weather.
Courtesy Navid Baraty
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The Thomas Jefferson Memorial sits behind a blooming cluster of cherry blossoms.
Courtesy Ian Dixon
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The National Park Service expects peak bloom to occur this year during the second week of April.
Courtesy Felix Masi
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In 1915, the United States government presented the people of Japan with flowering dogwood trees. The gift was in response to the cherry trees the United States received from Japan three years earlier.
Courtesy Felix Masi
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Cherry blossoms are a familiar springtime sight for Neal Piper, who lives in D.C. He took these photos in March 2013. He was disappointed the blossoms bloomed a lot later than usual last year because of cold weather.
Courtesy Neal Piper
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Here, the cherry blossoms overlook the Tidal Basin in Washington.
Courtesy Neal Piper
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When Piper took these photographs, the Washington Monument was under repair. A 5.8 magnitude earthquake caused cracks in the monument in 2011, according to the National Park Service.
Neal Piper/CNN iReport
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The cherry blossom season can last as long as 25 days.
Courtesy Neal Piper
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In the early 1980s, the United States government gave Japanese horticulturists some cuttings of cherry trees after a flood in Japan decimated many of the trees there.
Neal Piper/CNN iReport
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Cherry blossoms bloom in a variety of countries during spring. You can find these delicate flowers in the United States, Japan, Germany, India and even Turkey, just to name a few nations this flowering plant calls home.
Courtesy Neal Piper
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Travelers enjoy the sight of cherry blossoms so much that crowds start gathering in the park as early as sunrise, which is when Ian Dixon captured this photograph in March 2012. "Even at 7 a.m. it was getting tough to find good spots to shoot from due to all the photographers around," he said.
