Japanese Friendship Garden

My girlfriend and I decided to stop by since we were in the area. We’ve heard good things about it from friends that visited before.
It was $ 8 for a ticket to get in and that’s just for walking around the garden. If we wanted a tour of the new exhibit that opened up it would’ve costed more. It sounded interesting though. The exhibit was about ancient Japanese ceramics/​pottery. There was also a tea tasting option as well but we didn’t think it would be worth it.
The garden is nice. Nothing too spectacular. Not really breath-​taking. Just nice. You get to walk around in a quaint, relaxing environment. It’s a nice sense of peace. Though to be honest, the garden is quite small for the price of $ 8 and doesn’t really offer much to see besides bonsai trees, stone rivers, some bridges, and lots of green. There’s also a small koi pond which is nice. The koi fish are BIG though.
The walk to get to the bottom where the nicest part of the garden is quite long. Kinda annoying in my opinion to get to where we want to go.
We went when it was slightly drizzling. When the clouds cleared up right after it made the scenery look more pretty. The air was more crisp too which made the walking around more pleasant. That after-​rain effect.
TLDR; Nice place to visit but nothing special. $ 8 is a bit expensive for the experience you get. Wish we went when their cherry blossoms were blossoming. Would probably be a lot nicer.

This place is beautiful! Getting here was kind of a mission because its pretty packed and hard to find parking, so we parked pretty far and had to walk a good ¹⁵⁄₂₀ mins. But this place was definitely worth it, would recommend going here at least once!

My first time visiting this garden and also Balboa Park area, so I paid for the admission. I love anything Japanese. I just recently visited Japan, Hiroshima to be exact, so I got excited that San Diego has a Japanese garden. Without hesitation, I paid $ 8 for the admission ticket. However, I don’t see much Japanese vibes inside. The koi fish pond was nice, clear water and the fish looked healthy. I did not see a lot of Japanese plants compared to the Japanese garden in SF. The trail going down to the bottom of the garden is ok. The rock river and bridges are nice but not spectacular. We finished looking around the garden in less than 1 hour. We took extra time for tea ceremony. It was a nice demonstration and matcha tea tasted good. $ 3 for a few sip of tea but I did not mind at all. By far, SF Japanese Garden is a lot nicer.

This is a cool place with a nice history — So Japan gave us a little friendship garden for the expo and it stayed in Balboa Park. A little family grew up in the original house and later one of the children wanted to expand the garden… or something like that! :)
I encourage you to go and check it out. Many people think it’s very small but its expanded into the canyon and has a lovely event center and koi pond.
We volunteered here a few days ago to help weed the garden and bake cookies for their event.
They have some nice pieces of history in the welcome center, kimonos, rickshaws and more.
San Diego is the sister city to Yokohama in Japan.
Come here, to sip tea, stroll a pretty garden and enjoy a little historic info. It won’t take long, but it will be nice.

After battling holiday crowds and roads, the quiet walk through the Japanese Friendship Garden as a refreshing change of pace. Beautiful and very relaxing. It is much larger than it looks with several walking paths, a cultural center and dining room to host events.

Gorgeous place to visit and take photos of family or take a peaceful walk. Lots of plants to enjoy and large koi to watch. Well worth the price of admission. Restrooms are very clean!

It was just OKAY for me here. We attended a demonstration of a Japanese tea ceremony. It was interesting and refined yet slow and methodical. As with other Japanese gardens I’ve been to, you have to stay on the path and not touch anything. The gardeners were nice and showed us different paths to walk on. I liked seeing the bonsai trees but my favorite were the Koi fish. If you stand right next to the pond, they all come swarming over because they think you have food for them. It was a beautiful today to go to the Japanese Friendship Garden, but its not quite my cup of tea.

Since the renovation, this garden has improved exponentially. I first came to the garden back in late 2012. The upper portion of the garden had been built, but the lower portion was visibly under construction. It was tiny and disappointing. But I remember wanting to come back to see the finished garden.
It took me a while but I finally made it thanks to the generosity of a friend who got me an annual pass on Groupon. The garden was lovely. I really enjoyed all the koi fish in the lower and upper ponds. The trails were nicely maintained. And, as is custom with Japanese gardens, everything with nicely manicured without the obvious appearance of human manipulation as is so common with French style gardens. Much of this garden is even wheelchair accessible, and I even saw a wheelchair easily traversing the path to confirm.
Come take your engagement photos here, or have a picnic, or just chill out. This is an Oasis in the middle of San Diego.
Although reasonably full, the garden was still peaceful and worth a stroll. I’m sure I’ll be back soon.

Went to the Japanese Friendship Garden in Balboa Park last Sunday. To enter you have to get a ticket. They have two types of tickets: $ 8 which gives you access to the garden only, and $ 13 which gives you access to the garden and the exhibit. The garden is really beautiful from the inside, and very clean. it does not take that long to tour the entire place. The fish bound and waterfall are very nice, see the attached pictures. Staff there are really nice. To me, this is the best $ 8 I have spent in a while. Close free parking lot.

What a sweet oasis. I had expecting it to be on the smaller side, and certainly all one level, but while it’s not somewhere that requires an afternoon to trek, it’s enough for it’s own trip to Balboa. Easy parking, and a fair admissions price. Fun to poke around, watch the fish, and get a tea afterward at the café. Some parts are currently under construction, and the chicken wire takes you out of the nature serenity feel, but it’s still pretty lovely. And a quick history lesson of the Japanese community in San Diego as well.

Having been in quite a number of Japanese parks throughout this country, I thought this one is really nice but didn’t measure up to the best ones. You will have to pay an entrance fee and take a steep incline into the gardens. What I saw was nice, but not as Japanese as I would like. The garden was still under construction and it looked like the tea house that is being built will be a great addition to the park.

Kind of underwhelmed for the price of admission ($ 8). I had expected way more cool stuff like pagodas and flowers but basically the only cool things were the koi (including some really massive specimens) and some nice bonsai. The historical exhibit was super light and much of the garden was just relatively barren paths in a canyon. It would have been fine if the admission was like $ 3 or something but not worth it for the price. Maybe it’s better in spring? Hardly saw any flowers.

I have been to the Japanese Friendship Garden pre-​construction on countless occasions in the past. When the construction was in effect, I stopped going. Now the lower expansion of the Japanese Friendship Garden is complete and after all this time, I finally decided to see what they did with the place. Its gorgeous! My party of 3 arrived the moment it opened so we had free reign of the lower expansion area for a good hour or so before more people arrived.
Its a typical sunny day in San Diego with a slight breeze right now which perfectly complemented the sound of the creek and waterfall in place. Just for a moment, it was downright peaceful just sitting there and taking it all in. In the stillness of that moment, I can acutely smell the honeysuckles nearby, see a few squirrels and lizards running about, and caught a few hummingbirds flying around the nearby trees. I may have to take more frequent trips to this place. Its also worth the price of membership if you are a local. If the advertisement is still there, you can catch a Family Membership on Groupon or Living Social for $ 25 or less when they have extra promotional offers. I totally took advantage of the offer. 10% off at the restaurant as well.
When you realistically factor in the space of the area, the Japanese Friendship Garden has done a wonderful job in its landscaping and upkeep. It IS a Garden after all. Compared to other cities, the San Diego location may be a bit on the smaller side but if you’re going to be a pretentious snob about it, just move along because you’re clearly missing the point… and it’ll leave members like myself more free reign of the area. Recommend? Of course!
*The pictures below are of the lower expansion area only.

The first time I came here was several years ago during a spring cold snap (well, cold for SD that is). The lower temp allowed a wave a pink blossoms to appear across the cherry trees. It was an amazing sight.
I have loved this garden ever since. The koi. The flowers and trees, the design — harmony and peace, and of course the Zen rock garden. This is a great stop while at Balboa to relax mediate for a bit and let your stress go free.
It is a simple place that speaks to mindfulness and poetry.

I love gardens. The first time I have visited I loved it. Yeah it was small at the time and walking around only takes about 10 minutes for the whole thing but there’s always something so serene about the koi pond and the rock garden. Most recently I have visited for their Cherry Blossom Festival. I was so excited to see the expansion. The line for the Festival was insanely long, but they did a really good organized job getting people in pretty quickly. The layout of the festival was poorly designed and I’m guessing maybe because food is not allowed in the new area? Anyhow they crammed all the food vendors in a very small part which is also where the stage is located. So the food line were confusing and forming a line is rough because there was barely any room to walk through to get to the expansion area as well.
That’s probably the only negative to the garden is the festival being super crowded, but once you walk through the chaos you get to the expansion area. There is so much more room. It’s such a relaxing place to chill and enjoy the newly planted trees. I could imagine coming here to getaway and relax on a weekday. I can’t wait until they are completely done. I bought a membership from Livingsocial and it’s such a great deal. You can go to other gardens throughout the US for a discount or for free with this membership. Pretty cool.
Can’t wait for this place to be completed. :)

Finally came to the Japanese Friendship Garden when the full garden was opened. It is beautiful! There are a lot of unique items in the garden. It is well maintained and gives me many ideas of what I could do in my own back yard. I wonder if I could do those designs with food you eat? I only plant food. It will be cool to test it out!

Unfortunately, we were not able to do a full walk through because we got there right as they were closing. However, you can see a lot of it from the outside. From what we could see, the garden is very lush and beautiful. If you’re already in Balboa Park, it’s worth a visit.

This place truly is beautiful and is only very better and more extravagant as time goes on. This is new contraction and this garden will be immaculate in a few years I believe.
Make sure to look up when it’s free for SD residents because that’s when I went and anything free is always better. There are 5 different attractions in balboa park that are free on each Tuesday of the month.

Both times I’ve been here now the garden was under construction. It’s a bit hard to grasp how beautiful the garden is while there are trucks digging around, but you can tell it will be even more amazing once finished!
Been here for the past two Japanese cherry blossom festivals, and there’s a lot of great things about this place. I need to come back one day when there’s nothing going on so I can enjoy the garden without the crowds.
If it’s a hot day (which it often is in SD), you’ll want to be wearing your sunscreen and a baseball cap. The walk through the garden, although shaded with many trees, is not all that shady! Many of the trees do not cover the walkways, and the ones that do are not great at providing shelter from those UV rays.
There’s a nice koi pond, and the ambiance is soothing even when full of people. As much as I want to love this garden more, I haven’t ever had a 5-​star experience here. There’s not much to do, and you pay for a 10 minute walk through an under construction garden. Maybe it will be more worth it in the future.

Reminds me of my first home with my ex husband. He was a true Nissei who loved to garden and even made a koi pond in our backyard on our 10,000 sq ft lot. Our trips to local nurseries was almost our ritual every weekend, dressing our backyard with — mossy grass, red maple trees, green maple trees, cherry blossom trees, Japanese black pines, numerous bamboo trees contained in wooden crate boxes, sago palm trees, nandinas, etc. You get it. It was alot of work so when I visit these kind of gardens, small and big, I know how much time and sweat these people invested into making such a beautiful place, like heaven.
My last visit here was many years ago. Whether it’s taking a snapshot of the same japanese black pine, I never take the e-​x-​a-​ct same picture. Every visit is different. Each visit lures me to another area, to be mesmerize. To reflect. To relax. To just stop and breath.
I love the sound of the mini waterfalls in their koi ponds. The gentle water sound is enough to block the outside noise of the garden and the numerous kois of different colors swimming around seeking to be fed.
The canyon down the garden is still a work in progress but nonetheless looks amazing so far and very promising.
As with all the friendly posts, please be respectful when walking the grounds, and stay within the paths.
This is definitely a must see when in Balboa Park in SD.
Free parking. Adults are $ 6. Children 6 and under are free.
You will love it as much as I do!
#thankful