Upon my return from Canada, I had about one weekend to prepare myself for another adventure. Fearing a bout of homesickness upon my return a few months ago, Sheena and I booked this fantastically cost efficient trip to the southern main island, Kyushu! I had been there before, four years ago when I traveled with Nikki, but had only hung out in the north. Kyushu consists of seven prefectures and only two of which I did anything in so with the completion of this trip, I have now been to 45 of 47 prefectures! Beside experience points towards being a Japanese Travel expert, I also had a fairly wonderful time! It began early, as they most often do, on a Monday morning when Sheena and I caught the train to the airport and flew into Fukuoka. From Fukuoka we met our tour group and jetted off across the island to Beppu, a little hot spring city perched between the mountains and the ocean with puffs of steam dotting the green slopes surrounding it. Our first stop was this strange little village with triangular huts built around the steam that house baths and minerals that are apparently good for you. The second stop was slightly cooler, one of the 'hells' of Beppu with it's pool of red water! It was really cool (and by cool I mean hot because it was a hot spring in Japan in summer...) with an oni theme going on, strange palm trees and a little waterfall with koi and a lantern. We retired for the evening to our hotel on the beach (I of course went out and played on it for an hour before dinner) and enjoyed a Japanese meal set with sashimi and shabu shabu, salad, rice, miso soup and some other identifiable stuff, before taking a bath on top of the city overlooking the lights and night view.
On the second day, there was a heavy mist in the mountains as we bathed on the roof again and headed back inland to a little town called Yufuin. It's a really cute town where Nikki and I stayed a couple of nights, tucked into the mountains in a series of little shops surrounding a lake with a floating shrine. Like last time, it was drizzling, but unlike last time I had no umbrella so that was the first stop. Followed by a stroll around the lake through pretty willow trees and over bridges and then into the shops where I visited the all cats store again! It was still so cute! There was also one for dogs and so many neat things. My eye was instantly caught but this beautiful little treasure box that I purchased instantly and had to carry around the rest of the trip but I love it!
At noon we got back on the bus and weaved through this open plateau to a river gorge in Takachiho a few hours away. While pretty it was not what i expected to see for mythology says that near this place is an actual cave where it is said that Amaterasu, the sun goddess, went into hiding after her brother offended her with his vulgarness, and took the sun with her. The gods all met at a shrine nearby and came up with a plan. They tricked Amaterasu into making her believe that another goddess more wise and beautiful than her had replaced her. When she heard this she flew out of the cave and saw her own reflection in a mirror and believed it to be the new goddess. While she was out, the gods blocked off the cave so that the sun returned to the world. That mirror, along with a sword and a gem stone are the three treasures of Japan even though no one can confirm their existence as they are enshrined away from human contact. Still, I really cool story and the cave actually exists! Just not in the place we went which was only ten minutes away... Disappointed I did my best to enjoy the gorge with it's little waterfalls.
In the afternoon, on the way to our hotel, we drove up this very active volcano valley where the biggest active volcano crater on earth is. It was a pretty grass field with a mountains and in the distance the steaming vents of the volcano. It was aid that Kyushu was once two island and this volcano, Mt. Aso, was responsible for making them one. On the way down the other side of the mountain we saw this really bizarre little extinct volcano that was covered in grass and didn't look real at all! It was really neat! Arriving at the hotel we had another very Japanese dinner, another bath on the top floor and passed out.
Day three was a long drive to the southern part of Kyushu to a garden that used to be owned by a very important samurai clan which was also near the last battles before samurai went extinct altogether. It overlooked another very active volcano, this one as an island right off the coast which had it not been so cloudy would have been visibly spouting out puffs of ash. I suppose it's not really an island anymore though, as an eruption about 100 years ago connected it to the mainland, the strangest thing is the evacuees hardly let the mountain settle down before they builty right back over top of the ash and lava it had spat out! Anyways, the garden was lovely (and very hot) with many sections to it with little shrines nestled in bamboo groves and ponds with waterfalls, bridges and lanterns, a shrine dedicated to the cats that made an early journey to Korea with the explorers and lots of cute shops with one selling purple potato ice cream!
After the garden we went to a super lame omiyage place, and then the totally awesome Kirishima shrine with a rock that is apparently mentioned in the the Japanese anthem. Finally we made our way through winding mountains to a nice hotel overlooking the bay and Sakurajima, the volcano, which of course was clouded over... with some time before dinner I took a little hike back to where we had passed a waterfall, and spent a good amount of time perched on a rock enjoying the mist that blew down to me on the breeze. Dinner was another Japanese affair followed by a bath. This time the bath was outside arranged is this amazing rock garden, guarded by shrubs, lanterns and a beautiful crescent moon. I perched on yet another rock and kept my gaze trained on the moon which drifted in and out of steam from the hot spring.
A long drive that took us back north found us on a pretty canal drifting along in a narrow boat powered by a entertaining old man and a pole. We paddled past turtles, herons, a little floating market and buildings with perfect reflections, and under bridges just big enough for the boat and it's passengers if they ducked. It was really nice and the sun even came out a little so that a beautiful blue sky could at last be enjoyed. All too fast it was over, and once again we were on the bus, this time destined for the lamest of all stops, this weird porcelain park that was modeled after a European town with a giant palace and years of renovations needed to remake it's rundown atmosphere... After that it was on to Nagasaki for a brief walk around the peace park (I'd been before) to see the famous peace statue, the wings of water fountain, the epicenter and the remains of a church that was caught in the atomic explosion.
At last the day came to an end and we were free! Our hotel was this lovely place that clung to the mountain side and overlooked the bay, downtown, a temple and graveyard and the mountain which we would take a rope way up later to enjoy the night view; one of Japan's three best! The walk down was invigorating: first the evening bells echoed throughout the sloped city so that there song pooled in the bay and wafted up through the hills where I navigated a narrow set of stairs picking its way through a graveyard fresh with flowers from Obon, and then came the temple gong vibrating through the ground and me as well. Around me was the sound of summer in the bug's call and a horn sounded from a ship heading under the suspension bridge to the freedom of the open ocean. A glimpse of red caught my eye, behind the temple a little shrine lay tucked behind the graves of stone. The last gong came with the smell of incense cascading through the night air as it held me back a long moment to breath and intake the wonderment of being so little in a world so sublime. With that, I was back in our world and in down town on my way up the mountain on the other side of the valley. The night view was rather remarkable and now picture does it justice for our lookout was surround on three sides by the impressive expanse of lights and the fourth side looked out to the open oceans dotted with islands just visible in the fading sun. We finished the evening with a walk to the glasses bridge, the beautiful stoned arched bridge that reflects in the water to look like glasses, and caught a taxi back up to the hotel where I bathed and promptly fell asleep.
We had only the morning in Nagasaki the next day but spent it by glimpsing Dejima, the island that once housed the Dutch merchants who were the only foreigners allowed contact with the Japanese during the 200 years of isolation, catching the glasses bridge in the day time between willow trees and I skipped across stones in the water and played with this really beautiful black and gold koi fish in the stream, checking out the oldest church in Japan and finally briefly walking the streets of China town! After that it was bus and home. The airplane did cool things flying home and as it happened, we flew right over Tokyo and I got to see Tokyo Tower, the sky tree and Disneyland from the sky, it was really cool!
Upon arrival in Tokyo I sent Sheena home and had a lovely evening to myself perusing the English book store in Shibuya and doing a bit of shopping. Everywhere acts as if summer is over but it'll still be hot for another month at least. On the weekend I had an work meeting and a dinner party at my place followed by a fire festival to prevent Fuji from erupting on Sunday, but that's another story~
