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Kobe, Osaka and Kyoto continues

If you read the Kobe, Osaka and Kyoto piece below, you will get the introduction to our Kyoto trip.

Kyoto’s National Art Museum had lovely examples of ancient ceramics, fabric, early books on scrolls, artwork on wall panels, statues of Buddha and guards, and metal works.  Learning about the influence of China on the Japanese language, as well as influences of other Asia countries on early Japan has been fascinating.  I believe that this was our first museum visit in Japan.  Our visit to Eiga-mura, the Japanese version of Universal Studios was another way to view some of the history, albeit somewhat commercialized. According to the studio’s brochure, many of the Japanese movies and day-time shows are actually filmed at this site.  We were able to watch a short play of a samari battle with all of the appropriate sword fighting and drama.  In addition, Nate was able to catch a photo of two geisha actresses in full regalia. 

cheers. 

Kobe, Osaka and Kyoto

A number of short trips have taken place over the last couple of weeks.  We stayed relatively close to home with only one over night.  We explored in Kobe, in Osaka, our neighboring city, and we returned to Kyoto as it is so filled with sights and activities that we needed to continue our exploration. 

Kobe has a suspension bridge, the Awaji Island bridge, which is purported to be the longest suspension bridge in the world.  It has an observation deck that is about 50 meters above the bay.  The observation deck is below the road-bed, so every time trucks would drive over the bridge it would rumble and jump, sounding not unlike an earthquake.  I was a bit nervous being above the bay, but below the highway.  Neither Nate nor I would walk across the glass portion of the walkway.  But Nate did lie on the wooden walkway.



In Osaka, we took a ride on one of Japan’s huge ferris wheel.  The views of the city, a huge, sprawling, relatively uninteresting one, were great, despite the haze.  We also visited the aquarium.  It focused on the ecosystems around the Ring of Fire, and was nicely designed. It boasts having a whale shark in captivity.  It was interesting but sad to see such a beautiful creature in captivity.  The aquarium certainly didn’t rival the Monterey aquarium, but the exhibits were unique and we did see deep ocean flow crabs that were amazingly prehistoric.




Our return to Kyoto included visiting one temple, a museum and Japan’s own version of Universal Studios.  We went to the Nanzenji temple, which is known for its shrines in a forested hollow and a beautiful aquiduct.  We were looking for the waterfall where pilgrims pray while standing underneath.  Unfortunately, due to the lack of rain during this year’s rainy season, the waterfall was a mere trickle.  But the bathing area and all of the shrines in the woods and in caves made the hike worthwhile.




This story will continue above.

Shikoku Continues                                       June 4, 2005

Shikoku Island was shaping up to be thoroughly entertaining.  We had intended to head into the forest to explore and hike.  As we left the main road, the way became considerably more narrow and winding and we realized that our itinerary was going to be blow to bits and we might never make it out the other end.  Luckily, when traveling by car one can change course.  We decided to drive down the coast to one of the capes of the island, Muroto, said to be the doorway to the land of the dead.  Along the way we saw beautiful coastlines, craggy cliffs, smooth sand beaches tucked amid secluded inlets, aquamarine water, crashing waves and myriad surfers.  Luckily, the true identity of the cape did not reveal itself, I guess that only happens during storms. 

After our coast visit we re-entered the forest of the Iya Valley for a shorter, but no less exciting adventure.  We headed to Kazuribashi to visit a replica of a vine bridge that was built (and quickly cut down as protection from marauding invaders) during ancient times.  Crossing the bridge rivals the most exciting amusement park ride.  The bridge was about 40 meter above the river, and was constructed of intertwined vines and wooden slats.  The slats were about 6 cm wide and the spaces between them were about 12 cm.  Of course the bridge swayed, bounced, twisted and lurched as we crossed.  While I held on for dear life, some other tourists walked across as if they were walking along the sidewalk.  

Driving to the bridge and along the Iya Valley gorge was as exciting as walking across the bridge.  The road hugged the slope, was one continuous hair-pin turn, and had unbelievably steep drop-offs.  Its width was frequently no wider than a compact car and there were road-side mirrors to navigate the hair-pins.  Amazingly enough, a full-sized bus traversed the road daily, and local traffic careened down the road, while I was driving a cautious 10 – 20 km/h.  Luckily, we only encountered on-coming traffic on the infrequent straight-aways, which had small turnouts.  Someone was watching over us!!  Nonetheless, the views of the gorge were spectacular and the forest had a wonderful diversity of vegetation. 

The last stop was a small town that boasted a temple that was accessed by climbing 800 steps.  When we arrived at the town, Kotohira, we checked into a minshuku where we were fawned over by our room mother.  She served tea and cakes and explained everything about the minshuku and its onsen.  She was very taken by Nate and kept talking to him despite his clear lack of understanding.  By the time she finished, the heat of the day (30^oC) was abating, although the humidity was still oppressive.  The walk was very enjoyable as most of the tourists had gone, and the way was sprinkled with small, picturesque shrines.  The shrine at the end was very modest, but the views of the valley were terrific, with numerous perfectly shaped cinder-cone mountains.  

We ended our Shikoku visit at a restaurant that had a grill set into the chabudai (low table) where we grilled beef, onions, peppers and cabbage which we ate with rice and drank sake.  Cheers.

Shikoku

The Island of Shikoku                                                            June 3, 2005

 

Our next adventure involved a car trip to the island of Shikoku.  It is one of the larger islands in Japan, is located to the east of Kobe and has some of the country’s larger national forests.  This trip was varied, with a little something for everyone.  I had read that a few of the beaches on the island were famous for attracting nesting loggerhead turtles.  There is even a small museum, partially sponsored by NMFS and other international entities, in a tiny town, Hiwasa, on the west coast.

Fantasizing about seeing turtles nesting in the wild, we headed to Hiwasa, visited the museum, and found ourselves a ratty hotel on the beach.  That evening, while winding down in our room, we were surprised by a loud-speaker from outside.  Given that we could not understand what it was saying and Japan is renowned for political rhetoric spouting from vehicle loud-speakers, we ignored it.  Then the room phone rang three times with no one on the other end.  Finally, a hotel reception staff banged on the door, waving a brochure about a turtle, speaking rapidly, and beckoned us to follow.  We were able to catch something about tomago (eggs), so we knew that he wasn’t telling us that the building was on fire.

He lead us down the dark street where a small crowd had gathered, and as we peered off into the darkness of the beach, I wondered what we were supposed to be seeing.  Finally, we were allowed to enter the beach and we blindly followed the group to a single light on the beach.  There, in a simple enclosure was a loggerhead turtle that had dug her nest and was proceeding to deposit her golf-ball sized eggs.  She was about 84 centimeters long and 64 centimeters wide.  While we watched for over an hour, she kept dropping eggs.  Apparently, they can lay between 100 – 150 eggs in a hole that can range from 20 – 40 centimeter deep.  The turtle biologist who had made the measurements, was answering questions and keeping people from petting the turtle.  People kept streaming onto the beach, having been alerted by the loud-speaker car that kept driving through town. 

This was quite an event.  Young and old alike were watching in quiet awe.  There is a huge respect for turtles in this town.  It is even captured by the local temple which has gold-covered turtles at the base of its turrets. The next morning we saw that two turtles had made their way up the beach to nest.  Having had no expectations about experiencing this, this definitely was a huge highlight.

Hiking the Naksendo Trail

May 26, 2005

Our next trip involved hiking a portion of the Nakasendo trail.  It used to be a post road that ran between Tokyo and Kyoto over mountain passes and lush agricultural valleys.  Hundreds of years ago, it was the main route of travel for shoguns and their entourages, as well as thieves.  Sections of the post road, now a foot-trail, have been preserved and one can get a great sense of history by its traverse.  We chose to hike a five mile segment linking two preserved towns, Magome and Tsumago.

Getting to Magome was an adventure in itself.  We elected to take the cheapest route of travel that involved changing trains four times and then finding a bus to get us to our final destination.  This type of travel can be nerve-wracking as you don’t always make your connections and you frequently wonder whether you have gotten on the right train or how to find the correct bus.  However, after about 5 hours of travel into the interior of Japan, we were dropped by the bus at the base of a steep cobbled road that was crawling with tourists.  We dragged our bags to the tourist information center to find a minshukun (a type of Japanese bed and breakfast) in which to land. 

Magome was a gem.  The center street, the original highway route, was closed to vehicles.  During the day, tour buses dumped hundreds of Japanese tourists into the town, but by 5:00pm, the tourists were gone, most of the souvenir shops were closed and the town looked like a scene out of a shogun movie.  The buildings were wooden, with shoji screens over the windows and doors.  There was water coursing through stone gutters into koi ponds perched alongside the road, turning water wheels and sustaining myriads of colorful flowerpots.

The minshuku provided both dinner and breakfast and in typical, hospitable style, the meals were enormous!!!  It was a good thing that we were going to hike.  The trail was primarily old, unimproved cobble-stone.  As it climbed to a low mountain pass, we traveled through forests of Japanese cypress and bamboo past waterfalls and flowing streams. The views of the valleys were terrific.  On our way downhill to Tsumago, we traversed the countryside past farms with rice paddles and farm fields fit into every nook and cranny.  Despite the beautiful spring weather, we saw very few hikers.  It felt like we had the place to ourselves.  However, once in Tsumago, we found the tourists again.

We caught a taxi back to Magome and feasted on another massive meal.  Our return trip repeated most of the same route, however we took the shinkansen for much of the distance, and it significantly shortened the travel time.  This was a most relaxing and enjoyable trip.