Sayonara Sojourns Pt. 3 Seeing Sendai

So after a rather epic 7 hours of trains, chatting with old geezers, helping a young lady break open a hard boiled egg to discover she spoke almost perfect english, and generally just lolling my way up the country, I finally arrived in Sendai. My initial impression? I was really taken aback by just how lively the place is. I guess it had been over two years since the earthquake and tsunami at that point, and the city is a good distance from the coast, so maybe I should have been less surprised.

The liveliness of course totally worked against my favour this time. I, fool that I am, had completely forgotten to book somewhere to stay for this leg of the journey and so laden with baggage I began a frantic search for somewhere to rest my head. Alas nearly every place I tried turned me away and at one point I thought I may have to rough it in a love hotel. 

These places, funnily enough originally established in Osaka in the 1960's, are pretty damn seedy. They were originally built to allow couples, young and old, a place of privacy away from the cramped confines of modern Japanese living. These days however, they are more likely to be patronised by Japanese Salarymen trying to escaped the cramped confines of married life. Oh and prostitutes, definitely can't forget the prostitutes.

Suffice to say I just couldn't bring myself to stay at one of these places, I'm sure they are physically very clean but I can't quite say the same for the atmosphere inside. Instead I opted for somewhere that was a little bit outside of my usual price range. I figured what the hell, the likelihood of me travelling around Japan by myself is slim for a while and also after all the money I saved with my crazy travelling I could treat myself a bit. My friend was sadly busy that evening so I just settled into my room, watched a bit of walking dead and chomped on some zunda dango. Zunda is a kind of sweet paste made from edamame that is a local speciality and is absolutely delicious. Kind of like sweet mushy peas but way tastier than that sounds.

After a well deserved nights sleep it was off to see what sights Sendai had to offer. My friend had not been in town long and was also eager to have a look about. This friend is that same one I met out in Yokohama who works in the circus. As such she is always moving about the country and, as well as just being generally great company, has lots of great stories of her travels and life in the circus.

With not much lay of the land we copped out and jumped on board Sendai's local tourism bus, the loople. It was pretty cheap for the day pass and since it stops at all of the major sights it seemed like the logical way to go. It also meant we could spend less time thinking about where and how to go to places and more time just idly chatting, which was fine by me as the main reason I'd come out this far was to make the most of the little time I had left to just hang out.

Our first touristy spot was the Zuihoden Mausoleum, the tomb of Date Masamune who was one of the most powerful feudal lords of the Edo period,so powerful in fact he earned the nickname of "The one eyed dragon (独眼竜)", pretty nails right. The most striking thing about the Mauseleum itself is the colour palette. Many vibrant reds, greens, blues and yellows adorn the intricate and it looks as though it would be more at home in a modern chinatown than an ancient Japanese tomb. The surrounding area is also very beautiful with many massive cedar trees, symbolic apparently of the Date clan's long history. Besides the tomb is a nice little museum with exhibits regarding the excavation of the site. My friend was very taken with some of the patterned ornaments and sculptures. I myself was more fascinated with some of the ancient tools, it always amazes me how little things like glasses and scissors have changed over the years.

Next we moved on to Sendai castle, or rather what was left of Sendai castle. Sadly much of it was destroyed by the Meji restoration, a large fire in the late 1800s and bombings during world war II respectively. Whilst there is not much castle action the grounds themselves are pretty impressive. Sendai castle was a Yamajiro (山城) or mountaintop castle, one of the original styles of Japanese castle. As you can imagine from the name it is built on top of a mountain, Mt. Aoba to be precise, and with that comes fantastic sweeping views over the city below. I was happy to trade a view of an ancient Japanese castle for the great views out into Sendai.

With the weather cooling down a bit, it is much milder oop north, we opted out of a bus ride back into town and instead wandered back into town in search of adventure (read lunch). I think it was in the main shopping street that I really started to see the impact of 2011. We managed to find ourself a trendy little cafe with seats next to huge windows that overlook the high street. People watching is a mutual hobby of ours and you would think that the city centre would be ideal, but the streets were barren. 

Around 16,000 people lost there lives in March 2011 and several thousand are still missing. Add to that the numbers who are missing or have been evacuated and you can see it has put a real dent into the local population. The gravitas of the situation didn't really hit me however until I saw it first hand in those empty streets however. My friend showed me some pictures taken from the town nearby where she is staying that is quite literally not there anymore. The pictures were, well I'll let you imagine their emotional impact on me. I really wish I'd got my act together and done some volunteering out there.

Ok onto happier things now. After finishing lunch and ogling a shrine that appeared as though it had had the shopping arcade built around it, we went…fabric shopping! I know nice and exciting right? Well actually I enjoyed it a whole lot more than I was expecting. My friend is very into fabric, textiles and craft working and when you are around someone that enthusiastic it is impossible to not be drawn in yourself.

Sadly following this we had to part ways as my friend was a little knackered due to her intense work schedule. It's tough being a clown. I didn't mind too much, it would of been nice to spend a bit more time together but I can totally understand just wanting time for yourself so you can just relax. I figured I could use my remaining time to head out and see the new Gibli film I'd wanted to catch before I left Japan. Sadly the nearby cinema was only showing Hollywood fare and the other cinema was too far out of town. Instead I spent the final few hours in a Starbucks catching up on emails and chatting on Facebook, almost as good right? Right?

Well that ends my Tohoku travels. I took a night bus out at around midnight. It wasn't as hellish as the usual journeys but sadly all the seats were furbished with a built in sega mega drive simulator. I quickly located Sonic and Knuckles and, as I'm sure you could guess, didn't sleep very much that night either.

Ja mata neee.

Tokyo Day 2 – To Fuji

With a big stretch and a yawn our wonderful Liverpool arose to some spectacularly clear blue skies in their swanky hotel in one of the more up market business districts of Tokyo. Ok I’ll drop the weird third person perspective but the sky really was amazing on our second day in Japan’s capital. So clear in fact that it was possible to see Mt. Fuji from our hotel windows. Well that was that then our goal for the day was clearly settled. We were off to get a closer look at Fuji.

I’ll have to just spend a bit of time here to discuss how amazing the train systems are in Japan. It really is easy and fairly inexpensive to get across the length and breadth of the country by train. Now fair enough Shinkansen costs can start to add up but if you are willing to grin and bare through some slightly longer journey times you can get pretty far by local trains.

A quick flick through the guide-book and a potter on the internet found us a likely candidate for a nice place for a bit of mountain watching and photography. Gotemba (御殿場). In truth it’s a tiny little town, in fact there is almost nothing there, but it is the gateway to Fuji, one of the two main trails starts from Gotemba.

 

It was however perfect for our current purpose and the views were spectacular. Fuji absolutely dominates the landscape with clear shots being available wherever you walk. Also with Gotemba being so tiny it gave my Dad his long desired insight into what the ‘real Japan’ looks like. Sadly much like suburbia anywhere else in the world.

After a good wander and much mountain snapping we made our way back towards the train station with our beady eyes peeled for a coffee shop. I think it’s fair to say that, unlike in Europe, there is still little in the way of coffee shop culture in Japan outside of the big cities and, unsurprisingly, we were pretty hard pressed to find anything. Still we did find something eventually although a little outside of our expectations.

 

It was a coffee shop sure, but it also doubled as a clothes shop for women. The most eye catching thing, besides of course the rather flamboyant owner, were the various nicknacks that were all over the shop, including a Princess Diana memorial plate. Well after seeing that how could we not enter. The old lady was pretty interesting, mostly shocked that tourists would come all the way out to Gotemba let alone patronise her shop. There were pictures of her all over the place from her younger days including a picture of her on her way up Fuji. The coffee and tea was pretty pricey but I think the whimsical charm of the shop made up for it.

After that we made our way back. I opted to take local trains rather than the shinkansen, it’s expensive やで。It did mean sacrificing speed but the lovely costal views on the way back Tokyo made up for it, and I got to get a bit of reading in too. I do love trains deep down, I guess I have to since I spend almost a quarter of my time on them it seems, and I think I get all of my best reading done on them.

 

Pretty wiped we just milled about the hotel for a while before embarking into the surrounding madness that is Shiba. This is clearly a central business area as the surrounding streets are just chock full of Izakaya’s and pachinko parlors to cater for the outpouring of office workers after a hard days work. We went into one such establishment for some yakitori and I did some people watching.

The speed at which these guys got totally rat-arsed and chain-smoked their way through packets of cigarettes is pretty alarming. This is a side of Japanese society a lot of people outside of the country don’t see and to be honest it’s something I really don’t like. You sacrifice everything to your company, head out to a bar late, eat, drink away the stress, head home on the last train and then do it all again the next day.

The more I see it the more I realise it is not what I want. I just can’t take the high tension Japanese working life and seeing it up close and personal on this trip really hit that home for me. While I do like it here it reminded of one scary fact. I can’t stay, I just don’t fit. I love the people, and some of the cultural aspects of Japan are truly wonderful and admirable but I can’t slot in as another cog of Japanese society. I want to turn left when it wants me to turn right.

Sorry to end on a bum note but that was a really strong memory from the time in Mita. The lines and lines of men and women in Identical suits streaming out of offices and into Izakaya’s late at night is a bit scary to me. It is admittedly a bit better at least than some of the drinking culture in the UK but if that’s all there is for me if I stay here then I can’t do it. It really hits home how much I love the freedom of thought and expression that is afforded to me by research and how lucky, truly lucky, I am to be paid to do nothing but think somedays.

Next post will be a bit happier I promise, it has clowns and stuff. Also here are some wonderful Japan rail train sounds.

Ja mata neeee.

Hokkaido Yuki Matsuri

So after almost 2 years of hard work, stress, sleepless nights and god knows what else I’ve finally managed to get me some data I can work with. This of course means I’m now elbow deep in data analysis. A lot less stressful than experiments for sure but also a lot less fun. It’s repetitive, it’s boring and, thanks to the ambiguity of the technique I’m working with, seemingly never ending. But at least I have something I can work with.

Data analysis does however come with some benefits though. Almost all the analysis is computer based and as such can be done anywhere. This means I can do the unthinkable and…take a holiday mid-week. I know I know it’s very out of character and I’m pretty sure very un Japanese but hey, I’m not Japanese and neither is my boss so I managed to get away with.

So what prompted the desire to take a bit of a break, apart from being fully done in by several months of hard experiments? Well I’ll tell you. With my departure immanent, albeit not as soon as I was thinking it would be, I’ve been taking every opportunity to explore further afield whilst I’m in Japan. With that I decided to head out to the northern most reaches of Japan, Hokkaido.

The northern Island of Japan is famous for several things. Its natural beauty in any season is lorded by many of those on the mainland, its low population means that much of the natural landscape lays undisturbed. The same can also be said of its wildlife. Sadly this is best seen in the summer months and as we are in the middle of winter there wasn’t much chance of that. However winter also boasts some unnatural beauties of it’s own in the form of the Sapporo Yuki Matsuri (札幌雪祭り).

The snow festival is one of Japan’s biggest events seeing more than 2 million people flock to Hokkaido annually to bare witness. It was started by a few High school students building Snow statues in the centrally located Oodori park in the 1950’s and has grown and grown ever since. One of my favourite facts is that the local defence force is required to participate as a training exercise.

The festival runs for one week and whilst you can visit the sculptures anytime I definitely recommend heading down after dark. Sure it’s freaking cold (about -10­⁰C)

And yes the streets are crowded but the lighting is absolutely fabulous and really accentuates just how amazing these things are. Pictures do not do these things justice. The scale is just something else with entire buildings being reconstructed purely out of snow. I was pretty much in awe of everything I walked past, some of these sculptures were easily over 10 metres.

A little bit down the way is Sapporo’s central entertainment district, Susukino, where the streets are lined with spectacular ice sculptures. Again these really need to be seen at night as the pure ice glistens with the surrounding lighting. Once more I really can’t do these justice with pictures but I gave it a go anyway. If you go for the start of the festival you can also be treated to watching some of the sculptors hard at work with their chainsaws putting together some of the statues.

Of course no festival in Japan would be complete without Yatai’s, small portable food stores, and these were a bit of a treat. The other thing Hokkaido is famous for, besides nature and being mega cold, is food. It is one of Japan’s central agricultural hubs, being home to about a quarter of Japan’s arable land. Add to this the cold northern seas and that gives you great fish and veggies to boot.

Being that it is very cold Hokkaido food tends to be on the heartier side but when you are out in sub-zero temperatures that is pretty welcome. The miso ramen was amazing, a really nice blend of aka and shiro miso, and the curry soup is possibly the tastiest thing I’ve eaten in Japan. Sadly as it was only a 2 day stay I missed out on all the good seafood but as it was crab season I think I would have missed out anyway.

Due to the short nature of the trip there really wasn’t much chance for side trips unfortunately but I did manage one. Just a short journey from the centre, maybe 30 minutes by train and bus, is a small peak called Moiwa san. It’s not particularly but it does offer some amazing views out over Sapporo, as well as having a rather unique cable car journey to the summit. Sapporo doesn’t have many tall buildings so you can really see pretty far out across the area.

To be honest that is pretty much it. I probably spent as much time travelling out there as I actually did in Hokkaido but I’m really glad I went. My favourite moment? Well that is a bit private but one thing I found highly amusing was Panasonics stage at the Snow festival. They had cornered off an area to advertise their new range of air-conditioners, complete with Hawaiian scenery and a fake beach. Was it successful? I’ll let the thermometer do the talking.

Mata ne.

Finally Fuji

Well this post is long, long, long overdue but I am finally getting around to writing it. Yes you read the title correctly After a year and a half in Japan I finally got around to summiting its largest peak, and what self –respecting mountain man would I be had I not. My journey up was a little a-typical (well the start at least) but all the more fun for it I think.

So where to begin? Well let’s start with the weekend before. I had an absolute blast at a music festival called Summer Sonic. This is probably one of the biggest music events of the year in Kansai and it was pretty cool. Four stages of (mostly) excellent music, lots of people and, at least on the second day, great weather.

 

The first day was incredible though for far different reasons. Mainly a huge thunderstorm broke out halfway through the day. I have seriously never been that close to lightning. It was scary, harrowing and amazing al at once. The crowd ended up holed inside a baseball stadium for a few hours, a little miserable and soggy, until the power came back on.

After about two an a half hours everything restarted and I still managed to be introduced to some interesting new bands as well as seeing some of my all time favourite artists. It was a fun experience and I’d been craving live music, there is a bit of a drought in my area, I think I need to really get into the Japanese music scene.

 

Anyway I’m getting a little sidetracked so now onto the journey to Fuji. It started with yet another night bus journey to Tokyo. Once there I met up with an old friend from the UK who would be my climbing partner for the night. Yup that’s right we decided to opt for the traditional night climb up Fuji-san to see the sunrise from the Summit.

Standing over 3700 metres, Fuji-san is the highest point in all of Japan. In fact it is not a mountain at all but an active volcano, although it’s been around 300 years since it last erupted. It’s fairly verdant on the way up most likely due to the rich nutrients in the surrounding soil. Being so massive it features heavily in much of Japanese folklore, songs, poetry and so on. It is probably one of Japans most Iconic symbols and I really couldn’t end my stay here without visiting.

That being said we set off from Shinjuku on the 3 hour journey by train and bus to Fujiyoshida before setting off up to the fifth station (河口湖五合目). Once we arrived we met a great deal of people also readying for the night climb. As I said it is a very popular way to climb Fuji and to be honest even if you were to set out on your own you wouldn’t be lonely for long.

The climb itself is just a long and steady march to the top. There are plenty of mountain huts along the way to take a breather if you need one, usually necessary after the particularly steep portions. This climb is in no way difficult and there are plenty of pensioners and young children also on the trail. I think most people opt to climb a little earlier and bed down in one of the mountain huts to wake up for sunrise. This is expensive though so we opted to plough through the night.

This is the highest I have ever climbed and I was a little surprised by how quick the temperature changed, I went from roasting to freezing in a couple of hours. The oxygen level difference was also noticeable though nowhere near as bad as I was expecting. One thing that really made me giggle however was the over the top nature of many Japanese climbers, stopping every five minutes to take massive gulps from their oxygen canisters. The top moment was seeing a group of guys all taking deep pulls from said canisters before lighting up a ciggy each. Priceless.

I was also surprised at just how many huts there are. Whilst really expensive they were a bit of a god send near the top where I was deffo in need of a hot drink or two, the cup of 甘酒 near the top was divine. We reached the summit in about 6 hours, about an hour of this was spent queuing to complete the last 100 metres, and after a brief wait were greeted by the sun.

It made all the struggle worth it. I can’t put into words what the view was like adequately and sadly my phone’s little camera could not do the sunrise justice. As the sun rises up over the mountains and if the sky is exceptionally clear, as it was for us, you can really see huge rays of light spiking out in a half circle across the landscape. It looks just like the Iconic flag of the Japanese military.

Thoroughly awed and a little bit chilly we started to make our way back down. The ascent had been a pleasant one but I cannot say the same for the descent. The path consists of what felt like an infinite number of short zig-zags leading back down to the 6^th station information hut. The view never changes and the path is made up of small ash shale, which is not firm underfoot. You could probably run it in about 40 minutes but I did not have the energy for that. This part seemed to go on forever.

 

Once we’d finally got back to Kawaguchiko-eki we treated ourselves to some amazing udon, it’s about twice as thick as normal udon in Kawaguchiko and called houtou udon. With warm food in our bellies we nodded of quickly on the train journey back to Tokyo for some hard earned rest.

I think I fully appreciate why this Japanese proverb exists, “He who climbs Fuji is a wise man, he who climbs twice is a fool.” The ascent was fine and dandy and the views were gorgeous but on the way down all I could think of was “I want off of this rock.” My choice of climbing conditions also weren’t the best I think and it took me a good few days to really recover from this.

Anyway that's it for now.

Ja mata ne.

Yakushima pt 3.

Some how or other I did manage to wake up at 4am. Sadly however a tropical rainstorm was a blowing so all chances of heading up to Jomon-sugi where off. Whilst I’m sure it’s fairly impressive I doubt it would have been quite so if we’d spent several hours slogging through torrential rain.

Instead we opted to head one of the most accessible areas of forest on the Island, Yakusugiland. I realize that makes it sound like a bit of a theme park, and to be honest in parts it feels like it, but it is a genuine are of the forest that has been sectioned off and left open to the public.  The joy of this place is the choice. There are several routes that can be taken depending on your hiking ability and inclination and all of them offer sights of impressively tall and old tree’s.

Thanks to the bad weather we were forced to start a little later but it wasn’t too bad. It gave me a chance to talk to our host a bit more. The auld Dutchman was quite a character and it seemed he had been around most of Asia and Oceania (chasing ladies no less) before finally deciding to settle in Yakushima. It was on his recommendation that we headed to Yakusugiland as it was apparently still pleasant in poor weather.

After another long and windy bus ride we arrived at a hut marking the entrance of the forest and, after a little bit of confusion, we were on our way. We’d been told that the forests are actually best seen after a bit of rainfall and I can now testify that to be true. Not only is the sight of moss glistening on the leaves amazing, but the rivers and falls are much more impressive and that wonderful smell of damp foliage fills the air.

Whilst Yakusugiland does contain many well-paved trails with ample hand rails, if you opt for the longest course, as we did, then there is quite a bit of rough terrain also. After all the rain I was very glad to have rented some hiking boots, I think my ankles were glad as well with the ground being so slippery.

We followed the 3 hour course and far too soon reached the halfway point. It is here that the trail branches off with a steep climb towards one of the giant granite peaks of Yakushima, Tachu dake. I wouldn’t have known about this if not for my guidebook that I’m very glad I purchased. After a short debate we decided to go for it. We still had plenty of time and it felt as though the hike would have been over far too soon anyway.

The initial branch takes a very steep climb and it was surprisingly tough going. Gone where the carefully laid rocks and wood and the trail was mostly outlined by the roots of the trees themselves.  The steep climb is eventually rewarded as the trail levels out into a beautiful patch of forest.

Unlike Shiritani that we visited yesterday, this forest was the real deal. The current situation had been un touched for several centuries. The number of fallen tree’s was far fewer and there was a much higher density of the giants. It was awe inspiring, truly, something I’ve never come across before and reminded me just how much I love nature.

Yomping through the forest was great fun.  The trail was still wonderfully outlined by little pink ribbons but the path itself was not so pristine, occasionally we’d have to scurry over rocks, little streams and duck under fallen tree trunks. Eventually the trail leads into the protected Unesco area itself.

The nicest thing about this trail is it is far less travelled than a lot of the others.. We bumped into about ten other hikers tops on our way giving a wonderful sense of detachment from the ‘real world’. We did however share the toughest part of the climb with a Japanese couple who huffed and puffed up the 1km of about 20-50 degree incline with us.

This part was a lot of fun for me and maybe less fun for my friend. I love climbing as well all know and here I was in my monkey element, bounding up rocks, clambering over roots and hauling myself p the various ropes. To their credit though they managed everything with very little help from me and I only had to slow down a little bit.

That climb up was the most fun I’d had in such a long time, even if it seemed to go on forever. The problem is that the peak of Mt. Tachu is visible for quite a lot of the climb up. It’s always just out of reach as the path winds around, up and down. Eventually we got there though.

After one final rock climb we pulled ourselves up onto Tachu dake to take in the breathtaking view of…well a sea of white actually. It was a pretty cloudy day and at 1400m we were well above the cloud layer. The vast expanse of nothingness was still quite a spectacle however and well worth the climb up. After sharing a few “お疲れ様‘s” over lunch we turned around and began our desent.

At this point I realised we may be a bit short on time so we really had to go for it on our way back down. Since it was mostly downhill I was worried that it may be a bit tricky due to the steep gradient. Thankfully that wasn’t the case and we returned to Yakusugiland in half the time it had taken to climb up。We were even greeted by a troupe of wild macaques on the way down, I thought we weren’t going to see any by this point.

 

 After a brief pause we continued around the rest of Yakusugiland. Some of the paths were really nice, with several suspension bridges over the river that ran through the centre. My favorite of all the tree’s in there definitely had to be the Buddha sugi, on which one of the growths apparently resembles the Buddha’s face. I was definitely feeling a bit spiritual in the post climb euphoria.

We arrived back at the entrance with about two minutes to spare before the last bus. Bundled back to Onoaida we had a quick dip in the local onsen, an impressively warm 45 degree hot spring, before dinner and passing out from exhaustion.  Sadly that was our last day. The following morning I began the epic return journey to home ready for work the next day. I don’t quite know how I managed to come back to reality after such an awesome trip and I highly recommend spending sometime in Yakushima if your body and budget allow.

読み込みを継続していただきありがとうございます。

Ja ne.

Yakushima pt 1

Well Golden week has come and gone but I figured it's about time I let you know what I got up to. I’ve become more than a little burned out with all this hard work so its good to finally get an opportunity to relax. Golden week is a bunch of Japanese holidays that are organised together to allow for the maximum amount of holiday time during the week, and many people take the extra intervening days off as well.

My first destination for golden week was to be the gorgeous, sub-tropical, island paradise of Yakushima. It lies a couple of hundred kilometers off the coast of Kyushuu, the southern most region of Japan’s mainland. The journey there itself was quite an adventure. Due to a miscommunication with my friend I  did not have a flight ticket booked to Kagoshima. Disaster. Thankfully Japanese trains are incredible so it turned out to be no problem whatsoever.

I took a 5am sleeper train out of Himeji followed by a 3 hour Shinkansen ride to Kagoshima, good job I like trains and the Shinkansen are more comfortable than planes anyway, you even get a charger point for your phone or laptop. Once at Kagoshima it was another twenty minutes on the bus to the port and then a two-hour jaunt on a high-speed jetfoil to reach Yakushima itself.

The boat ride itself was amazingly comfortable thanks to a very still sea. We were treated to some excellent views of the many Islands of Kyushuu’s coast along the way including an active volcano. Even more of a surprise at about halfway we were joined for a short while by a pod of dolphins.

Yakushima is a hugely impressive site upon arrival. It is predominantly mountain and from the coast you can see what appears to be an impenetrable wall of towering peaks. It also gets an incredible amount  of rainfall , about 10000mm a year, and as such is full to the brim of plant life.

It is the plant life in fact that Yakushima is most famous for, in particular the giant cedar trees, or Yakusugi (屋久杉)These towering green giants live for millennia and attract tourists from all across Japan, and the rest of the world, to visit and bask in the glories of nature.

The cedar themselves were once harvested for building materials, mostly to be fashioned into rough tiles. They are particularly tough, the wood itself is very hard and due to the consistency of the resin within also highly waterproof. Sadly this meant the great trees were felled in their hundreds for several centuries. Sometime in the Edo period however it was decided that they were a national treasure and should be preserved.

This has now been extended to giving around two thirds of the island natural world heritage site status and the trees are no longer cut down. Now people come to the island to trek through these, almost, virgin forests and escape the drudgery of everyday life. Whilst it isn’t the wonderful isolating experience one would hope for it is still astoundingly beautiful and Yakushima caters for everyone from the casual stroller to the hardcore mountaineer.

Once on the Island our first port of call, after the port, was to get to our accommodation. This was a little easier said than done. The Island buses were on a pretty irregular schedule and stopped running fairly early. This isn’t helped by the fact the island really only has one main road.

Still somehow we made it to the sleepy little town of Onoaida and our lodging for the next few days, Jerry’s Mandela campsite. It was a nice enough little place run by an elderly Dutchman called Rainer, who’d travelled the world it seemed and decided to settle on the island, and his wife (I assume though I didn’t ask) Naoko. They were both friendly and very helpful the whole time. I think had we not been so knackered from travelling and hiking it would have been nice to chat to them a bit more.

Settled in we then wandered around the village a bit. It really was very quiet, with a single shop and a couple of restaurants. Apparently it had been a bit more of a hub of activity in the past with the southern administrative office being situated here but this, along with most of the official buildings had been moved to Miyanoura.

We wandered around a bit more before attempting to get to the coast. As I mentioned Yakushima is almost exclusively mountain so there is not much space to build inland. With a bit of clambering we got down to the sea and I was hit with another wave of nostalgia. Sitting on those large granite outcroppings and peering into rock pools took me right back to childhood trips around the Wirral and into Wales. It helped that the weather was absolutely beautiful as well.

As the sun began to set we made our way back up to the guesthouse and started making plans for tomorrow. Thanks to the quirky bus schedule it’d be a pretty early start, those buses were the bane of my existence I need to learn to drive. Since we’d been up at 4am that morning and not really stopped since it wasn’t long before we ventured into the land of nod, softly dreaming of the wonders to come. 

Mata kondo ne