Due to global warming, squid catches have been declining nationwide. Squid used to be a food for the common people, but now it is considered a luxury item. They cut up the squid while it’s still alive and you eat it while it’s still moving, so it’s a completely cruel story. It’s certainly delicious, and if you can’t finish it, they’ll make tempura out of the rest. This is even more delicious than raw squid. No wonder it’s expensive.
Squid dishes (1)
Squid dishes (2)
Yobuko Morning Market (11)
Yobuko Morning Market (12)
Yobuko Morning Market (10)
Although Yobuko’s morning market is one of the four major morning markets, there are not many stalls. Perhaps because it is a weekday. On the other hand, there are many police crackdowns on vehicles everywhere you enter the city. Tourists are not squid, so what’s the point of increasing the catch, or rather the number of arrests, in such a place? Drivers, please be careful. Recommended souvenirs include salt harvested from the mineral-rich Genkai Sea, mozuku seaweed that can be frozen in salt water, and dried mackerel, horse mackerel, and barracuda.
Yobuko Morning Market (5)
Yobuko Morning Market (9)nice smile
Yobuko Morning Market (1)
Yobuko Morning Market (3)
Yobuko Morning Market (6)Whales in the past, squids now
Yobuko Morning Market (4)
Yobuko Morning Market (7)
Yobuko Morning Market (8)
By the way, I don’t know who decides the top three or four, but I don’t like that Hachinohe’s Tatehana Wharf Morning Market isn’t included. I think that place is number one.
If you go to Cape Hado, you can see Iki, of course, and if you look closely, you can even see Tsushima. However, when I asked the locals, they said it was impossible to see Busan, South Korea, even in good weather. But it really made me realize how close we were to the border.
The fact that more than 130 Sengoku Daimyo(Regional rulers during the Sengoku period), who had previously fought bloody battles, were able to gather together to make up one team was possible only because of the command of Hideyoshi, who had unified the country. Moreover, Nagoya Castle, which was the same size as Osaka Castle, was completed in just a few months, and this walled city, which housed 200,000 troops dispatched to Korea and 100,000 people stationed there, only lasted seven years, falling into ruins with Hideyoshi’s death. There is an anecdote that Hideyoshi was pleased because the name Nagoya, where the castle was located, is pronounced the same as Nagoya, Hideyoshi’s hometown, but it seems that Nagoya in Kyushu was a more famous place name at that time.
Nagoya castle (3)
Nagoya castle (4)
After it was abandoned, the castle walls were reused as raw materials for Karatsu Castle and other buildings, and no longer retain their original form. However, there was an example of Hara Castle, which remained intact during the Shimabara Rebellion, becoming a base for an armed uprising by oppressed Christians, and it seems that the castle was actively demolished out of fear that a similar incident might occur. This is why there are few clear traces, and it is understandable that only some stone walls and earthworks remain. Furthermore, it is unusual for feudal lords to have their castles concentrated in such a densely packed area, especially on hilly terrain.
The dispatch of troops to Korea is seen as Hideyoshi’s ambition to invade the Ming Dynasty, but in any case, this battle caused a division among the Toyotomi clan’s vassals after Hideyoshi’s death between those who dispatched troops to Korea and those who remained behind to take charge of the supply routes, and Ieyasu‘s cunning took advantage of this, leading to the downfall of the Toyotomi clan. On the other hand, Korea’s land was devastated, and the Ming Dynasty lost its national power and was destroyed by the Qing Dynasty, a foreign ethnic group from the north. No one involved gained anything. It is clear that Korea and the Ming Dynasty were the ones who suffered the most.
pottery village Imari (10)
However, it wasn’t all bad. The soldiers who went to war had a hard time, but the feudal lords stayed behind and indulged in the tea ceremony, which helped spread Momoyama culture throughout the country. Potters brought from Korea laid the foundations for pottery in this area. The museum, located in a corner of the castle, is free to visit and is packed with historical documents. It even features a reproduction of the gold tea room where Hideyoshi held his tea ceremony. The construction of the tea room alone cost 30 million yen, and 16,000 sheets of gold leaf weighing 500 grams were used, with two layers of gold leaf. The shoji screens are made of red silk and feature a watermark of the paulownia crest. Apparently, a tea ceremony is held in this tea room once a year, and even the participation fee of 10,000 yen may be worth it. However, it is unlikely that you will be able to fully experience the feeling of wabi-sabi.
Nagoya castle (1)Golden Tea House in Museum
Nagoya castle (2)
Detour
Nanatsugama(Seven pots) is a place where the columnar joints have been eroded by the waves of the Genkai Sea, creating seven hollowed-out caves.
Nanatsu-gama (4)A wind-weathered sign
Apparently, the deepest cave is 100m, and when the sea is calm, you can go all the way to the back by sightseeing boat. The sea was raging on the day we went, and it was terrifying. I can imagine that it must have been extremely difficult to row out to Korea from here during the Korean War.
The town “Karatsu” was so crowded with people that I wondered where all these people were coming from in such a rural town. Through the crowd, 14 two-ton floats made in the late Edo period race down the narrow streets one after the other. Each community has its own float, but the number of people pulling these floats is incredible. The floats are decorated with lion masks, warrior helmets, sea bream, and dragon ornaments that swing like pendulums, giving the floats a sense of dynamism. The entire float is made of gorgeous lacquer.
karatsu kunchi fes (1)
karatsu kunchi fes (4)
karatsu kunchi fes (5)
karatsu kunchi fes (6)
karatsu kunchi fes (7)
karatsu kunchi fes (8)
karatsu kunchi fes (9)
karatsu kunchi fes (11)
karatsu kunchi fes (10)
karatsu kunchi fes (14)
karatsu kunchi fes (13)
When turning into an alley, the persons sitting at the front of the float brake with the soles of their feet while the persons at the back forcefully turn the float, leaving clear brake marks on the road. To be honest, the enormous number of pullers at the front are not actually very useful in pulling the float, and it is moved by the more powerful people in front and behind the float, who are right next to it.
karatsu kunchi fes (3)
The sacred object enshrined at Karatsu Shrine is carried between the floats as a portable shrine, with the priest sitting on it. He didn’t move an inch until it passed right in front of me, so I thought it was a doll, but it was actually a real person.
karatsu kunchi fes (2)
The highlight is when the float is pulled into the sandy rest stops outside of shrine. As with any shrine, the deity travels away from the shrine once a year, and the vehicle on which it rides is called “Mikoshi.” It seems that the gods get bored of staying in the same place for a whole year, so this journey is the festival itself. The rest stops at the destinations are called “Otabisho.”
karatsu kunchi fes (15)
karatsu kunchi fes (17)
karatsu kunchi fes (16)
karatsu kunchi fes (18)
Returning to the main topic, at the Karatsu Kunchi festival, the rest stops are located on sandy ground on the coast, so it is hard to understand why the floats are pulled into such sandy ground that they would sink into it, but this scene is certainly the most exciting. The floats cannot be pulled into the designated place in one go, so they are pulled in with repeated shouts. The floats line up in a single line, turning back and forth like a car parking in a garage.
You can find your view points of Karatsu Kunchi on the following map published by Karatsu tourism office
Karatsu Kunchi course map and time
Near this rest stops is the former Takatori residence, the mansion of a coal mining magnate. Inside the huge house, cedar sliding doors have been removed to create a path for performers to emerge from the left, and the tatami mats on the stage have been removed to reveal a Noh stage underneath. There is a hollow stone underneath the stage, and when performers stomp on it, the sound echoes loudly. This is how he would entertain guests at his home to watch Noh performances. It’s a truly luxurious story.
karatsu city (3)
karatsu city (2)Takatori Residence
Furthermore, in this mansion, the best rooms are not those on the south side, which get plenty of sunlight, but those on the north side, which face the coast and offer a miniature garden of islands floating in the Genkai Sea, peeking through the pine forest. Just like in England, rooms facing north are considered superior.
karatsu city (1)
A short walk from the former Takatori residence along the remaining stone walls of the castle town will take you to the restored Karatsu Castle. If you climb up to the castle tower, you can enjoy a 360-degree view of Karatsu city, the sea, and the arching Niji-no-Matsubara (one of Japan’s three great pine groves). However, you can still see it in the garden in front of the castle tower without having to pay to climb it.
karatsu city (5)
karatsu city (4)
karatsu city (6)Karatsu Castle
karatsu city (14)
karatsu city (15)bank
karatsu city (6) a
karatsu city (7)
karatsu city (8)
karatsu city (9)pine forest
karatsu city (10)
Detour
On the way back to the town bustling with the festival, I came across the wharf for the ferry to Takashima. Takashima is a small, trapezoidal island floating in Karatsu Bay, and its shape suggests that it is an island that brings good fortune. Once on the island, you’ll find Hohto Shrine, a popular spot where prayers are said to grant you the blessing of winning the lottery. You’ll want to get at least the money back for the prayer fee and the ferry ticket…
It is said to be the longest suspension bridge in Japan, Ryujin Ohtsuribashi, but I don’t see any reason to build a bridge here. It’s clear that the purpose is to attract tourists. I wonder if there’s anything interesting I can see on the other side of the bridge. Also, the bridge is made of a fairly sturdy steel frame, so there’s no shaking at all and it’s not thrilling at all.
dragon god suspension bridge (1)
dragon god suspension bridge (2)
dragon god suspension bridge (3)
dragon god suspension bridge (5)
The only thrilling thing about the bridge is that you can bungee jump from the middle, but no one was there.
bungee jump entrance in dragon god suspension bridge
The Kyushu suspension bridge, Japan’s second largest, feels more swaying, and on the other side you can touch two white snakes that symbolizes good fortune.
suspension bridge0
suspension bridge6 white snake named toguro
suspension bridge7 white snake named makitsuki
Detour
soba restaurant fujihiro
The road leading to the Ryujin Suspension Bridge is called the Soba Highway. You can enjoy freshly made soba noodles at one of the soba restaurants, Fujihiro. It reminds me of a soba restaurant in Yamagata.
To get to the falls, you either have to give up and park in a free parking lot quite a ways off and walk in the scorching sun of heart Japan, or you have to misjudge the free parking lot and drive deep into the souvenir street, where you’re stuck and can’t get anywhere, only to be guided by a shop assistant holding a fan (with a sign saying parking is 500 yen).
Furthermore, you have to pay an entrance fee to enter a long tunnel before you reach the front of the waterfall. The tunnel is decorated with illuminations, but the illuminations look a bit cheap considering the great outdoors ahead.
fukuroda fall (2) inside tunnel
Suddenly, the front of an overwhelming waterfall like nothing I’ve ever seen before comes into view. Water flows down the huge rock face in multiple streams (like Snoopy Waterfall, but huge!) , and the sound is so loud it’s difficult to even hold a conversation. The waterfall is made up of several tiers from the top, but the key point is that you can’t see it from the front for free.
fukuroda fall (3)
fukuroda fall (4)
fukuroda fall (5)
fukuroda fall (6)
If you take the elevator up from here, you can see the upper tier of the waterfall all the way to the back (like Yokoya Ravine, but huge!), and the amount of water flowing down makes the rock face appear to be in the shape of a heart, which has led to it being introduced as a power spot.
fukuroda fall (7)
However, it was extremely difficult to find the shape, and I ended up taking many photos, checking each time to see if it looked like a heart, which took quite a while. I think the claim that it looks like a heart is a bit of an exaggeration or a pushy advertisement.
fukuroda fall (8)
fukuroda fall (10)
fukuroda fall (9)
fukuroda fall (11)
Apparently it gets incredibly crowded during the autumn foliage season, but you can still enjoy the coolness even in the height of summer.
Detour
Fukuroda Falls is located in Daigo Town in the Okukuji region. It could almost be said to be in the Tohoku region. The Suigun Line connects Mito in Ibaraki Prefecture with Koriyama in Fukushima Prefecture, but it is an extremely local line. At Hitachi Daigo Station, a station along the line, an old steam locomotive is on display, and at a nearby shrine, the stone steps are decorated with Hina dolls during the Hinamatsuri festival. There is a wide variety of agricultural products for sale at the roadside station.
Both sides of the stone steps leading up to the Sanmon gate are decorated with hydrangeas, just like at Meigetsuin Temple in Kamakura. Once you reach the top, you’ll see a pond on the grounds of the main hall filled with floating cut hydrangeas, a very calculating or cunning display. Everyone will be uploading videos of this to social media. The ducks in the pond look very cramped.
amabiki kannon (1)
amabiki kannon (17)
amabiki kannon (2)
amabiki kannon (15)
amabiki kannon (3)
amabiki kannon (4)
amabiki kannon (5)
amabiki kannon (13)
amabiki kannon (19)
amabiki kannon (20)
amabiki kannon (7)
Even when the hydrangeas are not in full bloom, many peacocks are free to roam. In Buddhism, they are said to have the power to ward off evil spirits and purify. I’m sure the pattern on its spread wings looks like eyes, which may intimidate monsters. According to a local photography enthusiast I bumped into, when surrounded by people, they spread their wings, either to get excited or to intimidate.
He showed me the footage stored on his smartphone, which was full of footage of peacocks spreading their feathers. Apparently, each peacock has its own unique style; some will raise their long wings vertically with great force, while others will spread them parallel to the ground and then slowly raise them. Naturally, the former is more impressive, but it’s hard to find one.
Finally, if you go up to the temple grounds at the top of the mountain, you can see the flat Kanto Plain in its entirety, which also reminds me of the flat Shonai Plain I saw at Dewa Sanzan.
amabiki kannon (9) with Mt.Tsukuba
amabiki kannon (14)
Today’s Inn
It’s a very rural hot spring inn. For a moment I thought I had arrived at a mountain hut. The rice, miso soup and grilled sweetfish were especially delicious.
It seems that the city of Sakuragawa, literally translated as cherry blossoms along river, was formed through a merger of towns and villages, and while there are certainly spots comparable to the wild cherry blossoms of Yoshino in Nara, one of merged town of Makabe, which retains the same town layout as it did in the early Edo period like as Tatsuno town, is more famous. I headed for the old townscape, and was surprised to see huge stone lanterns installed at the entrances of private homes here and there.
makabe town (3)big house and big lantern
They were so huge that you would never see them at an inn or temple or shrine, and it seemed like each home was competing to have their own. It seems like peoplein Tokushima Prefecture are showing off their wealth by building magnificent udatsu at the boundary between houses, but with the recent increase in robberies, the giant stone lantern is intended to appeal to robbers, as if it is asking them to break into its premises. As we drove, we saw stoneworks everywhere, and the rows of stone lanterns waiting to be shipped were a spectacular sight. As I couldn’t buy a stone lantern as a souvenir, I bought a stone chopstick rest instead.
makabe town (8)tsukamoto tea storehouse
As you enter the town of Makabe, you will come across an old townscape that has been designated an Important Building Heritage District. While some buildings are well preserved, others are in a state of disrepair, and some look as though they will soon collapse if left as they are. I wonder if it could be used as a way to revitalize the town and somehow improve it. There are no shops that you can just drop into while walking around town. I’m sure there are similar places all over the country, but seeing the buildings decaying in the hot sun made me feel more lonely than touristy.
makabe town (1)miwa house
makabe town (2)
makabe town (4)post office
makabe town (5)
makabe town (6)
makabe town (7)kawashima storehouse
makabe town (9)shiota house
makabe town (10)iseya inn
makabe town (11)murai brewery
makabe town (12)stone storehouse
makabe town (13)inose house yakuimon
makabe town (14)Mt.Tsukuba
makabe town (15)nishioka honten brewery
makabe town (16)
makabe town (17)
Detour for lunch
There is a lovely little cafe, “Cafe125,” between Makabe town and Amabiki Kannon Temple. The whole house is decorated with handmade dolls and dried flowers.
The area was completely covered by pyroclastic flows from the great eruption of Mt. Aso 90,000 years ago, and the heat of the eruption transformed this into welded tuff. As it cooled further, its volume contracted, creating countless long vertical cracks, and subsequent erosion revealed columnar joints that can be seen everywhere. This is clearly visible in the waterfall.
Bat Falls
You can’t get close to the waterfall, it can only be seen from above, the road isn’t shown on car navigation systems, and the road to get there is so narrow that even a compact car would likely go off the rails, so the whole experience of getting there is filled with a sense of unease and a sense of being in a remote area. Suddenly, a parking space and a space to turn around appear. This is thanks to the local people who have maintained the area. Please check the entrance (“Park golf course” sign) from the main road (National Route 502) and the terrain from an aerial photograph beforehand. Cars cannot pass each other, but it seems that the road has been widened recently.
bat fall2
The waterfall is shaped like a bat with its wings spread, and in the Edo period, a wooden slide was built on part of it to allow ships to pass through. People in the past were amazing. The Kuju mountain range can be seen beautifully beyond the waterfall. It’s a place worth visiting.
bat fall1 and kuju mountains
bat fall3
Harajiri Falls is like Niagara Falls
The collapse of the tuff rocks over a width of 120m created a circular waterfall similar to Niagara Falls. The waterfall and the surrounding scenery are so beautiful that they make you think of a movie set or Disneyland. There is a suspension bridge that offers a panoramic view of the falls, but once you cross it the road is closed off beyond that point.
harajiri fall6
harajiri fall1
harajiri fall4
harajiri fall8
Chinda Falls
The collapse occurred over a width of 100m, creating a 20m-high step. It is famous for being depicted in a sumi-e painting by Sesshu during the Muromachi period. Unfortunately, the original painting was destroyed in the Great Kanto Earthquake, and only copies remain. Sesshu also painted Amanohashidate in Kyoto, so people really did travel a lot by foot in the past.
chinda fall by sesshu at source “yuagariart.com”chinda fall
In modern times, a dam was built behind the falls to generate hydroelectric power, and the structure remains. At first, I thought it was just part of the falls. The welded tuff that forms the foundation of the waterfall is a geology that is weak against vertical shocks, and has repeatedly collapsed due to being unable to withstand large-scale flooding. As a result, the waterfall has gradually moved upstream over a long period of time. Kyushu Electric Power Co. reinforced the rocks around the base of the waterfall, and now it is in its current form. Even man-made structures like dams can sometimes help preserve the natural landscape. There was a lot of water and it was making a roaring noise.
Taketa City is famous for the ruins of Oka Castle, a castle built on top of a cliff. It is the motif of the song “Kojo no Tsuki” (Moon over the Ruins of the Castle) composed by the musician Rentaro Taki, but I’ve already been there so I’ll pass this time. I took a walk around the old town, which I hadn’t been able to see last time. It’s a town with a sense of history like Kyoto. I was surprised to see a bronze statue of Lieutenant Hirose, who carried out the Port Arthur blockade operation during the Russo-Japanese War. I didn’t know he was from here. After the operation, the Japanese Navy, led by Commander Togo Heihachi, faced off against the Russian Baltic Fleet, which was said to be the most powerful fleet in the world at the time.
Finally, we had a special lunch (reservation needed in advance) at Okura Shimizuyu, a café that was once a bathhouse. Apparently, his parents own a vegetable shop next door, so they served us a variety of vegetable dishes. I couldn’t finish it all. They even served us matcha green tea.
taketa25 ohkura simizu public bath in the past
taketa26 restaurant now
taketa34
taketa28 restaurant managed bu vegitable shop
taketa30 lunch
taketa29 lunch
taketa32 remnants of public bath from upper floor
taketa31
taketa33 dessert
taketa35 fukujyuenn distilled spirits factory and shop
Our final stop was a barley shochu brewery in town, where we had the opportunity to try a variety of shochu while the proprietress was busy on her way to Tokyo to attend a wedding.
The village of Ubuyama, located on the outer rim of Mt. Aso, is a laid-back place. The outer rim area is made up of many alternating high hills and deep valleys, and once you enter a valley, it’s hard to tell where you are. There are countless water sources in these valleys. One of them,the Yamabuki Spring, has been selected as one of the 100 famous water sources in Kumamoto Prefecture, and gushes out 30 tons of water every minute. The way the green and autumn leaves of the trees are reflected on the clear water is beautiful.
yamabuki water source2
yamabuki water source1
yamabuki water source5
yamabuki water source4
yamabuki water source6
ubuyama village3 ohgi tanada (rice terrace)
Please note that navigation systems do not work this far, so you need to keep a close eye on the map. The terrain is so complex that it is difficult to know where you are once you enter the valley of the outer rim of the volcano. There are stacked fan-shaped rice terraces nearby, and you’ll want to take photos of the way they are filled with water before rice planting and the stars reflected in them at night.
ubuyama village4 cattle grazing
ubuyama village1 sobosan(grandmother mountain) and sea of clouds
ubuyama village2 aso mountains
ubuyama village5 cattle grazing
yamanami21 ranch near hotel
yamanami23 satoimo with a sticky texture
yamanami22 calf
There are also pastures everywhere. There were calves right in front of the Yamanami Inn, but I hope it wasn’t used as an ingredient in the barbecue at the inn last night. There is also a buffet with nearly 30 kinds of homemade pickles. I was impressed that even these things can be made into pickles. If you can’t finish rice, they will make it into rice balls for you to have as a midnight snack.
