Kumamoto / Aso - 熊本 阿蘇

We went with the Shinkansen north to Kumamoto. Borrowed a car and drove to the Aso National Park. Unfortunately, did my GPS tracking stop when we arrived at the old Caldera.

 We had an early start the following morning and took a Shinkansen to Kumamoto ("the origin of bears"), just to save some time. After we arrived in Kumamoto, we rent a car right at the station from a Toyota car dealer. The owner of the shop asked for everyone's driver license, so I took my change and used for the first time in three years my international driver license (a ugly grey note book) and put my European driver license in front of her. The effect was not quite what I was hoping for. She was looking at the license as if I want to joke around. After she had written down the names of the other three, she took my license and asked me what this is: well, it's an European driver license and the English translation and explanations, I said to her. Sorry, we only except Japanese licenses or translations, was her short answer. How international Kumamoto is! This city is certainly no example or general rule for all of Japan, but smaller cities in Japan certainly don't except or know international standards, such as the ICSI international student card or a driver license. If you want to borrow a car you better go to international car dealers in bigger cities such as Tokyo or Osaka. For me one more reason to get a Japanese license.

We wanted to leave Kumamoto as fast as possible in the direction of the Aso National park, as we planed to come back the following day. But not before we had a look into the castle of Kumamoto. I heard so many things about it: it was ranked together with Himeji caste (currently under renovation - I wrote about it in March 2010 and October 2009), and Matsumoto castle to the top three Japanese castles. Many other castles, such as Okayama or Osaka castles, got destroyed during the Meiji restoration and later   reconstructed in concrete. As I really loved the original character of Himeji castles I was soooo looking forward seeing the castle.

At the wall of outer Kumamoto - Castle

Giant trees in the park around the castle.

Kumamoto - Castle. The stone foundation is quite famous for its kind!

The castle ground was very beautiful with its wide grass (dry tough) and park lands and huge trees. The castle was also very pretty to watch from the outside and we made our way through passage and gangway to the inner aula in front of the castle. When we entered the first floor I was wondering what all the concret is doing here, but maybe it was part of some earthquake protection or so?! But unfortunately, this didn't change during our walk through the rest of the castle. Kumamoto castle revealed its true modern nature from the inside: concrete and steel. It was very disappointing for me, as I expected an amazing art of wood as Himeji castle. Nevertheless, it was very interesting to see many objects of many decades and centuries from the history of Kumamoto. From the top floor we had a great view towards Kumamoto. After we climbed down into the castle ground again, I was wondering if there are other wooden castles such as Himeji in Japan left and Kumamoto got ranked in my brain as pretty, but fake castle, except of one of the guard towers, which is still original. At leasst its original end is very famous, as the castle got burned down during a revolt in Kumamoto between supporters of the Restauration and conservative forces.

View from the top of the castle.

Cherry blossom also in Kumamoto!

After giving the castle a short visit we jumped into the car and drove to the Aso National park. As soon as we broke through some mountains I was amazed to find a huge wide plain in front of us with the volcano growing out of it's middle, surrounded by by a perfect chain of mountains of the same height. It was quite suspicious.  I used the chance when we stopped at a visitor centre to ask a women if this plain was once inside a bigger caldera, as the ocean around Sakurajima was once inside a super volcano. She confirmed what we were thinking: Once there was a volcano were we stood. It must have had the size of Mt. Fuji or even bigger. This volcano got blown away in a gigantic eruption  and the ash can still be found as a layer of ash even in Hokkaido.

We decided to get as high up as possible to the present Aso - volcano: the higher we got the more it smelled like sulphur. We could drive up to the top of the volcano, as it is still very active and the last time people got killed during a eruption was shortly before I was born, some 30 years ago. That explains why only so little people live around the volcano even though the land is perfectly flat. The yellow grass looked very pretty on the dark soil of the volcano.

On our way up to the top of the volcano "Aso". The clouds is sulphuric steam from the caldera.

View into the old caldera (Aso National park). You can still outline how huge the old volcano must have been: you stand in the centre and the mountain range in the distant is the old border of the volcano.

Greetings from the smelling mountain (^.^)/

From the volcano we had a great view into the valley, but the increasing sulphur smell slowly made us cough. We decided to leave fast and drove to our Ryokan in the mountain area north of the old caldera. On the way out of it, just at the moment when we crossed the remaining mountains of the caldera, the sun was setting and we made a brief stop to appreciate the view.

Leaving the old Caldera at it's north point at sunset!

Our Ryokan had its own Onsen and even though we arrived late there we still got some dinner of a very Japanese style (Miso soup, great fish, rice, pickles, vegetables). I finally found a place in Japan were I could see some more stars than in the cities but still not quite as much as I could see in Outback of Australia. Tired we jumped in our Futons after a short game of Wizzard and were looking forward to driving to Amakusa the next day.

We stayed in a small village in the mountain range with not much light and could see a lot of stars (first time for me in Japan).

Kagoshima/Sakurajima - 鹿児島/桜島

The Island of Cherry blossom (Sakurajima - 桜島) and the Kagoshima, where constantly ash from two volcanoes precipitate, were our next targets on our rout for day number two.

Kagoshima and Sakurajima. My GPS track stopped by the time we left the Island. GPS tracking is rather battery consuming.

When we arrived in Kagoshima it was time for lunch and of course my Japanese follows have long discussed in the car what to eat. Do you see the detour towards the south of the city on the map? That is were a famous Ramen (Japanese noodles soup) restaurant is. I have to admit, that it was one of my first noodle soup experience were I left the restaurant and had to say honestly this was really really good! Don't get me wrong! Most things are very good in Japan and there is hardly any dish I dislike, but this was just really tasty, especially as I'm not a big noodle soup fan.

We quickly checked in our luggage and the hostel we were planning staying in (close to the harbour) and were off to catch a ferry to Sakurajima. I don't want to write too much about it, as I visited the Island for the first time end of September last year and wrote about it; but two of us haven't been there!

Always smoking from the caldera - Sakurajima.

So what was different this time? Well first of all there was no Taifun coming and the weather was just great. We enjoyed ourself at the park, close to Sakurajima ferry port, and since it was still quite chilly we relaxed our feet in a hot onsen bath.

Onsen (Hot spring) foot bath!

As I was a bit hungry we ate some Mandarins (Mikan) from the Island and Ice cream made from these Mandarins, which was really refreshing. While we were strolling over the Island and gave the visitor centre a brief visit to check some facts on the Island, we also got a chance to discover our first Cherry Blossom this year.

First cherry blossom on the Island!

 After a beautiful sunset over Kagoshima, which we could follow from a dinosaur park on Sakurajima, we went back by boat. On our way back we found out that there is a cheap "romantic view spot" bus that brings us up the mountains of Kagoshima to see the city. It was indeed a good opportunity to discover something new in the city and a nice lady was talking during the ride about sights we could spot. After we were back in the hostel we quickly changed and were off to a Sentou (public bath) before jumping in our beds after a sec. round of Wizard.

Next stop was Kumamoto and Aso National Park.

Sunset over Kagoshima.

Kyushu trip - Kirishima 九州旅 － 霧島

From the first of March (Friday) until Tuesday the 5th of March I went on trip to Kyushu with my fiancée and two very good Japanese friends.

GPS tracking of our first two days. (1) Our hotel, (2) Shinto Shrine, (3) mountain museum. The smoke from Sakurajima is visible too!

It was a kind of trip I haven't done before in Japan.  In order to travel as cheap as possible to Kagoshima, I booked a bus to Kansai Int. Airport close to Osaka (~ 4.000 Yen) and met the other three there who came from Kanazawa. We flew with a flight from Peach Union to Kagoshima and arrived at the airport after about one hour flight at 1 p.m. (~8.000 Yen). 

Right after we landed, we borrowed a car and drove in direction of Kirishima (霧島). It was raining like hell, but we didn't care at all. It was just great to be outside, in spring Kyushu, with lots and lots of Onsen waiting for us. 

Short stop in rain on the way to Kirishima

Since Kirishima means literally "Island of fog", I was indeed expecting an Island, but instead we drove higher and higher into the mountains and vanished in the fog. I should have done my homework before and read more about where we are going, but I have to admit than my part of the travel organisation goes towards zero.

So much smelly fog!

This fog was partly made of clouds and partly from steam, rising from the numerous hotsprings. It smelled wonderful like sulphur when we arrived in the little town of Kirishima (霧島). We tried some local products, such as sulphuric steamed eggs (intensified), sausages or (of course) sweet potatoes, since the old district of Satsuma is famous for these.

Rain can be pretty positive when you visit a waterfall, because it will have much more water!

Sulphur steamed eggs. Taste still like normal eggs, just look yellow after you've peeled them.

After a short hike in the hills around the city and a short stop at a waterfall, we checked in our hotel-like Ryokan (a Ryokan is a traditional Japanese guest house), where we were really happy to put all our luggage down in our Tatami room. It felt like on a school trip, as we four were going to sleep on the ground in Futons in one room, looking forward to playing cards before falling asleep.

First room, first night!

After the check-in we made a brief stop in one of the big shrines (Shintoism) in Kirishima. It was an amazingly huge ground, devoted to at least three goddess. Among them "Tengu", a long nosed daemon-like creature with incredible sword skills. Apparently it taught sword fighting to Miyamoto Musashi. I talked a lot with Bito-san about Bushido and it's origin and he recommended the book "Bushido" from Nitobe Inazo, which I'm currently reading. You can download it for free from the Gutenberg-Projekt homepage.

Kirishima Jinsha, entrance stone!

The shrine and rain! Was still very pretty to look at!

Overall, I was confronted with so many unconnected historical facts (for me, as uneducated being) during our travel that I decided to study much more about Japanese history and especially about the time before, during and after the Meiji-Restauration, as well as about the history of Christanity in Japan, as soon as I'm back in Okayama. Kyushu was a main base for the first Christians in Japan, which got later extinct during a revolt. But more about this later.

We spent the evening in the Ryokan with its three building and confusing floor numbering, as the building had different elevations and hence the floor number changed according to the buildings basement. (Sorry I forgot to take a picture). We had a great Japanese dinner, green tea in our room, a table tennis match, and two hot bathes in the hotel Onsen.

Furthermore I was able to motivate three new player for the game wizard (^.^)/.

Dinner! There was still soup, rice and some extra meat served.

 The next day we left early in the morning. The sun was shining and we decided to visit a museum in the mountains, almost 800 m above sea level, before going to Kagoshima. The museum offered some interesting but also quite disturbing art, but we enjoyed much more the outside area with its sculptures.

View from the museum.

No one really wanted to go there on Saturday morning, as it seems!

Race to the ring! Who do you think has lost?

Three friends finished their Bachelor degree!

From there we drove down to Kagoshima to visit Sakurajima and the city itself. 

More about this next time!