Northern Ibaraki

G'day everyone,

last Sunday I had the pleasure and privilege to accompany Isoji and his family on a trip to the northern part of Ibaraki prefecture. Japan consists of 47 prefectures and are similar to states, although I can't tell to which degree. Ibaraki is the prefecture where I live and work right now. The city of Tsukuba however is located in the flat plain part of the prefecture. The northern part, which we visited, is mountainous and filled with a lot of small and rather isolated settlements. In short, just what I love. The weather on that day was also perfect: Cloudy and humid coupled with occasional light rain and a huge downpour at lunch time. Just perfect. And to proof that I haven't lost my mind I prepared a lot of pictures for you so you can get a feeling for the place.

Our first stop was Hanazono Shrine, which literally means flower park shrine. It wasn't the season for any flower to bloom though. It is located in a pretty isolated place, but so was basically everything I saw that day. We also saw a waterfall. Here are some pictures:

The shrine gate.

Our first waterfall. Isoji's wife and I are talking about the flora.

What are you saying? The waterfall is not big enough? Well, in that case you'll have to wait for the next one.

Our next target was Yamatsuri (lit. Arrow festival), a small town, in search of lunch and another waterfall. To get to the waterfall we had to cross a pretty, red suspension bridge followed by a narrow gorge. The following pictures will show you that the weather was perfect and that I haven't lost it...

View from the bridge to Yamatsuri.

The river we had to cross.

View into the entrance to the gorge together with Isoji's family.

Isn't it a nice view? Together with the low hanging clouds and the mist over the trees? Beautiful. The following pictures show the gorge and the waterfall at the end.

That bridge was pretty slippery.

Those rocks were pretty slippery.

That waterfall was pretty ... pretty.

There was a huge overhang over the waterfall. I tried to make a picture of it together with the fall but it was just too huge. Here are the fruits of my not so successful labor:

Huuuuuge...

What are you saying? This waterfall is still not big enough? I've got something special for you then.

Our next stop was Fukurodanotaki ("Rice bag waterfall"?). I hope this will be big enough for you.

That's big in my book.

Wait, you're still not satisfied? Haha, I have a surprise for you then. This is only the lower part of the waterfall. How about this:

Woah, that would classify as "pretty big" in my book.

Still not big enough? Are you mad? Well, you'll be surprised to hear that this is still not everything. Watch this:

Well damn.

That's 120m height and 73m width. If this does not satisfy you than I suggest you hop in a barrel and throw yourself into the Niagara river.

At this point I'd like to thank Isoji and his family for taking me with them on this trip. I was able to see places I would've never been able to see otherwise, not to mention the lovely company. Thank you so much.

どうもありがとうございます

See you next time.

Cheers

Nils

PS: There was an earthquake this morning! Enough to shake my empty beer cans out of place. Isoji made a little video of the intensity propagating through Japan. Pretty neat.

Nasudake

Konichiwa Minna-san,

This time I've got something special for you, at least I hope it will be as special to you as it was to me. This is where I went this weekend:

Yep, it's an active volcano.

This picture is by far not the most appropriate to really show you the beauty of this mountain, and I assure you that one picture will be not enough to get my point across either. So be prepared for a lot of pictures and a lot of meaningless talk from my side since I believe the pictures would suffice on their own... but I can't stop myself...

Let's start from the beginning. I managed to make a day trip out of this but that came at a cost. I had to travel about 200 km taking 4 trains and 1 bus, 5 hours in total. And that was just one way. Waking up at 4:15 am I arrived at the bus stop at Nasudake at 10:32 am. Quite a ride. I missed one train because I couldn't find the right platform in time but was still able to catch the bus I originally planned to catch right on time. Pretty nerve wrecking. Nerve wrecking because time was crucial. The last bus would leave Nasudake at 16:33 pm and I had high ambitions, wanting to reach both peaks, Asahi (1896m) and Chausu (1915m), the youngest peak.  I really wanted to get a picture from Chausu while standing on top of Asahi. And it was beautiful. Just look at it:

Unfathomable beauty.

Isn't it incredible? The rocky peak surrounded by lush greenery and the gentle shape of a cone so typical for a stratovolcano. I couldn't believe my eyes, mainly because THERE WAS A FUCKING CLOUD IN THE WAY. Remember last year? When I was in the U.S.? I visited Mt. St. Helens and the volcano was covered by clouds almost every time I came to see the crater. Or the first time I went to Mt. Rainier. The peak was covered by a cloud as well. I guess I am haunted. The most infuriating part was that, for my whole ascend, there was not a single cloud around Nasu. Unsure about how long the peak would be covered by that cloud and the fact that I was on a tight schedule I started my descend from Asahi towards Chausu. And guess what, half way down the cloud disappeared. I didn't want to go back up because of an additional reason: It was bloody exhausting. Just look at what the path looks like:

See the people standing on top of the ridge in the distance?

Pretty rugged terrain.

And steep too.

Nonetheless I was able to get I pretty nice view on my way down from Asahi:

Kireina

This picture also comes without that green stuff on the side:

Pretty neat I'd say.

Before climbing Chausu I wanted to take a look at the fumaroles. "What the heck are fumaroles?", good question. Fumaroles are spaces where volcanic gases, like sulfur dioxide, escape to the surface. These things were quite impressive, not only because the area where they appear turns yellow because of the sulfur precipitating but also because of the roaring sound they make. Just imagine a huge leak in a gas pipeline or a leak in your bicycle tire, just a lot deeper and louder. It was so impressive that I completely ignored the very obvious smell of rotten eggs.

Do you know that smelly smell? That smelly smell that smells... smelly?

Sulfur crystals.

Guess where I had lunch. I was wondering why I was the only person eating lunch there. Don't know why.

There were actually a lot of people around, just not in that area. I probably said "konichiwa" a gazillion times. That's how many people there were. A gazillion. I didn't see a single foreigner though. Quite a few people asked me where I am from and shook hands with me, "Guten Tag". Very funny.

After my very delicious lunch break I began to ascend to Chausu. It wasn't far but very steep. I now understand the difference between the two japanese words for mountain, "yama" and "dake": "dake" is a lot steeper. After making it to the crater rim I was greeted by this view:

Nope, no lava lake.

Lava lakes are pretty rare, just to get this common misconception out of the way. A few hundred meters around the crater was the highest point:

Don't forget the Shinto gate, it's a holy mountain after all.

This was the view to the east. The view to the west is rather different:

Mountainous and isolated.

In case you were wondering where I was standing while the cloud was blocking my view. I was standing right on top of the highest peak in the following picture:

Asahi peak.

And this was on top of Asahi:

Lonely little shrine.

The rocks on Chausu locked very peculiar and I couldn't explain why. After asking Shinji about it... I still have no idea. The scientific community has multiple theories but they are not 100% sure how these rocks are formed.

Weird...

...rocks.

Even though I had to travel about 10 hours in total for this trip I had a smile in my face for the whole time. If you're ever wondering how you can make me happy, involve volcanoes!

So much from me for the time being. I'll catch you next time.

Cheers

Nils

PS: In Japan there are a lot of trains that skip stations to get to the important ones faster. Depending on how many stations they skip they are named "express", "semi-rapid" or "rapid" for example. On my way back home I caught a "super rapid rabid train". That was pretty wild.

Do you feel the rainbow?

No, I don't...

Da das Wetter mal wieder nicht wirklich mitgespielt hat bin ich am Sonntag, bei 1000% Luftfeuchtigkeit, wieder nach Tokyo geduest um ein paar Ziele von meiner Liste abzuhacken. Unter anderem ging es zur "Rainbow Bridge", die tagsueber allerdings eher langweilig ist. Nachts erstrahlt sie in bunten Farben. Ich habe mir eine schoene Aussicht von der Brueck aus auf die Tokyo Bucht erhofft, leider war es ziemlich diesig. Sehr beeindruckend fand ich "Odaiba", die kuenstlichen Inseln in der Tokyo Bucht, die, unter anderem, durch die "Rainbow Bridge" mit dem Festland verbunden sind. Hier ein paar Bilder:

Nicht allzu bunte Rainbow Bridge mit Sicht aufs Festland

Links das Festland, rechts Odaiba

Mariokarts hatte ich ehrlich gesagt nicht erwartet...

Ausserdem habe ich mir noch den "Hama-rikyu" Garten angeschaut. Dieser wurde im 17. Jhd. vom Tokugawa Shogunat auf neu gewonnenem Land errichtet. Ich hatte mir ziemlich viel erhofft weshalb ich letztenendes wohl so enttaeuscht war. Ich musste mir natuerlich eine Zeit aussuchen, in der keine einzige Blume bluehte. Es war alles gruen, umgeben von Hochhaeusern und Hafenwasser. Ich fands wirklich nicht allzu toll. Das Teehaus inmitten des kleinen Sees ist allerdings wirklich huebsch.

Teehaus inmitten eines kleinen Sees aus Meerwasser.
Im 19. und fruehen 20. Jhd. wurden Staatsgaeste hierher eingeladen.

Und noch ein Teehaus...

Nach diesen beiden Stopps begann die Luftfeuchtigkeit mich langsam umzubringen, weshalb ich mich wieder auf den Heimweg machte. Obwohl mich dieser Trip nicht wirklich umgehauen hat war er dennoch besser als die Alternative: Nix tun.

Ich hoffe ich habe naechstes mal mehr zu berichten. Heute Nacht werden wir von einem Typhoon heimgesucht. Ich bin mal gespannt.

Bis denn denn

Nils