Akiu

We've been fairly busy for the last few weeks, teaching summer school. We only had one day off in the middle, so we decided to make the most of it. We went on a lovely long bike ride, to Akiu. It's a hot springs town about 12km south west of our house. Due to the insane hot weather we've been having recently, we weren't tempted by the hot springs, but there was plenty of nature to keep us busy. Right near the town there is Rairaikyo gorge, and a further 10km along the road is Akiu Great Falls. Despite a 2 thunderstorms, and very aching legs, we managed to get round everything and had a lovely (if exhausting day!).

I hope you're not all fed up with photo of rice fields, trees and mountains because, once again, that's pretty much all that's here! It's not my fault, blame the Japanese countryside.

Trees around Rairaikyo gorge

The gorge

We were so hot after our bike ride that I was longing to jump right in that water, but there was sadly nowhere to get down to it. 

Pretty flowers

Out into the greenery

A camera theft by John led to a picture of a bridge disguised as an aqueduct

After a bike ride in the thunderstorm. As John put it, "I've genuinely had less wet showers"

We finally made it to Akiu Great Falls. They were gorgeous and worth the rain!

It always surprises me how calm a river becomes straight after a waterfall

Mist on the mountains, and greenery everywhere. Sums up our day! 

I wish my camera took panoramas, there was this view in every direction.

Nearly home

Collapsed at home, Olympics on the telly, and a gorgeous sunset outside. What a lovely day!

Heading Towards Yamadera

On Monday we managed to cross another thing off my 'To do before leaving Japan' list, and finally made a visit to Yamadera. It's a temple on the side of mountain, and more information about it in my next post, but first, the hike we did to get there. 

You can get the train straight from Sendai, via our house, to Yamadera, but if you get off one stop earlier, at Omoshiroyamakogen, you can hike the remaining 8km. The first half is along a river, secluded and gorgeous. The second half is along a road through pine forests and past rice fields. Slightly less secluded, but just as lovely. The whole walk took us about 2 hours, and we still had enough energy to climb the 1,000,000 1000 steps to the top temple at Yamadera (after we'd eaten our delicious bentos).

Enough rambling, time for photos! 

View of our hike from the train station

About all there is to Omoshiroyamakogen!

Down we go!

Relaxing on the bridge

The water is so so blue and clear! 

Bridge not made for fat foreigners!

Ridiculous path cut out of sheer rock

The most life we saw on the whole path.

I need somewhere like this to come whenever I feel stressed out.

Off the path and onto the road. 

Heading towards Yamadera

Rice fields.

If you want to do the hike yourself it's really easy. At Omoshiroyamakoen, cross over the road bridge over the station and the river, and on the far side of the bridge follow the sign on the left marked ハイキングコース. After that, it's just a case of following the path. You could barely get lost if you tried. Definitely a recommended extension to a trip to Yamadera!

The Next 5 months

It was a difficult decision, made for lots of reasons, but John and I have decided to limit our stay in Japan to one year after all. The main factors are not feeling very satisfied with lives here (too much free time and it's been impossible for us to find worthwhile activities to get involved in) and an increase in competitiveness for the Masters course we want to do on return to the UK (Social Work). So, we'll be heading back home at around Christmas time.

In the meantime, we still have just over five months left in Japan. We've managed to fit a lot into the last 7 months, but there are a lot of things I still really want to fit in before we go. Both sets of parents are visiting in the next couple of months, so we're hoping to do lots of these things with them. 

Things local to here

• Climb Mount Zao - We've skied down this gorgeous volcano, but now I want to hike up it and marvel at it's lovely lake.
• Visit Yamadera - A temple on a mountainside, only 20 mins by train from our house. It's a disgrace that we haven't been yet, but we haven't. It'll happen!
• Visit Matsushima Bay - We did this today. Photos coming soon!
• Visit Zuihoden Mausoleum - Sendai isn't exactly chock-a-block with historic buildings, but Date Masamune founded the city, and is buried here. Since I have had a love of him and his onigiri head since I first got here, I think I need to spend an hour or two 

See what I mean about the onigiri head?!

• Celebrate Tanabata - Most of Japan celebrated tanabata last week, but the biggest and best is yet to come! Sendai has the most famous festival in Japan, held at the start of august. It conveniently falls on my birthday, and I planning to celebrate hard! 
• Go to the statue - It's a little know fact that Sendai has the 6th tallest statue in the world. It's of the  Buddhist bohisattva (enlightened person), Kannon. However, it was built for tax avoidance, rather than religious motives and so people don't like it. It's not mentioned in most tourism info, and is apparently surrounded by pachinko parlours. Sounds like it has the potential to be an amusing, if not enlightening experience!

Others

• Buy LOTS of stationary/origami/bento/craft items and send them home - I love all these things, and Japan is a paradise for them. I plan on buying a good few years supply. Good thing my parents have a big attic!
• Play pachinko - It's loud, it's garish, it's expensive, but it's apparently regularly played by 1 in 6 Japanese people, makes up 40% of the Japanese leisure industry (including bars and restaurants) and it's revenue is 4 times that of all the casino gambling in the world. It seems to be an essential Japanese experience. 
• Take couples purikura - I love purikura. John hates it, but I just need to get a few beers in him, and I'll have some photos that will make all the Japanese people I know go kawaiiiiii for about an hour!
• Stay in a love hotel - Not as sleezy as it sounds. They're not all about prostitutes here, but provide privacy for couples living with extended family, plus they're a cheap and convenient place to stay. another random only-in-Japan thing! 
• Visit Tokyo Disneyland and Disneysea - I love Disney. I plan on going in November, on a school day. Hopefully that way I can have Mickey (and Duffy) all to myself.

source

• Get a good view of Mount Fuji - Climbing Mount Fuji was on my list of things to do before leaving Japan, but I don't think I'm going to have time during the open season, plus various blogs about it make it sound less enjoyable than a lot of other climbs, so I've given up on the idea. It's gorgeous and iconic though, and the small glimpse I got from the Shinkansen isn't enough. I want to go and revel in the view sometime.
• See the Pandas at Ueno Zoo - Panda's are cute, and there aren't any in England. 

Anyone got any other suggestions? I think it's a fairly achievable list so far. There are a few other things I ideally want to do (visit Hiroshima and Nara, climb Mount Iwate, visit Kinkasen island (it's pretty close, but I don't know if you can get there post tsunami), visit Hiraizumi, see the 5 coloured lakes), but I'll see how I go. 

My Month: Bits and Bobs and Being Outside

Onigiri. I've been making these a lot recently. Yum.

Storytime at school

Gyoza, ready for the pan. I've been having a dumpling phase recently too!

We went out with our friend Shoko and some of her friends last week. It was 90 minutes of all you can eat BBQ meat and all you can drink. Yum!

We went for a bike ride. The countryside is gorgeous.

I have no idea why there was a random church in the middle of nowhere!

Hirosegawa River

Rice and water everywhere!

Pretty flowers

Firefighter drain cover, mark 1.

Cool firefighter drain cover, mark 2.

A battery vending machine

Hiking: Nikkawa Line

Taiwan has re-kindled my Hiking bug, and so the second free day (the first was spent hungover, whoops) we had when we got back we got our boots on and went to the Nikkawa Line.

With a lot of googling, I'd found out a little information about this hike, but not very much. There was this blog, which was helpful and had the only map I found, but is 6 years old. Then there were mentions of it on various Visit Miyagi type tourism websites, but nothing concrete. I'm sure I'd have been able to find more information if my Japanese wasn't so awful, but as it was, it was a bit of a leap in the dark!! We managed to persuade our friend Amy to embark on this madness with us, and off the three of us went!

We got the train 20 minutes from our house, in the opposite direction from Sendai, to Okunikkawa (it's on the Senzan Line from Sendai, 40 minutes, ¥570). It's a tiny hamlet with about 5 houses, and the hiking signs are really obvious as soon as you get out of the station.

Here is a map of the area (source).

We wanted to walk the brown loop in the centre-left of the map. We set off in that direction, but after about 600m there was a sign saying it was closed. However, being the bad foreigners we are, we went over the rope and down to a lovely river.

Pretty shrine in the middle of nowhere

Very dubious staircase

Going across this bridge would've been the next step...except there was no way to get onto it. The ladder was completely destroyed and none of us fancied climbing up sheer rock!

Undeterred, we headed back to the station and then walked the right hand side of the yellow loop along the road. At the bottom there was a car park and a sign to the walk marked pink on the map. That also had a sign saying it was closed, but we worked out enough of it to realise it was saying the path was shut from November last year until April this year. And since it is now May we decided that we'd take our life into our hands and ignore the sign. I know, we're bad people, but it looked too pretty and we wanted our hike!

The walk follows the river about 4.8km all the way down to the unused Yatsumori Train Station. It's a lovely walk, mostly along the river, which occasionally diversions into the forest on either side. There was a lot of rock scrambling (mostly due to broken steps) but only one or two places where it felt at all unsafe! Unsurprisingly, since it was officially closed, we didn't see anyone else and we had a lovely hike. 

Once you get to Yatsumori, you can follow very quiet roads another 5km, through farmer country, round to Sakunami, a hot springs town with a station on the same line as Okunikkawa. 

It made for a great day hike and took us about 5 hours in total. There's a campsite at Okunikkawa, and we're hoping to persuade some other friends to come there with us for a camping trip in the summer. When the really hot weather eventually arrives, a swim in this river will be just the thing!

Lovely mountain views 

As well as mini waterfalls

Taking the high road!

Next time I come, I'm bringing my swimming stuff, this water makes you want to dive right in! (It was ridiculously cold though!)

The only living thing we met on the whole trail!

Bye bye river, we'll be back sometime!

What I can only assume is earthquake damage on the road

Pretty shrine in the middle of nowhere Mark 2

Poor house

Can anyone tell me what these are? Graves? Memorials? Shrines?

Rice farming

Gorgeous tree in Sakunami. There was really nothing in Sakunami. We were all starving by the time we got there and we couldn't find anywhere to buy food :( So it you want to do this walk, take all your provisions with you!

Apparently John has "always wanted to do this" and the deserted Sakunami Station was the perfect opportunity. Silly boy!

PS - Mum and Dad, do you think a stay at the campsite here and a walk around this area might be a good way to spend a day of your visit?