Vacation 2010 Day 11: Cambridge

I arrived in Cambridge to a drizzly, grey day, though it was possible to find a little color in the grounds of a small, old, church.

I had visited Cambridge once when I was a schoolkid, but I have almost no memories of it.

One thing I do remember is punting on the River Cam.

A lot of the colleges have nice gardens.

Like its older counterpart in Oxford, Cambridge gets a lot of tourists, but I think Oxford gets more.

You are never far from one of the 31 colleges that make up Cambridge University, the oldest was founded in the 13th Century.

More Nobel Prize winners hail from Cambridge University than any other single institution in the world.

Every college has its own chapel.

I also stopped in at the Fitzwilliam Museum.

Arisanomiya Shrine

The shrine of Arisa is located in a cave about 90 meters above the Takahashi River near Niimi in Okayama Prefecture. To get to the shrine you have to walk and climb through 1 kilometer of the Ikura cave.

Arisa was a local girl who lived in the village about 400 years ago. She had a boyfriend called Mosaku. Apparently all was well until one day the daughter of the local lord passed through the village. This girl/woman was so stunninbgly beautiful that even as far away as China they had heard about her great beauty.

Mosaku became smitten by this girl and left the village to go after her and try to win her hand.
Arisa waited.
And waited.
He never did come back.

No longer able to stand her grief Arisa climbed up to the top of the waterfall that drops down from the cliff above the cave and threw herself off.

The villagers built the small hokora for her.

For some reason, the logic of which defies me, the shrine is now a place where young couples come to pray for good relationships.

Unfortunately the only way to reach the shrine is to pay to enter Ikra-do, but it is well worth it.

Along the tracks

On Sunday I went down to Gotsu for the annual Kagura Festival, but after a few hours indoors I couldnt stand it any longer... outside was another beautiful clear day and as we have had so few this month and as the good weather was not likely to last, I headed off for another walk.

I got off the train in Kawahira and headed up the tracks.

This section of the river has no road on this bank, and as it was 90 minutes or so till the next train I reckoned I could get along the tracks before it came.

There are a few abandoned farms along this side of the river....

Closer to Kawado I passed by a place that has fascinated me since I moved here, a hidden valley. The entrance is very narrow and choked with bamboo and undergrowth and there appears to be no trail in, but one of these winters when the undergrowth has died back Im going to try and find a way in...

Though its the longest river in West Japan, the Gonokawa is not well known but I have yet to see a river in Japan that is more beautiful.

I arrive safely into Kawado without encountering the train.

Kawado, the bustling commercial hub of Sakurae Town.......

Second fall colors walk part 2

After my brief exploration of the abandoned school I carried on into Kawahira.

There is not much to Kawahira,... a couple of temples, a shrine, a koban, a railway station,.... no shops.......

I climbed up to the local shrine, a place we have visited several times for matsuri.

Down from the shrine I get to the station where I have to wait 10 minutes for the next train. 5 trains a day in each direction. I get off next station up the line, Kawado.

Heading across the bridge to my village I notice it is starting to cloud over.........

For a final　blast of Fall color hanging down a neighbors wall......

School haikyo

Coming into Kawahira I stopped in to explore the old abandoned school

There are hundreds and hundreds of abandoned schools in the countryside of Japan. As the population has fled to the cities student numbers decrease until a community can no longer sustain a school.

Many of them get used as community centers.

This one had some machine tools and so was used for something, and also used for storage of agricultural equipment, straw, etc.

There were many holes in the roof and consequently the floor was in bad condition so I didnt try to explore upstairs.

A few more years and this building will collapse in on itself. Maybe a few years later it will be bulldozed. A few years after that they will maybe try and get it listed as a World Heritage Site.

Second Fall colors walk

9 a.m. and the sun starts to burn off the mist that fills the valleys and blankets us all night long. It promises to be a fine day as I head across the river to catch the train downstream to Gotsu Honmachi where my mountain walk begins.

I head out of Honmachi by the ancient San'indo, the road that once connected the capital in Asuka with this region. Then I head up the slope of Star Mountain.

It takes less than an hour to reach the pass at 300 meters, and from then on its downhill all the way to the river at Kawahira.

I love these mountain roads. More like wide hiking paths as there are no vehicles.

The forest and vegetation is thick, and only rarely can I catch glimpes of a vista, so for Fall colors best to look up.

There are no villages up here in the mountains, nor hamlets, only the occasional isolated homestead. If 2 or 3 are in close proximity then for sure they are relatives. A different breed of people. More independent, more self-sufficient.

Maybe half the homesteads are now empty.

About halfway down there is a small shrine on the hillside across from a big Gingko tree. When I first walked this way some years ago I stopped in at the shrine, as is my habit, and found it fairly dilapidated, so I was surprised this time to hear the sound of hammering and power tools as it appears it is being renovated. I would guess there are about 6 families left in this area, so it is good to see that they still care about the shrine.

Getting lower in altitude the valley starts to widen a little and I reach the "suburbs" of Kawahira.

To be continued

Fall colors walk

As the sun burned off the mist early this morning the day promised to be fine, and as it has been pretty lousy weather for a few weeks I decided to get out and try and photograph some Fall colors.

I had to meet someone in Oda City in the afternoon, so I decided to head up early and spend a few hours exploring the Honmachi district.

Honmachi means "oldtown" and there are a half dozen or so temples and 3 or 4 shrines to explore.

There wasnt a lot of color about, but enough to satisfy me.

Going upriver on the train home the setting sun highlighted the mountaintops so I resolved to head up into the mountains for a walk tomorrow.

Mine-Ji

Mine-Ji is an ancient mountain temple looking down on Unnan Town in the Okuizumo district south of Lake Shinji.

I previously posted on the Nio and Fudo Myojin statues here.

Reputedly founded in 658 by the legendary En no Gyoja, considered to be the founder of Shugendo, the temple was reputedly visited by Kobo Daishi and has been a Shingon Temple since then.

There are a lot of nice statuary in the extensive grounds, and several shrines, one to Inari, and one to Suijin. The shugendo tradition continues here and in April a Himatsuri (fire festival) is held.

With advance reservations the temple is one of the few in the region that offers shukubo (temple lodgings) and shojin ryori (vegetarian buddhist meals) There is a nice garden that can be enjoyed while drinking tea, and an interesting library and an altar for Tibetan Buddhism.

 

This felt very much like a "working" temple, active in many areas, whereas so many temples are simply funerary sites. There is no public transport to the temple but Kisuki Station is about 2k away, and the temple is only at about 180 meters elevation, so not so hard to walk to.

 

I dont usually find painted screens all that appealing, but this one in the temple really struck me.

The views from Fukuoka Tower

From 123 meters above ground the observation deck of Fukuoka Tower offers stunning 360 degree views.

Right down below in the Momochi Beach and Marizon, a pier with expensive restaurants and a wedding chapel.

Looking up the coast towards downtown. Numerous hi-tech companies have buildings in the Momochi district. The largest high-rise visible is the Hilton Hotel, formerly the JAL Seahawk.

Fukuoka City is home to about one and a half million people. Ranked 14th in the worlds best places to live, most people seem to live in apartments.

Bombed heavily towards the end of the war, like most Japanese cities there is little left of prewar architecture.

Another view of the Hilton.