Eureka Matsushima Memorabilia

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Japan has a nifty list called the Three Views of Japan. It is (supposedly) the country's three most celebrated scenic sites. We happen to live really quite close to one of them - Matsushima - which means that visiting it at least once while we were in Sendai was almost a requirement. A few weekends ago we did just that; just hopped on a train and went to see a bay full of tiny pine-covered islands, our excitement running high. To be honest it has a nice reputation: a famous haiku about the area consists of the poet just saying "matsushima" followed by "ah", apparently indicating a loss of words at the beauty. Or lazy poetry. Follow us after the jump to learn more!

A zoo, a mountain and a river walk into a bar...

Last week we had another long weekend - this time in commemoration of Health and Sports Day, added to the list of Japanese holidays in 1966 in commemoration of the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo Japan. They were the first Olympic games in Asia. Interesting trivia: despite being the Summer Olympics, the 1964 games were held in October in order to avoid the notorious Japanese rainy season which occurs over the summer.

Thanks to strategically-placed vacation days, we had a four day weekend ahead of us and thus decided to capitalize on that by getting out and doing a lot of things. First on the list was a trip to the Sendai Yagiyama Zoological Park, a place that looks fairly close on a map but is in reality quite far away. Blind to this reality, we chose to bike there. At first thing seemed to be going well, but as time wore on the route became more and more uphill. And we're not talking a simple uphill incline like the one you had to walk to and from school when you were little. This was uphill to comical proportions. By the end we spent a lot more time walking with our bikes than biking, as to do the latter would inevitably lead to one's demise. But after an hour's trip we had arrived!

Finally arrived!

Kelsey makes friends with the pandas.

Nico displays his love of maps.

A staple in any serious tourist location.

The adorable couple.

For a zoo that's barely a footnote on any Sendai tourism website, it was actually really great. They had all the basic animals any zoo that wants to be taken seriously must have: monkeys, elephants, lions, tigers, giraffes, bears, apes, penguins, etc. What set this particular zoo apart from our vast zoo experience (consisting of a few trips to the Toronto Zoo) was in the promixity of visitors to the animals. While still out of arm's reach, most animals were displayed very close to visitors, and only a small amount of caging was used. While back home the security around the animals is often to keep visitors out, here any determined visitor could be amongst the animals with ease. The result of this was an incredibly enjoyable zoo experience, along with far too many photos (our camera died halfway through our trip).

A particularly energentic monkey; took a while to get him to stand stil.

Feeding time for the elephants!

A giraffe shows off its stuff.

Nico attempts in vain to convince the giraffe that they are brothers.

Kelsey thinks the flamingos have an excellent eye for colour.

Hippo is angry. And hungry. And wet.

An undercover photographer gets a rare look at a napping gorilla.

One of their most exotic creatures

Within the park there was also an interesting monument of national historical importance...

Yup.

The gals all go gaga for baseball players.

Next on our list after the zoo was climbing Mount Taihaku! Mount Taihaku is an oddly-shaped mountain (it looks like a tree-covered pyramid) topping off at a little over 320 metres. It's no Mount Fuji, but it's supposed to be a very scenic climb that people as physically unfit as us could conquer. The mountain is still in Sendai City - we think - but it is quite a ways away from downtown. Getting there (by bus) was a lot less strenuous than getting to the zoo, and we couldn't have picked a better day to hike up the mountain!

Mount Taihaku.

Intrepid yet inexperienced mountain climber Nicholas Lombardi is not impressed.

Overly enthusiastic mountain climber Kelsey Laswick enjoys the trees.

BEWARE OF SOMETHING!!!!!

When we mentioned that Mount Taihaku was a lot like a tree-covered pyramid, we weren't kidding. Especially about the tree-covered part. There were trees everywhere! It might as well be considered a thick forest with a pesky mountain in the middle rather than a tree-covered mountain. While it was the weekend, the official path was still quiet and relatively empty. We crossed paths with a few other hikers along the way, but never for long. Another curious thing was that our fellow hikers were all seniors! Maybe climbing mountains isn't the hip thing to do anymore. We were in for a two hour climb up the mountain and we needed to keep our energy up, so we made sure to pack a lunch (which was promptly eaten on the bus ride up to the mountain).

An example of all the trees, along with some of the other hikers.

The large gateway marks the beginning of the deadly gaunlet.
...not really.

It's just where the pathway starts getting uphill.

Someone was nice enough to leave hiking sticks for us!

Some people need two.

WHO DARES CHALLENGE THE MOUNTAIN OF TAIHAKU?

Kelsey and Nico, elevation unknown.

Unfortunately for us, after about an hour we were strongly discouraged from continuing up the mountain by rope fences and big signs that warned of falling rocks. Not wanting to be forever known by the locals as the photogenic but foolish foreign couple who were crushed by falling rocks, we turned back. Luckily we still technically climbed the Mountain (just not to the top), so we can add "climbing a mountain" to our list of things we did.

A praying mantis we saw on our way to the mountain.

The same praying mantis, on our way back from the mountain...

Wanting to break our theme of exhausting uphill climbs, we decided to do something a lot more relaxing the following day. The area where we live is very close to the Hirose River, a fairly large body of water that flows through Sendai City. We often bike past it on our way here and there, and it is quite beautiful. One thing we've been meaning to do for some time was to go out on the river with a boat. Normally such a wish is impossible due to the fact that we don't own a boat, but luckily for us there is usually a small boat rental guy on the riverbank on nice days. For just 500 yen we could take command of a little row boat and float around to our heart's content on the river for 45 minutes. It's a deal we simply couldn't pass up!

But first; lunch! Delicious pizza-man.

Captain Nico of the S.S. AwesomeBoat.

Kelsey does her best pirate face.

Nico tries to figure out where we are.

"Put your backs into it! Ramming speed!!"

Kelsey gives rowing a try.

And promptly gives up.

With a bike adventure, a zoological extravaganza, a mountain climb, and a boat outing all under our belts, we felt like it was time to spoil ourselves. Feeling a little hungry and wanting to give the local flavour a try, we settled on a little restaurant called "Freshness Burger". Japanese food at its finest!

You know you want it.

Esteemed burger-critic K. Laswick takes her first bite.

It passes! Dig in!

While our diet could use some work, we think our activites in honour of Health and Sports day were appropriate. We were outside, afterall! That'll be all for now.

For the entire unedited album experience, click here!https://picasaweb.google.com/118335130766899996104/ZooMountainRiverBurger?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCJuJyIjq_9D9Fg&feat=directlink

The Road Less Travelled

The claim that Japan is a beautiful place is hard to argue with, and the snapshot we got of the country last week only makes it more convincing. Sendai is located in the Tohoku (North-East) region of Japan, which is typically considered the backwater area of the nation due to its low urbanisation in comparison with some of the other regions. While it has its share of large cities like Sendai and Koriyama, most of the space here is taken up by rice paddies, forests, rivers and mountains. This usually becomes quite apparent when travelling between cities; but on October 1st we were persuaded to get off the train in that middle section and explore.

Our lovely train emerges from a tunnel that must have taken 5 minutes to get through.

Welcome to Omoshiroyama!

Omoshiroyama is, of course, known for its massive moths...

Our destination was Omoshiroyamakogen Station, a mouthful of a location that can be justly called off the beaten track. It's a tiny station without even employees, and a population which seemed to double with the coming of us and a couple others. It is located in the large mountain range between Miyagi Prefecture (where we live) and Yamagata Prefecture, our neighbours to the West. It looked a bit like it was - at least in busier months - a skiing area for those who find the idea of hotels and restaurants and street lights to be far too posh.  But our road (at least for now) was not up the mountains - instead we went hiking in the valleys.

Pretty...

Liam ruins a perfectly good photo.

A hikin' we will go.

There's a couple of steep drops; we were lucky to have stairs for this one!

Railings? We don't need no railings!

The path led through a river valley, complete with bridges (ranging from sturdily-made to falling apart), ledges, twisted pathways, steps built into the rocks and more. We might have gone a little crazy with our camera due to the sheer amount of beauty that surrounded us. There were rock formations, waterfalls, a huge amount of vegetation...well maybe I'll just show a bunch of photos?

Aforementioned beauty.

Nico tries to find a shortcut.

Moments before he was washed away...

Liam develops a deep connection with the Mossy Rock.

One of the better bridges!

The path had its fair share of slight dangers. That isn't to say that the path is strewn with the bodies of inexperienced hikers - we are still here afterall - but only that this isn't your typical walk in the park. In places the path narrows considerably, often accompanied by a slight downward flow of water that makes the ground nice and slippery for you. And of course there are the bridges, which have either seen better days or were really never up for the whole "bridge" thing in the first place. Our habit of jumping on top of these bridges didn't help either.

Water-slick narrow pathways? Why not?

Liam demonstrates how not to not cause the bridge to collapse.

Kelsey, not to be out-risk-taker-ered, follows suit.

Emma is having none of that nonsense.

One of the many "one person at a time" bridges.

It's not a short hike, and our tendency to stop after every turn and take fifty photos did not help things in the least. The weather that day was perfect - not too hot, not too cold - but as we progressed it did get a bit more chilly, causing the sweaters to come out of their bags. Luckily for us the hike was a straight line, and one of our party had done it before, allowing us to simply follow the leader and focus entirely on our camera.

Almost-group photo!

Kelsey takes a break.

Liam leads the way.

Pretty...

Just a big rock, chillin'.

As the path continued and picturesque, breathtaking natural beauty became the norm, we ended up getting a bit silly with the camera.

One of the indigenous valley-people.

Kelsey shows off her glamour muscles.

Just posin'

Nico refills our vital water stocks at a stream.

It was around this time that the rain started coming down; not the greatest thing to happen when your rain-gear consists of leaves held over your head in a makeshift umbrella. Lucky for us, this was also around the time that we had reached the end of the valley and started heading back up the mountainside. Not so lucky for us, we were a few kilometres away from Omoshiroyama station...

Frog! 

Our upward path led through here: basically a long dark sewage tunnel.

Eek! SASQUATCH! 

Emma shows off her innovative rain gear.

Kelsey eats her lunch well before lunchtime. 

Nico follows suit.

Full group photo at last! 

Almost...there...

After a bit of a walk back to our start point we decided to go in the opposite direction and up the mountain a little ways. On our upward climb we passed a few abandoned (or at least severely neglected) ski lodges, a few other sight see-ers, and dodged a couple cars before coming up to a large field of flowers. They were apparently called "cosmos" flowers, which sounded more than a little odd at first. There was a gazebo in the field with a little bell in it where we ended up taking our lunch stop (for those of us who had not already gobbled up their lunches) and ending our escapade.

The hills are aliiiiiive....

Warning, adorable squirrels?

Kelsey stops and smells the flowers.

Nico wrestles with the flowers.

Our lunch gazebo!

After that it was just one (much shorter) trip down the side of the mountain and off to the semi-abandoned train station which would take us home. Overall, definitely worth the 700 yen ticket it cost to get there (which was never claimed, as the Omoshiroyama station seemed completely un-staffed).

For posterity.

View the whole album here! There are a lot of pictures.

P.S. Happy birthday Ellie!