Mount Takahata and Mount Kuratake from Torisawa to Yanagawa stations
SPLENDIFEROUS weather. No wind, no cloud, forecast max of 21C. You know what that means.
Todays hike was out on the Chuo line. This line was badly impacted by the recent typhoon but its all back to normal now, they pulled their finger out because they knew I was coming.
It took just over 100 minutes to get from Ueno to Torisawa station, the last bit on the local line from Takao to Torisawa has excellent views, but you have to stand at the door to appreciate them because old women will shut every single blind on the train.
Torisawa and most places along the Chuo line have a convenience store, this is compared to the Ome line which mostly do not. That is because the Chuo line is also a road that does not end in a dead end. That is my theory anyway.
Todays title, au naturale hiking trail, is in reference to the completely un-messed with trail. No steps at all! No seats anywhere. There were a few signs as you shall see, but mostly painted rocks. Generally at the start and near the summits someone has made an attempt to cut a few steps into the cliffs, there was absolutely none of that today. To celebrate I completed most of the hike au naturale also, until I started getting burnt.
The trail was quite eroded in many places, muddy, and in the lower bits lots of boulders and tree trunks had washed down cliffs onto what was the path. It was a case of follow the ribbons and make unexpected water course crossings. The lower parts on the way up and down were really hard going because of this, but there was never really much chance of getting lost. I also did not see a bear. I also did not see another person! Not for 5 hours. That was a little unusual.
This hike is quite well documented, featuring on at least two popular English language websites, and on a few best dayhikes near Tokyo lists, so where were all the people? I have no idea.
Halloween is over. Time for Xmas. The celebrate, this boy band have put on their velvet lounge suits to advertise xmas cakes for 7-eleven. But that is not all. Starbucks release their xmas range of snow globes and mugs today. They need barriers and crowd control! There were lines of Japanese women down the street at 6AM. Only 2 people at a time were allowed in store to browse and purchase. Luckily for me to be able to get a quick breakfast at the only place open at this time, a staff member was asking if anyone in the line was just wanting coffee and not to buy xmas decorations. I was the only one, but it meant I could go straight to the front.
Here is the little village of Torisawa. As you can see from the above photo, they have a 7-eleven from where you can buy calorie mate and pocari sweat. It was very bright sunlight all day.
I think my mountains are the one towards the left and the one just off the left edge of the screen. Look at the horrible farmers smoke!
The gorge / ravine running along the Chuo line is not as impressive as the one running along the Ome line, but it is still impressive never-the-less.
Gorge in other direction, never as impressive in the morning light.
The hike starts at a swamp that is apparently a pristine reservoir full of mountain water. I wont be partaking of a drink.
Thats the path. It was hard going, and then got harder.
Signs are a welcome comfort, but note they do not show distance or time like on some other mountains.
And there it is, Fujisanyamadakedeska. Or as I like to call it, Mount Fuji. A lot more snow on it this year compared to the same time last year. Someone live streamed their death climbing it 2 days ago. And before I am told its not climbing season, THOUSANDS of people climb it every year out of season, even in January and February. There are organised tours every single day. Of course that does not make it safe, but people also die climbing it during climbing season. Given the amount of snow and ice on it right now, you could not do it without ice axes and crampons etc.
I was panicking about how much snow there was on Fuji. Oh yeah, this is the summit of the first mountain for the day, Mount Takahata.
The view across the Chuo valley, assuming thats what it is called, has no Fuji but is also impressive. I have climbed quite a few of those mountains.
Still not a lot of leaf color to go crazy over. This seems incongruous with the amount of snow on Fuji.
Time for the second ascent. Much more pleasant than the first one.
Its me, at summit #2 for the day, Mount Kuratake, with another mountain in the distance behind me. Those are my awesome new orange technology socks. They are still going well. It is not the same pair, I have more than one, but I have worn the same shorts and t-shirt for 3 different hikes now!
Here it is again, without me getting in the way of the view.
The path down descended into rocks, streams and fallen logs. Hard going again.
I managed to not get my feet wet, but it was a close call a few times! I think I crossed a stream no less than 20 times.
This is probably the best picture of the day. It is, as you can see, an amazing huge rock covered in moss with the sun shining on it and trees growing out of it. Very magical. A rabbit literally came out of my hat it was so magical.
And then I emerged down the side of a sandy cliff onto a road and was somewhere near Yanagawa. The start/end point of the hike had collapsed from erosion, a steep cliff had formed, I just slid down onto the road to end my hike. It appears there was another way 100 metres further down the road, judging by all the temporary pink ribbons and spray paint on the road.
The road back passed this nice house growing delicious chillis. I pulled a couple off and chomped on them on my stroll back to the station.
I had been up there, somewhere.
And now for the ravine shots from Yanagawa. Not bad, wires in the way.
In the afternoon light the view back the other way is probably better. Thats all for now, probably wont go too far tonight.
Eating ramen at the ramen street at Tokyo station
As skillfully predicted, not many photos tonight. This is one of the things I type often, apology for not many photos.
Tonight I had to figure out what train pass to get to cover my journey tomorrow and subsequent journeys at a discounted cost. There is no one train pass that covers all the places I am going to except the full Japan train pass that costs a fortune. I think I have come up with a plan to get the JR East Nagano Niigata Area Pass to get from Tokyo to Takasaki, then Takasaki to Niigata, then probably most of the way back. This allows any 5 days use out of a 14 day period, so I will need to use it on a couple of day trips too.
Then I will use the JR East Tohoku Area Pass, which will cover Yamagata, Koriyama and back to Tokyo. This pass also allows 5 days usage out of 14, so I will again do a couple of long day trips with it. That one is easier to use up as it even works in Tokyo along the Chuo and Ome lines so I can use it at the back end of my trip.
The tricky day is to get from Niigata to Yamagata.
When I booked this trip I planned to use a combination of a minimum 3 local trains that go over the mountains, but this is only one service a day, and theres some suggestion one of the lines is a bus replacement currently. This method would also take at least an hour longer than catching the Shinkansen almost all the way back to Tokyo and then all the way north to Yamagata. The Shinkansen would be far easier, more comfortable, and more likely to get there. However if I wasnt traveling on a discount rail pass, it would be very expensive. So my current plan is on this day to use the Niigata pass to catch the Shinkansen back to Omiya in the north of Tokyo, then buy the Tohoku pass at Omiya and make an immediate booking to Yamagata from there. Should be a fun day!
Now that I have completed that long winded explanation that is poorly worded and meaningless to everyone except me, after buying my first of probably 2 passes I went to Tokyo station, ate ramen in the underground ramen street, came back to my hotel and wrote this very long sentence.
Here is the aforementioned Tokyo station. Its an underground city, with some above ground bits.
The above ground huge lit up roof is very impressive, but there are not many eating places up here, to the underground!
Surprisingly, huge lines at all the underground eating establishments. I would have thought people would like to venture outside on a Friday night. Not me obviously.
I selected a place with a medium length line, maybe 10 people, bought my ticket and waited for some delicious ramen. It was supposed to be very spicy but it was not. Also, I hate it when they picture the egg cut in half, but then they dont cut it in half! Its too big to swallow hole and cutting it up with chopsticks just causes it to disintegrate. Now that all that whingeing is out the way, it was in fact very nice.
Tokyo to Takasaki with a quick visit to Byakue Dai-Kannon
Now I am in Takasaki, about an hour out of Tokyo by bullet train.
Now I have escaped the millions of tourists in Tokyo, so that I can be the only tourist and feel very very important.
Now I have run away from the Rugby World Cup grand final which is on today, although it is actually on in Yokohama, a small suburb of about 10 million people near Tokyo.
Getting to Takasaki was easy enough, although my first choice of Shinkansen was fully booked, so I had to wait another 30 minutes. I knew this because I actually booked yesterday. The grueling 1 hour journey was over before I knew it, and I was too early to check in to my luxurious hotel. From the window of my train I saw a giant Buddha statue on a hill on the horizon, so why not just walk over to that and back? Thats what I did.
Two things of note, on the train a small child was given a box of ping pong balls to play with. That went about as well as expected, every 8.3 seconds a ping pong ball bounced down the aisle of the train, followed by a small child running down to find it, which was repeated about 223 times.
Later in the day on my way back from the Buddha park, while crossing the mighty river, an old lady on a bike stopped, and yelled at me, while pointing at my shorts. She did not like my legs at all. The tirade lasted at least 30 seconds, then she nearly fell off her bike trying to ride off in a hurry.
Here is the inside of the Shinkansen. It was full!
Takasaki as seen from the station level 2. It is quite a big commercial centre due to all the train lines that meet here.
Hmm, whats this, a path up a hill? I will follow and find out.
Half way up, the usual kind of shrine, with kids dressing up as Japanese Marvel super heroes.
Further up the hill I found a number of abandoned cars while trying to find a view. This was the best one.
Eventually I found the statue I had seen from the train.
Buddha plus red bridge. Peak Japan right here. You cannot see the view of the city unless you pay the fee to climb up inside the Buddhas brain area.
Around the back is a botanic gardens that is under construction. To get to it you have to cross this big red wooden bridge. I was still trying to find a view of the city.
View of area that is not the city as you can see, just boring non colorful trees.
Finally after retreating I found a view of Takasaki, from a car park. I can see my hotel.
This is where I was crossing the river and was verbally assaulted by an old witch who cast a spell on me. Those mountains in the distance, I know what they are, but I dont have enough time to get to those. Too many mountains!
My predictable APA hotel actually joins onto the station via the elevated skywalk.
The room is minuscule, despite being a double. Its all fine except the power points are directly behind where you need to open your laptop. I have had to slide it across and sit a bit sideways. Poor design. No feng shui. Also the room is 9/15th's occupied by a television.
Visiting Maebashi, which has no Shinkansen station
Where I am staying, Takasaki, has a major Shinkansen station where two lines split and go in other directions. There are also 4 or 5 other normal lines that start or end there, probably to connect to the Shinkansen.
Before the Shinkansen was constructed, the regional capital and largest city was Maebashi, not Takasaki. I went there tonight. I sure did say Shinkansen a lot today.
Depending on where you read, Maebashi may actually have a higher population, but there is nothing there. I feel as though it must be half the population it once was. It is only 3 stops on the local line from Takasaki, long stops, but no more than 10km, and yet its a total ghost town.
I could not find anywhere there to eat, and I walked around a lot. I spent too long there looking before I gave up and as a result, I was late getting back and some places were closing at 9pm, limiting my choices in Takasaki as well. Thats a lot of geography for tonight, now lets do some pics and go to bed.
This is the most colorful area of Maebashi I could find that was an actual business.
This area looked promising, but the lights are actually attached to the wall around a demolition site.
After a lot of looking, I found the covered shopping street. Almost completely abandoned.
Here is the only sign of life in the shopping street. The owner was cooking his dinner on a small bbq alongside his store.
Maebashi is full of car parking buildings. I will remember it for its wonderful car parks.
I am actually going back to Maebashi tomorrow as its where my bus departs from. That is one of the reasons I went there this evening, to try and figure out the bus situation. Confusion about the bus has only increased. Note all these sticky taped paper additions to the sign. Apparently a new timetable was released on 1 November. Today is 2 November. The bus info place has closed down. So theres a good chance I wont get to where I am going tomorrow. I hate buses.
Back at the Maebashi station, I looked around for anywhere to eat. Mcdonalds or nothing, but look, the line goes out the door and down the street! I elected to go back to Takasaki instead.
I just missed a train so had a few minutes to spare, this allowed me to find a sleepy cat guarding a pizza shop, which was closed.
Back at the Takasaki station area I found a cafe pronto still open. My choices were pasta or beer. The pasta was ok, but in the pictures it had a lot more mushrooms. They were very confused that I did not want beer.
There are currently 5 comments - click to add
Alex on 2019-11-06 said:
I was a bit surprised by no restaurants around Maebashi station, but there seem to be many (well 20) in Google Maps and Tabelog about 500m north of the station, which seems to be near where you found the shopping street and the car parks. Only 7 around the station which is a bit poor.
adriana on 2019-11-02 said:
the notices at the bus stop are about extra buses for the gunma marathon. i couldnt see a date though.
Brian on 2019-11-02 said:
Very hard to find somewhere to eat late at night in small towns. We've had similar experiences. Usually to only options are convenience stores but are not always available.
David on 2019-11-02 said:
Dormy inn is always double the price
The status is 41.8 metres high and 4km west of the station
mother on 2019-11-02 said:
APA hotel always tiny and not that cheap. Dormy Inn much better. Buddha is not Buddha but Quan Yin goddess of mercy. How big and where is city centre in relation to station?
Mount Akagi daytrip from Takasaki
Its the second day of a three day weekend here in Japan, and people are daytripping all over the place. So I decided to go to a very popular spot. The weather was not clear blue sky, so the photos are very muted, but it was warm, and no rain.
Mount Akagi is easily accessible, you can drive to the crater lake. Then you can ride around in little paddle boats which will one day provide one of the more amazing ways people die in a natural disaster.
As always, I took public transport. I lined up for the bus 45 minutes early, and was surprised to see a fellow white guy at the head of the line. He was explaining things to people in fluent Japanese. I chatted with him. I normally avoid this at all costs, but I wanted to know when the bus was going! He was British, but lived in Japan since 1980. He goes hiking all the time and has only ever once seen a bear (that was the other question I wanted answered!). He told me his name and when I googled it later it turns out hes written a few books on hiking in Japan and worked as a freelance journalist mainly reporting on soccer (football), including for BBC Asia. So that was unexpected. I wont speak that much again until I get back to Australia, I strung at least 10 words together in a row. My face muscles feel strained.
Once I got to nearly the top of the mountain on the bus it was time to set off up over the two peaks, Kurobi and Komagatake. I would not be alone today. Not by a long shot.
The trail was well marked and there were hundreds of people. This was at times very frustrating, finally I experienced what most people go on about, waiting your turn to climb, and waiting a really long time to descend. What I could have done in 2 hours took more than 4.
On the way down a small girl followed right behind me. When I got a bit of clear air in front of me and was able to go faster, she kept up. I tried to let her past, she would not pass. I have no idea who she belonged to, maybe she was on a daytrip on her own, but she looked no older than 10 years old. The path down was very steep and rocky, big steps, I had to lower myself with my hands. She had a technique of sliding down the rocks on her bum and a few times it looked to me like she hurt herself, but she never complained. I dont think her pants will be worth much after the day though.
The descent seemed to take forever, but I still managed to make the early bus back, the bus after was not due to leave for another 2 hours (I think?).
I wont try and explain the bus timetable, the bus companies website was wrong, the summer timetable had been extended extra days due to the long weekend, except for today, but they had put on an extra bus that was not on the schedule to bridge the gap between Saturday and Monday, but only if enough people lined up. Yeah, thats how buses work in Japan, hopeless.
Here is the bus I was on. As it turns out they put on enough buses for everyone to get a seat, but all leaving at the same time. You can see the guy I mentioned above sitting at the very front left. I predict my mother will do some kind of forensic analysis of this photo to see if she can find out more about him. Maybe you can see his reflection in the windscreen. Enhance.... enhance....
Here is the village area by the crater lake. Very gloomy skies.
Behold, the lake itself. I got a shot without any of the swan shaped paddle boats ruining the view.
Time to start my climb. Up here, around 2000m in altitude, the leaves already fell off the trees. But fear not, what I call low bamboo is abundant, and I like the low bamboo.
There are quite a few different peaks, but the main path which I stuck to, goes over the two highest. You can do a multi day hike up and over here and connect to another mountain, apparently not possible to complete in one day.
Its a shame all the farmers decided to set fire to their crops. On the way back to the city later in the day the smoke was very thick, and people were all coughing on the bus, it actually smelt of smoke.
I have taken this photo and one very similar higher up a bit further down. I think I like this version more due to th yellow contrasting foreground.
The lake as seen from above, and so many mountains, and so much smoke.
Summit area #1, Kurobi. Most Japanese people bring a gas stove and make omurice and ramen. Really a guy was whipping up omelets.
Nice view down the valley, would be nicer if the sky was clear.
Time to head down and up to the next peak, via more low bamboo.
The second peak, it looks small but if you load the full size pic, you can see people very close to the centre of the pic to indicate scale. I could draw a scale marker on the pic but I would be making it up and it would be wrong. From here to the median point of the protuberance is 0.0000721 parsecs.
Summit #2, Komagatake, with shrine. This is not where you get a good view from though, walk another 100 metres past here to the scenic panorama spot.
Here it is, scenic panorama view spot. The photo does not show it but there were more than 100 people here having lunch. One girl opened a big bag of mandarins and they all fell out and rolled off the cliff. Everyone laughed. Then they all offered her food. I didnt offer her any of my muesli bar.
My big unshaven sweaty head, in all its glory. So much glory.
View without the people in the way. So brown, so grey.
Time to descend. Time to be held up by slow people with smaller legs than me trying to negotiate huge rocks.
A bit more low bamboo, it reflects the light a lot.
It does not look that steep, but it was really very steep.
Look at that long line of people snaking up the path. GET OUT OF MY WAY. Actually a helmet might be a good idea, a lot of rocks were being kicked down the path, and some went a very long way before they crashed to a halt. This shot with people for scale and reference gives a better idea of how steep it was.
Lake from lower down, with a bit of color, and a red bridge if you squint.
There were a few spots to stop and get a bit of a better view from.
Almost there! People were racing motorbikes on the road around the crater lake. The noise was amazing. No serenity to be found here.
Once at the bottom, predictable temple. The bus ride back took forever and got stuck in traffic near Maebashi. Probably due to low visibility from all the smoke!
Covered streets and modern malls do battle in Takasaki
Tonight I explored Takasaki. It is quite nice.
First I located the old covered shopping street, which is so old they have branded it as such. There were actually a lot of businesses there, mostly 'girl bars'. And at roughly 6pm, its changeover time. Not changeover of the girls, but changeover of the stores. All the shoe stores close, and all the girls arrive. The girls did not look Japanese and they did not look at all happy while I was waving my camera about.
After deciding there was nowhere to eat along the old area other than unwelcoming smokers bars serving grilled bacon on sticks, I wandered back to the shiny new station area.
This has at least 3 department stores, including Takashimaya. However its actually Aeon style that is the nicest, and as you shall see, levels 7 and 8 are nice eateries. Not a food court, more like separate open seated areas for each small plastic shiny restaurant. The kind of place I like because its cheap, informal and has pictures for a menu. I can point and not speak.
After ingesting my dinner way too quickly it was time to go to the ticket office and advance select my ticket to Niigata for Tuesday, this time I got my #1 choice of train. I suspect the lack of train availability yesterday was all to do with the long weekend to celebrate the ascension of the emperors cat to the eucalyptus throne.
Now I must examine my list of possible activities for tomorrow and make a choice, based on weather, energy levels, cost, likelihood of being too busy on a public holiday, desire for bear encounter.
Here is the Aeon style building. You can see Takashimaya poking out behind it.
A lot of Takasaki looks like this. Old, but interesting.
They know the covered streets are dead. So dead that they are branding them retro.
Mainly its a spot to park cars now.
Speaking of parking cars, this is a car parking spot. A car park. What do you call it if its only one level of car parking? Anyway, they strung the lights up and put the festival float thing that is powered and makes noise and has moving characters in the middle of the car park to attract customers.
Level 7 of the Aeon style building. Everything here stays open until 9pm, even on Sunday. Probably because of all the train passengers that transfer here.
This place with the giraffe and the two Australian women ordering something is actually a mini Ikea. I think there might be one in Australia somewhere now. They dont actually sell any furniture in here, but you can look at it and order it from a kiosk. And yes, they sell coffee and snacks.
100 Hours curry, 10 chillis out of 10. I liked the look of the colorful vegetables. It was quite nice.
CHEESE CANDY. Individually wrapped chunks of cheese. White flavorless cheese. I think you mainly buy it so you can have something to unwrap and enjoy the texture of.
Perhaps cheese candy goes well with Okinawan dish of pigs ears. The contrasting textures are a delectable delight.
There are currently 3 comments - click to add
bobule on 2019-11-04 said:
nice autumnal vibes, food looks awful though!
jenny on 2019-11-03 said:
you can keep the cheese candy and the poor piggy ears thanks.
mother on 2019-11-03 said:
the time to start the descent is the photo of the day - lovely streaky sky and haze over the hills with the lake in the middle.
There are currently 3 comments - click to add
mother on 2019-11-01 said:
strangely enough I've never seen that side of Tokyo station - always the old building. Hard to find somewhere to eat without a queue inside big stations. Better to find the back streets.
David on 2019-11-01 said:
I say incongruous all the time, it embiggens me
adriana on 2019-11-01 said:
Incongruous - have you been reading the dictionary?