Japan for the 9th time - Oct and Nov 2019 - Page 4

Lots of train lines merge at Takasaki as I keep saying. However 2.5 of them are out of action still!

A proud day indeed for this colorful city! Welcome Uzbeki ribbon tossers of inferior potassium.

Yokokawa station. It is very spectacular. I remembered from last time it was spectacular. Great weather today too.

You can climb all of those mountains, from the other side at Mount Myogi. They have a reputation for killing many people.

Quaint little street by the station. If only the vending machine guy would move his truck.

There is a railway museum at Yokokawa. Here is one of the old trains being positioned for the tourist ride which goes a few hundred metres up the old abandoned line.

A bit more of the railway museum with a fantastic backdrop.

It is easy to follow the trail, there are maps everywhere, and it is afterall an actual railway line. Here is a bridge and a view.

This is where last time I diverted onto a 4.5 hour hike through the bear infested woods. Last night on BBC Asia they had a story on the high number of bears in Japan, and how they are dealing with them... in Karuizawa! Which is just over this set of hills. They have special dogs that frighten them out of the town back into the mountains... where the hiking trails are!

I decided bears dont like tunnels, and kept to the tunnel trail.

This is lake Usui. It is a slight detour from the trail, but worth it. There are three picturesque bridges to walk over. In the foreground is silt building up that is being prevented from going over the dam and down stream. A recent study found this kind of silt build up at dams, especially hydroelectric dams which were previously thought to be green power, causes a lot of methane to be produced as all the organic matter sinks and decays ANAEROBICALLY. Without the dams leaves and stuff in streams decay aerobically, and release 13.8x less CO2 (equivalent). I did the maths.

Here is the aforementioned dam. Through that bridge you can see another bridge behind it. Magical.

Another bridge, and some kayakers. Hungry bears look on. Soon...

Annnnddd its another bridge. Such a small lake, so many bridges.

But, tunnels outnumber bridges. All the rail sleepers have been removed and lighting has been added. The longest tunnel is just over 500 metres. The acoustics were great, I did my usual repertoire of baby shark, all the single ladies, hammer smashed face.

This is the main attraction along the trail You walk over the top of it and then down a stair case. Theres a large car park here for all the people too lazy to walk to here. Shameful.

Its a nice bridge though so I took another photo.

And one more.... for now.

The longest tunnel had little windows to the outside world, with bear warnings hanging in them!

The end of as far as you can go is here. The station remains largely untouched, too hard to dismantle I think. Its a shame they dont re open the remaining few kilometres to Karuizawa, I suspect the very long tunnel is too long to be safe for pedestrians. Interesting fact, the whole line including 20 or more tunnels and a similar number of bridges was built in only 18 months. People occasionally died from the coal smoke as the tunnels had very poor ventilation. A new blind system was invented, but was still almost useless. Hence this little bit of train track in the middle of Japan was the first electrified rail anywhere in Japan.

Here in the valleys, a bit of color has come, but its still not peak color. Last visit I was too late. The color comes late this year. I actually read that on a translated Japanese social media hiking website service thing yesterday, 'This year, late comes, all leaf color, I wait in patient, soon.'

On the way back, there were a lot more people getting in my way.

That is another more recent, but also closed alignment of the same rail line! Theres an entirely different set of abandoned tunnels.

Here is the famous bridge again, new angle.

Here is my famous head again, same angle.

And back almost all the way to Yokokawa are these buildings that have some kind of historical relevance. You can pay a steep fee of a thousand yen to go inside, but I peered in the window and inside they seem to be piled up with concrete rubble. Now I am doing my washing, fun times.

This is the midpoint of the walkway to nowhere, station in the distance.

When you get to the end, theres this building, and a display home village. Perhaps this building is the local council.

The far side of the station and the aforementioned, LABI.

Tomorrow in Australia is the annual horse killing festival that is a holiday in my state that I always miss. Huge vats of ice will be kept trackside, and any horse that needs to be shot in the head for not winning will be dipped in ice, loaded on the next plane and flown directly to Takasaki to be my dinner.

I elected on the spicy raw horse and tofu stew. Negotiating what size rice I wanted had the waitress giggling uncontrollably for no apparent reason. SMAAAALLLLLLLLLL.

I was up early in Takasaki. Behold the beautiful tree lined streets! I saw them elsewhere doing this to the trees. They do this BEFORE the leaves change color and fall off. They were doing it in Niigata as well. Its easier than cleaning up the leaves.

The Takasaki station area is vast.

They are really, really super excited about the visiting Uzbekistanian Uzbekistani Uzbek Uzi rhythmic gymnastics team.

I climbed up the wall of the local arena to get a nice shot of the town. Who left the leaves on that tree?

Here comes a train. Not my train. This line has the double decker trains, I dont think I ever rode on one in Japan. This however is a normal, single level train.

The station area was all but vacant. There is one guy on the other platform.

Here is a photo of Niigata. Those trees need to be cut down immediately!

This is basically where my hotel is in Furumachi. It all looks nice and modern and colorful, but shut and without people.

There are underground shopping areas also, these are old, but still, abandoned or closed, apart from a second hand shoe shop!

I found the local market. Not a lot happening. One place is selling used bits of barbie dolls. Mainly pieces, not whole dolls.

This is the demolition site mentioned above. Those two guys are the ones who chased me.

And here is my hotel room. I know it looks similar to the last one, but its quite a bit bigger and much more comfortable as a result. The desk is much bigger too. Now I have a theory about the last hotel. I had a double room booked, but when I checked in, they asked me if I was just one person staying, and the check in girl thought it was unusual that I had booked a double room if I am on my own, she said as such. I think she changed me to a single room! Now I am going to check photos on their website..... hmm, inconclusive, they mainly have photos of the extensive collection of ear cleaning apparatus they provide to all guests.

Signs of life.

More signs of life.

Lots of places to eat.

That is NOT OK in 2019.

Niigata has some malls. Although theres a lot of construction in and around them.

Isetan exists, but something called the rainbow tower that all the travel sites talk about is now PERMANENTLY CLOSED.

My ramen tonight was a bit different. Quite thick noodles. Small chunks of what I assume was pork, but I have no idea. I only eat things floating in red liquid now.

And right by my hotel, heres a modern covered shopping street. Very well lit. No people. Maybe tomorrow?

I was out the door at 6AM, and surprise rain had arrived. This was not part of the plan!

As I went further south on the fast train, it was still raining a bit, but starting to clear up.

I think this is Nagaoka, sun starting to break through.

Sunshine! The dark clouds on one half and bright sun on the other provided a great twilight effect. I am getting better at taking photos from a moving Shinkansen. When you read my Japan trips, the drinking game is Shinkansen. Each time I say it, drink.

By the time I got to Doai station, it was very bright. Doai station has two platforms, this one above ground, and the other one, which is the deepest in Japan for trains heading North. You will see it later as I went back towards Niigata from that platform.

The first part of my journey was to run really fast up the hill on the regular road to the bottom cable car station. I had set myself a time limit, 2.75 hours max to get to the summit or turn back. I was making hay will the sun was shining at this point thinking it might rain later, going as fast as I could. Heart rate hit 175, my watch got angry.

I followed the access road up to the top cable car station, heres proof I did not take the cable car. The access road is hard going, it can only be driven on by things with caterpillar tracks. It is very steep and very rocky. A few times big rocks slid out from under my feet as I ran up it.... yes I ran where I could.

Looking back down the rocky path. Rain was coming! I had options if the weather turned really bad, stop at the top cable car station and catch it back down being the least desired plan.

I was gaining height very quickly. The hike starts at about 600 metres and ends at 2000 if you make the summit. The top cable car station is about 1200m. So if you take the cable car you skip a lot of the challenge! DONT BE WEAK!

Its raining on the next mountain over, which I also wanted to climb a few days ago but went to the volcano instead.

I arrived at the top cable car station after just over an hour, which included 5 minutes of stuffing about at the bottom getting on the right track. There are a few ski fields up here, but the big mountains are to the right of this pic and the big ski fields are further down the valley. I did not even stop here, had to keep going!

Looking back down on the cable car / ski resort. This part of the trail was nice and smooth, with wooden planks in many places. It is a very popular trail from the top cable car station to the summit, however I was the only person who ran up from the station.

I was headed up there, into the cloud. Well I was hoping to, as long as it didnt rain too hard and I had enough time to get there. Also, another rainbow. I was still running wherever I could at this point, soon it would get steeper. Under the rainbow there, that steep cliff, that is one of the most challenging ice rock cliff climb things in Japan. If you read about Mount Tanigawa you will read that it has killed over 800 people, more than Everest. This is largely from the ice climbing and also avalanches in winter. You can ignore all that if you are climbing it in hiking weather.

Views started to appear. Amazing views. They would only get better.... until I entered the cloud that is.

Lower down view in the other direction. Somehow the rain never arrived. I was very relieved, and puffing hard.

Bonus view.

Getting higher.

Still blue sky.

Now the steep parts started. There were ropes and chains but no ladders. They were not really needed, but have been added to this hike due to its popularity. I saw a lot of other people even though its a weekday with questionable weather.

The view is starting to get pretty serious now.

This one is looking back down in the direction I had come from. I like the silvery trees and shrubs, caused by the icy winds.

Even though I am only going up to the first peak in the range, which I think is highest, you can continue on for many days of camping over all those peaks. There are huts along the way to set up camp inside. The range is the border between Gunma and Niigata. The weather can change very suddenly.

Another look down the valley.

And the other valley.

Now to keep going into the cloud and towards the summit.

It was getting very steep! But it was not very windy. So far...

I hit the cloud, and it started snowing. Not enough to show on the ground though. Even though I was only wearing a long sleeve tshirt, I was not cold, despite it being about 0 degrees. The key is to keep going as fast as possible.

Ice started to appear. Thankfully not enough for me to be worried about slipping.

About 100m below the summit is this emergency hut. I think its where you are supposed to camp for the first night on multi day hikes.

Here I am on the summit. It was very windy on the summit, and very cold. I was ahead of schedule, but no time for happy snaps. I could not do THE STANCE because my camera would probably blow off the mountain. I am wearing my favourite, oldest long sleeve t-shirt that has appeared in many shots on the top of mountains.

ICE ICE BABY.

For my fast descent I had to put my camera in my bag and put my gloves on so I could use my hands to lower myself down rocks. On the way down I went back past a number of people I passed on my way up. They were very chatty, making triangles with their hands and asking Peak? Yes? And when I said yes they would clap. These were mostly older women. They like me on mountains because clearly I am not in Japan to impregnate their daughters if I am climbing a mountain. They would probably let me have an ice cream. Anyway I got distracted, this photo is proof I DID NOT take the cable car back down. I ran back down, fast.

I was early back to the station. This is part of the station, a pedestrian footbridge going into the mountain, where the giant straight down staircase starts.

Before hitting the stairs, I checked out the chalet shop. A nice spot. I wonder if they stay open all winter or if they get completely snowed in?

Here is the actual station. There is no staff. You can not use SUICA/ICOCA. I am using my Nagano/Niigata all areas travel pass so I didnt have to worry about buying a paper ticket. There is a ticket inspector woman on the train and she seemed to catch a few people that got on at other stations. My pass was checked twice in both directions, riding for free is not an option if you plan to steal from Japan!

I am assuming that sign says its 486 steps. There is no lift, there are no escalators.

Here is the inside of that pedestrian walkway I showed the outside of before. It could fall down any day now.

Steps, all the way down. No bends, no turns, just a straight down staircase. They are all in groups of 5 with a mini landing after every 5 steps. Every 50 steps they have painted a number. It sounds like a lot of steps but its really not that many. I went half way back up again as I had time.

Heres the view from the bottom looking back up again.

The deep, deep platform. People come here in the middle of the night and go ghost hunting. They also come in the day time to check out the steps. You can see other people in my photos of the steps, but none of them actually boarded the train, I was the only person who got on the train at this station. I am lead to believe on average only 22 people a day use this station, that number includes the top and bottom stations.

There is a toilet at the bottom. I have no idea where it drains to. Theres no door on it!

The waiting room is filled with hungry / angry ghosts.

I walked to the end and took a long exposure, nothing much to see. I aint afraid of no ghosts.

The local train took me back to EchigoYuzawa where I changed back to the Shinkansen. This is a very popular onsen town and ski resort. The main ski fields are a few km away, I saw lots and lots of huge hotels on the sides of hills, and lots of chair lifts. No snow yet though. Because its such a popular spot, the station has lots of high end shopping for tourists.

Out in the street people were soaking their feet in volcanic boiling water. Hopefully its hot enough to kill tinea.

The station forecourt is not really representative of the Yuzawa area, the much fancier hotels are all on the ski fields. The station is built on the side of a hill.

The shops inside the station however, are all very nice.

On the bullet train back to Niigata, clear blue sky again! I missed all the weather apart from some welcome snow. Actually, all of a sudden the train got wet like we hit a sudden downpour, but I think we went through a train wash.

Photo for my mother. They have hung little quilted things under the pedestrian walkways all over town. Hundreds of them. Most of them are not very good!

Red light district.

Most shops were shut at 7pm, this one was quite nice and still open. I bought a few handbags, geisha face paint, toe slippers.

This is now officially the quietest street in the world.

There are a few small alleys with lights on, but nobody home.

Down this alley is where the demolition site is where those guys threatened me with a big spanner.

This restaurant serves pork. Or maybe its a brothel with ugly girls.

The underground mall thing was close to abandoned. If I waited a couple of minutes I am sure I would have got a shot with zero people.

Heres my dinner. It was tiny and quite expensive. It is not curry or ramen. It came from Royal Host, which you can find all over Japan. I nearly got some kind of baked stew with cheese on top, but they were nice enough to show how many calories were in each item. 1200 calories in cheesey stew! Only 600 calories in my tiny pork thing with vegetables.