shinkansen

The long railroad to the north

Will our grand send off

help us through the train night

or exhaust us both?

So here we are finally after faffing around at the Shinkansen gates expecting to be whooshed to Hokkaido while we slept but are redirected to Track 13 – not a bullet train line. All the paparazzi are still lurking about and a guard comes running down the platform to get us underway.

He checks the signage – as do we – and the insignia on the train.

Both look fine but this is our train.

Not the post modern express we’d hoped to help us through the night – rather less elegant inside than that in Some like it Hot as it happens. The Hokutosei seems to use rolling stock from the fifties.

However, we installed ourselves, the train set off and after organizing our bags in this tiny space we set off for the dining car. Oh, oh, no. Reservations only and must be made three days in advance. Why did nobody tell us this when we booked our berth at considerable expense above our JR Passes? A cart came by with some provisions and we had a few bits and pieces so we were able to construct an amuse bouche and then dinner.

Fish biscuit amuse bouche Dinner

After this wondrous repast and a few rounds of “Take Two” there being no electricity for blogging except by standing in the washing area – and dear reader some lines have to be drawn. So anticipating an early (06:35) arrival in Hakodate we prepared for bed. As we finished our ablutions the train stopped. We looked through the window to see a solitary figure on the platform opposite photographing us. Ironically, or perhaps necessarily, we were at Fukushima and expressed our solidarity as best we could.

Not a great deal of sleep was had by either of us before dawn broke and we emerged from the Seiku the world’s longest undersea tunnel (53 Km; 33 miles) into Hokkaido. We soon had our first glimpse of Mt Hakodate, arrived at the station and saw the train depart for Sapporo. Off for a day of enforced sightseeing as we can’t check in till 4 pm.

As the song says “Oh what a night!” But not quite inn the same way. Do the sums: Osaka – Tokyo 570 km in 3 hours; Tokyo- Hakodate 830 km in 11 and a half hours.

In Japan

It’s not all about the beef

In two Kobe days

can we find the real source of

Haruki’s ideas?

A taxi delivered us to Takamatsu Station bright and early – too early again for the train we’d selected with the fewest interchanges but at the gate they insisted that if we took the 09:33 Marine Liner we could get a direct train to Shin-Kobe soon after arrival in Okayama. Soon after we were seated the train attendant, as they are called, came up to us with this piece of paper with times and platforms for our interchange – without being asked and in English.

It was just another example of the superb service we are receiving from all quarters. The train ride was under grey clouds that nearly touched the roof. So going back across the Seto-Ohashi bridge on the train was interesting as we took the lower deck which would have afforded views but for the grey. We were very impressed that a journey from a different island across the bridge and round the coast of over 150 miles had been accomplished in under two hours door to door in a combination of local train and shinkansen. Drizzle turned to a downpour as we arrived in Kobe, dropped our luggage of at the very stylish Hotel b Kobe and set off on a circular city bus tour to get our bearings.

We got off the bus to visit a lovely little museum of glass bead work. We are just not used to finding a museum on the second floor of a smart downtown office block but that’s where the Kobe Lampwork Glass Museum is. With an excellent display on the long history of using glass beads for decoration it then reveals the many styles and techniques used by modern beadworkers. With the rain lessened a little as we made our way out after a fascinating hour, we then got back to the real work of the day. Just round the corner is the Higashi Yuenchi park which is home to memorials to the great Hanshin earthquake of 1995.

Murakami wrote a collection of short stories called after the quake which feature people affected in various ways by the after effects of the massive earthquake. Being in the park with it’s monuments showing the scale of the disaster and expressing the hope and determination of the people of Kobe to overcome it was extremely moving especially with the latest Tohoko tsunami so fresh in our thoughts. Juggling camera, bags and umbrella was not easy but I hope we can give some indication of what it meant.

The 60 cm drop at the left edge of the trellis A flame of hope burns Memorials line the park

shows the effect of the earthquake

As the rain worsened, we decided there was only a choice of two places to visit next – the aquarium or a sake brewery tour. Hey we’ve seen lots of fish on our plates and in ponds and have only a vague notion of how sake is made so the truly educational option wins out. We hail a passing cab, opining that it’s much too far to walk – and how. The driver was a bit confused but kept on heading north along the shore road with yen flipping over alarmingly on the meter. However he did take us to the right place even if he wasn’t quite sure and hovered at the gate getting wet until an official was able to reassure him that this was indeed the Kaku Masamune Brewery which we had selected on the map we obtained from the Tourist Information at the station because our coupons gave us a free tasting and a free sake vessel each. The tour was fascinating as we followed a group of Japanese visitors who were led round by an obviously hilarious guide as sides were frequently split with laughter. It was a potentially hazardous tour evidently- and that was before any sake was consumed. A young lady came to our rescue and took us to a viewing room where a ten-minute video helpfully put into context all the equipment we had just seen.

We took a train back into town and with light drizzle replacing the torrents we walked around Sannomiya, the central shopping and entertainment area of Kobe, had a beer or two and dinner of cook- it- on- the-hibachi Kobe beef and vegetables. Heresy we know, but on this tasting – admittedly not in a gourmet restaurant – Hida beef has the edge. Then drawn as always to a bar with a Spanish flag and the promise of a glass of tempranillo we were drawn into conversation with three young people, two of whom had been to study English in Hampstead three years ago. It turned into a bit of a night of great hilarity – proving again how friendly and welcoming we have found people on this trip.

Thursday was a complete contrast with brilliant blue skies and temperatures well over 20 degrees and there are almost as many umbrellas in the streets, now taking on the role of parasol. The tradition of all those bamboo umbrellas in wood block prints is maintained today on the streets of modern Japan. We planned today to look for formative influences in Ashiya the Kobe suburb where Haruki lived from an early age. A couple of stops along the line to Osaka and we get off in a pleasant, probably quite affluent suburb. Did the sun always shine this brightly over the young Murakami? The reception desk staff at the hotel next to the station were wonderfully helpful in pointing us towards the library Haruki used to frequent, his Junior High School and the monkey cage which features in a story in the collection The Elephant Vanishes. The young ladies did inform us that the monkey was dead. In fact the park used to have parakeets and monkeys in cages but they were closed for economic reasons in 2010 – fate of monkeys unknown but probably properly transferred into alternative care. We strode through the elegant suburban streets and found the library with little trouble and the park was right next door. I’d have been happy to locate and photograph the exterior but we were warmly invited in, presented meishi and blog address and were introduced to a librarian who hadn’t met Haruki but had had some considerable contact with his mother. We asked about the house he grew up in to be told it had gone but there were some older houses in the area that are similar. His Junior High School was also just a few blocks along the road. In Uchide Park with a witty touch the council has added a panel to the cage with a monkey reading Murakami’s book Kafka on the Shore.

Leafy Ashiya The Library

The monkey cage Kafka-reading monkey Ashiya Junior High School

We looked for other connections and saw a few houses of the type he might have lived in. Coffee in a quaint coffee house served by a lady who must be in her eighties and back to the station to explore central Kobe further. As we’re actually on holiday too this involved a ride in a cable car to the Nunobiki Herb Gardens. The ride gives great views over the whole sprawl of Kobe and down to the port where we were headed next. Very well organized there’s a sloping path from the top cable car station to the middle point. It gave us an opportunity to indulge in some more Japanese ice-cream with fresh strawberries as they are at the height of their season and local honey. The variety of plants was excellent with many unfamiliar species and varieties among the more common and some beautiful flower beds displays gave us a restful and relaxing break.

There are a number of references to the Kobe harbour area so we caught the circular tour bus to Meriken Park and were met by an enormous dancing fish designed by Frank Gehry and construction supervised by Tadao Ando – being made of steelmesh it was of great interest to us David Begbie admirers. Just beyond it was another earthquake memorial with a whole section of the collapsed harbour wall to remind visitors of just how awesome the power of the earth can be.

The rest of the harbour area is devoted to retail and entertainment and we had a leisurely beer watching young and trendy people come and go in stylish, outlandish and downright weird wardrobe choice. Many Japanese people have real recognizable style. Others have style that’s sometimes hard to interpret. Back to the hotel to change and out for a quiet okonomiyaki dinner – Katie was right, Kyoto rules when it comes to this mix of rösti and vegetable pancake. This was OK but the previous one was much tastier. We’ve enjoyed a couple of days in Kobe getting close to the environment that helped form Murakami and therebyinfluenced his writings. It’s a very European feeling, lively city and it’s been a fun visit even if we’ve as so often only scratched the surface.

In Japan

Off to Okayama

Our first bullet train

Kyoto to Okayama

excited or what?

With our domestic laundry duties completed the night before, cases packed, we’re off to take our first shinkansen or bullet train to Okayama. We walk across to the station find the appropriate gate and are told we can actually get an earlier direct train rather than the 10:13 we’d planned that meant a change at Shin-Osaka. Some shinkansen are not valid for travel with JR passes so we were delighted to be told to get up there and get on. A swift purchase of a sushi box for breakfast and we’re on the platform. Slight surprise that the platform is not at ground level but up a level on stilts. Important to check with the sign boards which coaches (carriages) are for unreserved seats on a highly accurate poll of two trains it seems they are usually the front three or five so it’s good to be waiting in the right place when the train arrives. The coach numbers are clearly marked on the platform and orderly queues form behind them. A sleek, shiny beast slides into the platform but it’s not ours. It disgorges its passengers and loads new ones swiftly from orderly queues – the Japanese do queue in the most disciplined manner everywhere – while a guard signals repeatedly to each end of the train before waving it out. Ours is next and on we get.

First impression of how much space there is. We were worried about stowing our copious baggage but it fitted in easily. There are loos and recycling points every two carriages, a trolley service comes through with acceptable coffee and sandwiches and so on which we didn’t need to try having scoffed our sushi. After that initial delight the actual journey was a bit dull. Much of the track runs through noise-reducing barriers or tunnels so you can’t see much. But it is quite fast once it gets out of the station area. You feel that satisfying little push of the seat into your back as the acceleration kicks in. From Kyoto to Osaka is only 26 miles and we did it in 13 minutes so quick but not amazing. The rest of the trip to Okayama was similar because of three more stops but we have longer journeys ahead.

Arrival at the hotel in Okayama way ahead of check in time which as usual was three o’clock, we were utterly charmed by the hotel director who came to greet us, told us a room was ready which we could occupy straightaway with no extra charge. Mr Yamamoto speaks fluent and elegant English and had spent years travelling with groups of traders in Europe and Asia and has the style and urbanity of a well-travelled gentleman. I enlisted his help shortly after we had gone to our rooms to see if he could suggest somewhere special for dinner on Dee’s birthday next day. He went off to make enquiries and later came up with a solution and then booked both the table and a taxi to take us there.

We then walked off to see number two in our great gardens of Japan subquest. Okayama is delightful. It has really funky trams, loads of buses, broad main streets behind which lie lots of atmospheric smaller ones. It feels lively and very cultured. On the way we passed by, and were of course, diverted into a Saturday flea market in front of a shrine. Lovely pots too big to think about, dubious netsuke, old farm and cooking implements, clothes, books, prints and stall holders rushing to erect gazebos as the rain started. We did however stand on the bridge and watch cormorants in the river before going on into the Koruaken and were well rewarded.

The spaciousness, variety, beauty of the planting and the “borrowed landscape” of a nearby mountain worked superbly. The rain mostly held off too. It’ll also, like Kenrokuen in Kanazawa, have it’s own page when we are back in the UK and can sort the photographs. On then to Okayama Castle which is impressive and we hoped would have an exhibition of wood block prints, judging from the poster we spied. It did, but only three of them, poorly displayed and part of a bigger exhibit on travel in the Edo period which was interesting but not what we’d hoped for. However the nearly birthday girl did get to be carried in a palanquin!

From the castle we went, getting soaked now, in quest of Maruzen Books where we succeeded in purchasing our coveted road atlas of Japan. Incredibly in a modern shopping mall were stacks and stacks of second hands books being eagerly leafed through but good numbers of people. It was a bit like a vertical version of the stalls under Waterloo Bridge outside the National Theatre. We then wandered through a long shopping arcade with a Dutch Week so tulips and pancakes everywhere. We got lost and finally made it back to the hotel extremely bedraggled and determined to eat very close to the hotel.

It couldn’t really have been closer – diagonally across one street, in fact a pleasant, well-planted and landscaped canal-side walking area rather like the Gion Canal in Kyoto – and into Hachimonji a small but crowded Japanese restaurant where we were taken in hand by a gentleman of some years and guided through a “we’ll give you the best things to eat” menu. Sashimi to start was fine. Then small fish, increasing less strange vegetables, broad beans, rice of course and tempura and finally fresh strawberries, with local biscuits and a soft jelly-like blob of subtle and excellent taste. All washed down with a few beers and some sake. As he relaxed with increased shochi consumption, it was clear that he’d fallen hook, line and sinker for the charms of my wife. I was forbidden to speak any Japanese because my wife speaks it so beautifully. She’s taught the Japanese for beautiful so she could accept his compliments. The husband and wife chef and patronne spoke a little English and went along with the banter and joshing until he took a phone call from his wife asking where the hell he was – we heard Igirisu in his shamefaced reply so we knew we were being used as an excuse. The time to break up the party finally came but not before everybody in the room had joined in a rousing rendition of Happy Birthday to Dee. Does everybody meet characters like this on their travels or is it something about us?

In Japan

Kyoto diary

Three nights in the same

hotel, how will we cope with

such wardrobe choice?

Good morning Kyoto. A little later than intended after completing the three day blog, going to Yodobashi – an incredible nine floors of electronics, electrical, camera and computer gear with some stationery thrown in – to buy a bigger USB drive to store all the photographs we’ve been taking. Yes they are on the cloud but it’s always reassuring to have a physical backup for us oldies. Our late night activities were accompanied by a little whisky which may have accounted for a good night’s sleep.

There’s some admin to do today too. We need to exchange our JR pass vouchers for the real thing and reserve our week after next overnight train to Hakodate. Fortunately the hotel is right across from Kyoto Station so we don’t have far to go. JR passes were easy, the sleeper reservation not so easy as the train I had selected from Hyperdia online is no longer in service so we’ll have to go from Osaka to Tokyo and get an overnight from there to Hakodate. It’s booked and we’ll just rejig things a bit.

Kyoto station is stunning. A glass and steel facade with amazing angles, lines and reflections and an interior to challenge Grand Central for the classical railway station images of the future. And like the St Pancras redevelopment in London it’s making stations not just places from which to travel but places to be. It has a stage and stepped terrace for music gigs, more restaurants and shops than you can imagine and a green garden on the roof with some very clever eco planting that helps reduce heat transfer into the building – lots of summer days are over 35 degrees – 19 last year alone and it will probably rise. From the roof there was a great view of the Kyoto Tower and our acceptable but undistinguished hotel (the one with the white T up the front). And that’s where we headed next.

Having set out in jeans and jumpers we quickly found temperatures soaring to 25 and up. We didn’t pack shorts but fortunately did have some light walking trousers and sandals which were more appropriate attire for the day – thank goodness for the three day unpacking stay. We set off with Katie’s “dorky” maps to explore some small parts of this huge city. Mastering the simple two-line subway, we went first the Shinjo-dori the main shopping street to see if we could buy a Japan road atlas in English to help with our next stages of rentacar travel. We found a big bookshop with new Murakami book posters everywhere but no road atlas. Off the main street, which is the universal, global big city shopping area, are arcades crammed with little shops which are much more interesting. Then we came to another of Katie’s suggestions, Pontocho, which is a narrow street lined with bars and restaurants overlooking the Tama River. It was so warm that we just had to go into one to enjoy the air conditioning for a bit and of course a beer. We had a great view of a team who had dammed up part of the river to build a platform out over it which apparently many of them do for the summer season. We could imagine the delights of a glass of wine out on the terrace.

Refreshed we strode off to the Nanzen-ji Temple where we enjoyed the beautiful spring garden – the shimmering colours of acers in spring are almost a match for their autumn glory and of course so much fresher. Here we also obtained, as advised, our hon (pr. hone) a folding book on which temples stamp their insignia with a hanko (handwritten kanji combined with a special rubber stamp). They are beautiful and will give us a great souvenir of our trip.

We then set off on the ‘Philosopher’s Walk’ a canal-side stroll through eastern suburbs with stretches of complete calm and peace conducive to higher thought – I certainly needed that – and small craft shops selling locally produced goods. By the time we reached the end we were well away from train lines and subway but Dee had cleverly picked up a bus map and the next one to round a corner was the 100 bound for Kyoto Station. It was very crowded at shop and shrine closing time and we stood for most of the journey which was a shame as it passed several landmarks of which we could only see the bottom half.

The philosopher? … in pursuit of gesiha on the walk? … this is what Dee wanted by the end of it.

As we got back to the station, we decided to see if the Kyoto Tower had an observation gallery. It does, we went up. Dusk falling visibility hazy after the heat of the day but a fun visit nonetheless.

Shinkansen passing on the approach to Kyoto The Tower reflected in Kyoto Station

After a freshen up and a couple of much needed beers following a hot day on our feet we decided to head out to find dinner locally. I don’t know if you have the same problem but we are very indecisive when confronted with a street with five restaurants all of which look interesting. We walk up, we walk back, we look at menu pictures outside and then we decide we really are hungry and are going to have to plump for one of them. We did and it turned out to be a hibachi grill place. We were shown, shoes off of course, to a private screened booth with a footwell under our table and were served fresh vegetables and akta mackerel which we cook ourselves over a brazier with three red hot charcoal logs. Great fun and very tasty and we had chosen some excellent sashimi as a starter. We enquired of our server how she spoke such good English and it turned out that Mikita was coming to Brighton in June to study English and had been practising ahead of the trip. We have been struck by amazing meetings with people with existing and possible connections throughout the trip – there really are only six degrees of separation.

We left the restaurant and walked back towards the hotel and spied a rather lively and bright yellow-coloured bar (apologies to our Hornet friends that it is yellow AND green) – standing only and it had a great name. So given the deprivation of yellow as we are missing so much Watford football, we thought a sake night cap was in order. It proved a great people-watching place as late nighters popped in for a quick one on the way home and two ladies of a certain age stood consuming beer to our left until closing time – when we too were asked to drink up and depart – extremely politely. Busy, busy, Kyoto.

Masoho restaurant entrance The last orders bar

Friday dawned fresh, bright and breezy and it was back to jeans and sweaters big time. How can the temperature change by 15 degrees overnight? Well it did and we took the subway south to visit Higashi Inari Shrine. Sadly we missread the map and finish up at a station which is s forty-five minute walk from the shrine rather than the railway station that’s right in front of it. So a taxi was hailed and delivered us to the Fox Shrine which apart from amazing main buildings has a walkway of shrine gates or torii which stretch up to the main shrine on the mountain and involve 10 000 vermillion gates – awesome. We only walked the first three thousand as other sites called but a stroll to the top and back would make a great half day outing given more time. We were approached by a uniformed guard and were worried that we’d been photographing in the wrong place but he was a retired firefighter who had spent time in Sheffield and Liverpool on job exchanges and welcomed the opportunity to speak English. We next took a short train ride to Tofukuji Temple where the buildings are stupendous but the main attraction was a beautiful zen garden on all four sides of the main hall. A wonderful oasis of peace and contemplative strolling in the midst of busy, busy Kyoto. On our way back to the station we called into a small temple Doju-in where the attendant most beautifully calligraphed and then stamped our hon.

We then used our JR Passes for the second time on a train to Kiyazumi which is an amazing complex with superb views over the whole spread of Kyoto and then walked through quaint streets with fabulous little shops dotted about until we reached the Yasaka Pagoda and turned in to the Maruyama Park a popular open space with ponds and shady pathways – and a few ups and downs as we’re in the mountain foothills. After an increasingly chilly walk around the park as the wind got up we descended to the Chion-in Temple just in time to find it close. This is fortunately a short downhill walk from Gion the ancient geisha district which we wanted to explore. It’s lovely, weird and wonderful. We saw women buying kimonos and accessories, having their hair done and one of my favourite shops was a koto, shimasen and shakuhachi shop.

Yasaka pagoda Maruyama Park Old and new Kyoto meet in Gion

Some difficulties next after boarding a train at the first station we came to, Kawaramachi, where we showed our passes only to be told at the exit ticket barrier that it was a private railway and we’d need to pay. Kyoto – maybe Japan trains = confused.com. However we got back safely and did a load of laundry in the coin-op in the hotel, conveniently on our floor. Then repacking ready for the road tomorrow and what felt like a wimpy dinner in the restaurant beneath the hotel which was actually rather good – beef and potato stew for me and fried beef and rice for Dee occasioning slight food envy. She had made the right choice.