A Year in Japan

July 2002

Before I start my lengthy (oh no) account of my latest roadtrip, I thought I `d give you a brief guide to driving etiquette in Japan to give you an idea of what I experienced for 1800km over a week. It was not pretty.

I don`t know what the driving test entails in this country, but these people can`t drive for shit. At least the Indian and Indonesian antics were amusing. The Japanese are just dull drivers lacking any road sense or motivation to go anywhere. I am also increasingly convinced that the reason that they invented the `Kamikaze` pilots in the Second World War is that even if they managed to get a plane in the air, there was no way in hell, they`d ever get it back down again intact. Not if their car driving skills are anything to go by.

Despite the arrival of the Wet Season, I had a week`s holiday and had planned a roadtrip west of Tokyo to take in as many places as possible. The biggest hurdle was getting through Tokyo itself and I decided to tackle it overnight. I left the flat at 12.30am and motored down Route 6 into the heart of the city. It was pouring with rain, but the roads were full of roaring trucks breaking the speed limits. Around Tokyo, the streets were filled with taxis too. I was headed for Yokahama, the satellite city in the South West. Was there a sign? Was there hell. It was only the biggest place around.

To get around Tokyo, the locals pay unfeasibly large amounts of cash to use the expressways (toll roads) which are built above the city, pass through tunnels and bypass the World`s supply of red traffic light junctions. I decided to stay on the local roads as much as possible, because I love traffic lights! This worked ok until Route 6 ended in an industrial estate. I didn`t know where I was, spotted a main highway, took it and found myself passing Disneyland going South East out of the city in completely the wrong direction. I wondered what the unlit Fairytale castles were doing there (strange architecture I thought). I did a U-turn headed back into the city and saw a Expressway with Yokohama signposted.

By now it was 3.15am and I was wondering if I`d ever escape the city which is a nightmare to negotiate. There are no bearings anywhere. It is just an endless sprawl. Bugger the cost, I jumped onto the expressway which took me under the centre by tunnel and then up around the tower blocks. The expressway was virtually empty. It cost around £7 in tolls but 30 minutes later, I was surrounded by Yokohama`s tall towers. In the pouring rain, it looked like Batman`s Gotham City. Three nights later, the World Cup Final would be held here. Coming off at the Yokohama Station exit, I saw a signpost to my destination and pulled into the sleeping town of Kamakura at 4.30am. Mission accomplished, I crashed in the car for a couple of hours. It was lashing down outside.

Kamakura

� A small relaxed town trapped between the sea and a circle of wooded hills, Kamakura is steeped in history. Many of its 65 temples and 19 shrines were founded eight centuries ago, when, for a brief and tumulturous period, it was Japan`s political and military centre� (Rough Guide).

When the epic power struggle (in the left corner we have weighing in at 98 lbs, the Taira Clan, while in the right corner, topping 220 lbs, the Minamoto Clan), ended in 1185, the warlord Minamoto Yoritomo became the first permanent Shogun and the effective ruler of Japan. He established his military government at Kamakura and over the next century, dozens of grand monuments were built here, especially Zen temples. Zen Buddhism (and the art of shopping) flourished under the patronage of a warrior class who shared similar ideals of single minded devotion to daily and rigorous self discipline �whip me, beat me, make me write bad cheques etc�. Cue `Grasshopper` from the 70`s TV series `Kung Fu` (if you are old enough to remember that. Note to Don Coon in the USA: You are!)

Kamakura may once have been a quaint religious seaside resort, but its ambience has been somewhat marred by a train line that cuts through the heart of the town with trains rushing past every few minutes and the gridlock of traffic in the narrow poky roads which have to stop at the rail crossings waiting for the trains to rush past every few minutes. Surrounded by lush wooded hills, the sights are sprawled out in every direction and in the pouring rain, it took an age to get my bearings. One of those days that if you were at home, you`d have stayed in bed reading a book. But oh no, I had to grin and bear it. I was, after all, on holiday. It continued to rain all day. It was bloody miserable. I had slept in the car in the middle of a brace of small temples. They were all small, plain affairs with manicured gardens and rainwater dropping off the curved roofs like mini Niagara Falls. I took in half a dozen of them and there was wasn`t a Zen Buddhist monk in sight. They were at home in bed with a good book.

Down by the seaside, I literally stumbled across the two most famous sights. In the district of Hase, `Hase-den` stands high on a hillside overlooking the bay (not that you could see it today). Though the temple`s present layout dates from mid 13th Century, it was, according to legend, founded in 736 when an eleven faced Kannon (Buddha) washed ashore nearby. The statue is supposedly one of a pair carved from a single tree in 721 by a monk. He placed one in a temple elsewhere in Japan and pushed the other out to sea. Nowadays, the Kamakura Kannon, just over 9m tall and gleaming with gold leaf, a 14th Century embellishment, resides in an attractive chocolate brown and cream building at the top of the temple steps.

The complex also contained something I`d never seen before; a Sutra Repository containing a revolving drum with a complete set of Buddhist scriptures inside. One turn of the wheel is equivalent to reading the whole lot (building up your karma for the next rebirth). There were also ranks of `Jizo` statues, some clutching sweets and wrapped in tiny woolen mufflers; these sad little figures commemorate stillborn or aborted children (I had seen some of these in Hokkaido). Attractive manicured gardens and small ponds included a multileveled `Hydranga Walkway`, full of blooming blue, er.. hydrandas.

Down the road, the most famous sight, Daibutsu, stood in the grounds of the Kotoku-in temple. This Great Buddha is 11 metres tall. He sits on a stone pedestal (rather like an oriental Humpty Dumpty) , a broad shouldered figure lost in deep mediation (ie I wish these bloody tourists would disappear), with his head slightly bowed, his face and robes streaked grey-green by centuries of sun, wind and rain. Completed in 1252, the statue is constructed of bronze plates bolted together around a hollow frame. Amazingly, it has withstood fires, typhoons and tidal waves and even the Great Earthquake of 1923. It now survived a 10 minute visit by Bob Jack. I mean, it wasn`t as if it jumped around or anything. I took a couple of photos, walked around it a couple of times and left. I have, afterall the World`s Tallest Statue (a Buddha) on my doorstep in Tsukuba. I was fed up with being wet. Mid afternoon, I found the Youth Hostel by the sea and went to bed with a good book.

The next morning, the skies had cleared somewhat and the tour resumed at 7am. The Engaku-Ji Temple (1282) lay buried among ancient cedar trees. The layout follows a traditional Chinese Zen formula; a pond and bridge followed by a succession of somewhat austere wooden buildings with the encroaching trees and secretive gardens adding a gentler touch. The first building, the two storeyed main gate `Sanmon` (1783) was a magnificent wooden structure built on massive tree trunks, under which pass the pilgrims. I was the only person here this early in the morning, apart from the temple sweepers who sweep all the paths and areas of sand and grit so that everything looks perfect. I rated this temple the best I saw in town but the quiet early morning ambience and sunshine probably helped.

I certainly thought it was better than Kencho-Ji, supposedly the greatest of Kamakura`s Zen temples. I found it more open and less intimate. The towering, copper roofed Sanmon was certainly impressive as was the original temple bell (1255) which hung nearby.

A majestic, vermillion lacquered `torii` (the symbolic `n` shape portal that appears at every shrine and temple in Japan) marked the front entrance to the Minamoto Clan`s guardian shrine since 1063. Most of the present buildings date from the 20th Century and all had striking red paintwork. A long flight of stairs led up to the main shrine (also in red). As with all Shinto shrines, you could not enter, just peer into the gloom. Nevertheless the site was very impressive (as far as shrines go; that`s enough temples and shrines for now - ed).

Izu Hanto

Mid morning, I pushed on west to Izu Hanto. En route, I passed through the historic castle town of Odawara. The castle looked very impressive from the outside; lots of stone walls, flowers and ponds full of giant carp waiting to eat one of the small schoolchildren on their excursions. Japanese castles are nothing like the traditional ones you think of in Europe. They are generally small affairs with a central wooden tower. They have probably all been rebuilt on old foundations and had gardens built around them. Inside this one, there was a terrible childrens` zoo, with a motley crew of dilapidated animals, kept in appalling conditions. For example, the raccoon had a cage 3ft square. The lonely elephant had about 30ft square of concrete. This place was worse than Saigon Zoo. Rolf Harris could have spent a series of `Animal Hospital` here.

"Formed by Mt Fuji`s ancient lava flows, Izu Hanto (Izu peninsula) protrudes like an arrowhead into the ocean west of Tokyo, a mountainous spine whose tortured coastline features some superb scenery and a couple of decent beaches. It takes at least two days to make a complete circuit of this region" (Rough Guide)... blah, blah, blah. I think not. I did it in half a day, though I failed to use one of the estimated 2300 hot springs on the pensinsula. I also failed to find any scuba diving opportunities.

This was Japan`s version of the Great Ocean Road in Victoria, Australia. They were very alike. Just remove any beaches, raise the hills a few hundred metres, cover them in fir trees, make the sea a rich navy blue and leave out the 12 Apostles. Well, it was a Japanese version. The narrow twisting road that hugged the coastline high above the sea was a joy to drive, dipping down to the occasional Japanese concrete ridden hotel complexes that broke out like ugly blemishes along the coast. How many tourists must turn up to these places and exclaim `But where`s the beach?` which is sadly lacking. Maybe the Japs don`t sunbathe.

I didn`t stop until I reached the attractive (by Japanese standards) harbour town of Shimoda where US Commodore Perry parked his `Black Ships` in 1854 forcing isolationist Japan to open this port and a few others to foreign trade (ie the western powers). I paid tribute to his statue by the waterfront and his famous quote "And if you cause any more trouble, we`ll drop something a lot bigger on you, in, oh about 91 years time". I also checked out, Ryosen-ji, the temple where Perry signed the `Treaty of Friendship`. If the Japanese hadn`t signed, he threatened to let his Black Ship sailors onshore. They hadn`t seen women since Hong Kong. Maybe I`m making some of this up.

I cut inland across to the western side of the peninsula, past splendid rice paddy scenery. The locals were bent over in the fields with cotton bags over their heads under their conical hats as protection from the sun/insects. Its amazing to see so many old people in Japan almost stooped over from years of hard work. They totter around like little dwarfs, but still get out in the fields every day for a workout.

The western edge was an even better drive, where resorts were minimal and small fishing ports in sheltered bays hugged the coastline. I forgot what a traffic light or a 7-11 store looked like. Even the roads were relatively empty. At Heda, I turned back inland to Shuzenji where there was a Youth Hostel outside town. But when I arrived it was fully booked. It was 6pm and I had nowhere else to go but Hakone, my next destination about an hour north.

Fuji Hakone Izu National Park

�South of Mt Fuji and 90km west of Tokyo is the Lakeland and mountain area known as Hakone. Even though there`s nothing here that you absolutely must see in Japan, you`re bound to enjoy a visit to this region� (Rough Guide) ...unless you spend an hour fruitlessly trying to find a youth hostel in the dark, then have to sleep in the car and in the morning awaken to find Lake Ashino-ko invisible behind the mist and rain.

I don`t know if its just something that happens at 5am on a Saturday morning, but holed up in a layby in some woods, I was rudely awoken by numerous boy racers in loud cars and motorbikes tearing up the road next to me. The roads were clear. There were no police. Lets go for it. Banzai! Not the best alarm clock. No sooner had I got back on the road, than endless Turbo Nutter bastards were up my arse wondering why they had to drop a gear for some tourist half awake. At this time in the morning?

I sought seclusion at Hakone Shrine. I had passed by it the previous night with its twin sets of red lanterns aglow leading through the woods to the complex, and this morning at 6am, as I walked up through towering trees and mist swirling around, it was a very atmospheric and tranquil haven. As I arrived, a lone monk was banging his gong (oo-er) inside. Even better, they`d just had a major clear out of Buddhist temple tourist tat (the stuff that devotees bring or buy and leave around the shrines) and I was able to pick up a bag full of free souvenirs from a large pile waiting to be dumped. Have you no shame Bob? No.

The lake was completely invisible. I noted that the fishing tackle shops were open at this early hour, catering for the numerous fishermen. Japan tends to open late and close late. 10am is the usual opening time for most shops. But there is a 24 hour small convenience shop culture – 7/11, Family Mart and Lawsons where you can pick up food/alcohol at any hour. And vending machines. They are everywhere selling drinks/cigarettes/camera film/small cuddly toys (and allegedly disposable knickers though I haven`t seen those). They used to sell beer until it was realized that any kid could grab a brew at any age and beer got banned. The kids can`t legally drink alcohol until they turn 20 here. I seem to have forgotten about Hakone...

...which in the rain wasn`t difficult. I caught sight of the naff `Pirate` ships that ply the lake. They looked like they had escaped from Disneyland; huge multi-tiered, box shaped affairs covered in crappy golden decoration and false funnels with `Please sink me` written all over them. What with those and the armadas of swan shaped paddle boats, it wasn`t a good incentive to hang around and wait for the mist to clear. The tourists flock into this area to do a multi-transport one day tour – train, cable car, pirate ship and bus. They wouldn`t have seen a thing today.

As I drove north to Mt Fuji, it occurred that my legs were suffering sharp shooting pains. It was really uncomfortable to drive. It was either a result of being cramped up in Mr Whippy overnight or the long hours of driving. Whatever caused it, it felt like trombosis and it was very painful. I suffered for the next 24 hours.

One of the main problems with Japanese guidebooks is that they assume that everyone is using public transport and use the bus/train stations as their focal point. There is never any road information (numbers of the main routes around would be nice), so everytime I entered a city or town, I had to just feel my way around and literally drive around in circles until I found what I was looking for.

Fuji Yoshida; Successful Climb of Mt Fuji

Fuji-Yoshida was a case in point. Lying at the base of Mt Fuji, it is sprawling twin town affair with Kawagushi. It took 6 Japanese locals to confer with each other to point me in the direction of the Youth Hostel. Ten minutes later I was back with the locals, having not found it. They eventually knocked up some old man who came out onto the street in his white nightshirt and baggy underwear. He drew a map which was spot on. (You don`t want to do it like that, you want to do it like this!). No matter. The Youth Hostel was booked up for that evening. After an hour of searching, I gave up looking for the other one.

The area is known as Fuji Five Lakes. The central attraction is Mt Fuji, Japan`s most sacred volcano and at 3776m, it`s highest mountain. You have all seen pictures of it. Fuji-san has long been worshipped for its latent powers (it last erupted in 1707) and near perfect symmetry. The summit is capped with snow between October and May. There is an official climbing season of July and August (due to start in 2 days when I arrived), but you can climb it most of the year. Today, in miserable weather, the volcano was somewhere behind the rain clouds and mist.

I stumbled across another wonderfully atmospheric shrine, Fuji-Sengen-Jinga. A giant red `torii` and a broad gravel pathway lined with stone lanterns, led to this large colourful shrine (1615) set in a forest. It dates from 788 and was built at the foot of the volcano dedicated to it`s worship. It is the official start for the climb up Mt Fuji if you want to do it from scratch. At 9am in the rain and mist, handfuls of joggers and walkers were setting off on a two day nightmare. There are 9 `stations` (areas of lodges) en route and the majority set off from 5th Station half way up. I knew you could drive there, but didn`t have a map. Behind the shrine, I noticed a single track road heading up the volcano and followed the twisting trail up through the forests for 20 kms until the road was blocked by a barrier. So, obviously not the road to 5th Station, but a secret backroad up the mountain. Back near the bottom, I cut across around the volcano and came across the Fuji Subaru Skyline; the toll road up to 5th Station. Here, little uniformed men stood in toll booths and demanded 2300Y (about 12 English Pounds) to let me through. `Not in this weather, old chap`.

Nearby stood the Mt Fuji Information Centre. I watched miserable looking tourists decend from the tour buses into the pouring rain. So much for their promised view of Mt Fuji. The Centre was an excellent multi-media display of the history of Mt Fuji, flora and fauna, and guide to the trails with film footage of the climb. I discovered that my secret unofficial route, though a much further climb than the 5th Station start, would get me up there. Best of all, I was given a English language map of the local sights. The second youth hostel was only 5 minutes away and it was empty!

Despite the miserable weather, I did a tour of the nearly lakes; Lake Shoji, Lake Sai and the big one, Lake Kawaguichi. It was all a bit like the Lake District in England (especially the weather), but hardly stunning. It looked like Slovenia and Macedonia with Japanese resorts and pointless sights of interest. I`ll admit I skipped the Icicle Lava Cave, the Bat Cave and `Doggy World` (don`t even ask). Even the Fujikyo Highland amusement park with the fastest roller coaster in the world looked deserted today. I drove around, massaging my legs and came across a flower festival by the side of Lake Kawaguchi. Fields of vivid violet lavender were the main attraction. Hundreds of Japanese poured in to walk through them and buy garden stuff at the stalls. There were also a dozen small garden exhibits up for judging. They looked like mini `Blue Peter` garden jobs complete with plastic windmill and garden gnomes. On a dreary day, this was a major highlight! The Japanese love their gardens and gardening as much as the English.

At the Youth Hostel, I met 30 something, Julian from England. He had just spent the last month following the English team around the World Cup (he hadn`t missed an England away game in 5 years; I offered to buy him an anorak). Inbetween the games he had taken in as many sights as possible and today he had just completed Mt Fuji from 5th Station. He hadn`t seen a thing but it was his only chance to climb it before he flew home. The dictorial little old man who ran the place joined us for a soak in the onsen bath. (`Bath time. Now!`). Later on, the YH filled with a University club that visited YH`s on the occasional weekend. Lots of giggles by the girls, a few of which tried out their English on us. We were, unfortunately, not invited to the pyjama party.

It bucketed down with rain all night like the world was about to run out of water. I was up and gone by 5.30am without breakfast. The rain had stopped but the overcast skies left no view of Mt Fuji. I drove up the `unofficial` free road and parked at the barrier. Setting off at 6.15am, I walked for an hour along the sealed but traffic free road.

The sun came out and suddenly, there it was; Mt Fuji high above me, a huge mass of volcano. I could see the summit and the trail of `stations`/lodges up to it. I started heading up along an unmarked footpath for a few hundred metres. I came across a lodge where it said 2200m. Oh that`s ok then, only another 1600m straight up.

Postcard Photo of Mount Fuji
Photo of Mount Fuji in Summer

My devious route had completely bypassed 5th Station, where the tourists all start walking from. I didn`t see another person for three hours after leaving the car. I followed my nose. If I was going up, I was going in the right direction. But I`d only bought one litre of water and the sun was roasting. I was only wearing shorts and walking boots. Dripping with sweat it was hard to limit �my water replacement. The lodges sold half litres of water for £3 a bottle. I`d rather die of thirst.

I joined the main route at 6th station. The trail was well marked but it was a slow clamber up lumps of heavy sharp lava rock. Up above the clouds, I had a spectacular view of the clouds below me (the kind of view you get from an airplane), with distant peaks poking out of the white layer. Above me loomed the summit. But it was a tough slog. Dehydrated and fading, it seemed to go on and on. Groups of people who`d climbed up the day before and stayed overnight at a lodge to watch the sunrise, were coming down from the summit. They looked miserable. With the rain, they had seen no majestic sunrise.

By the time I reached 8th station, I seriously wondered if I had the energy. The path just went up and up over jagged rocks to the still visible summit. I was running out of water, seriously underestimating the amount of fluid you sweat out on roasting days like this. I knew I was flagging, when for the first time in living memory I was passed going up a mountain by two Japanese walkers. Of course, I`d been walking a lot longer than them and they hadn`t lost half their body fluid.

Two wooden `torii` gates had been constructed on the mountain about 500m apart and between them was the longest climb I could remember. Thousands of little shiny bells on ribbons had been attached to the gates by previous groups. Somewhere inbetween, someone came down past me �About 90 minutes from here�. �What? But I can see the top�. �Oh no you can`t�. Fortunately I had passed the snow line which had a few large infrequent areas of snow in the hollows. I filled up my water bottle with snow and chewed as much of the stuff as possible.

By the time I reached 9th station at 3500m, the fog had descended. The summit was gone and I was forced to wear a shirt in the freezing winds. The wind occasionally blew the fog away and I caught glimpses of the crater edge but not the crater. I dropped down along the edge, then clambered up a final large mound of lava. 6 hours after starting, I had reached the highest point in Japan (3776m) and for my efforts could see bugger all. Noone else was around. It was miserable.

There`s nothing like feeling completely exhausted, knowing that you have to repeat the same experience again and downhill, which is worse on the knees. So at 1.30 pm, down I came. By now, hundreds of people were ascending up to the various stations to spend the night before the final push for sunrise. I felt vindicated by the fact that I`d been walking a lot longer and further than them and they looked even more shagged out than me, stopping every 100m. The fog descended with me. I met an American who was trying to get up to the top and back to 5th Station and then still get to the World Cup Final at Yokohama that night. I doubt he made it unless he turned around before the summit.

At my `unofficial` route, I left the hoards. There was zero visibility in the mist. Nothing looked like it had this morning and it was a bit disorientating. As long as I was heading down, I was sure I`d come across my sealed road that seemed to wrap itself around the mountain. I was relieved to stumble onto it, just as a thunder storm erupted. I finished with a very pleasant (Not!) one hour hike back to the car in the pouring rain. On Mt Fuji on Sunday June 30th, noone did a better impression of a drowned, knackered rat than me. It had taken a 10 hour roundtrip to conquer the bugger and it was the toughest climb I`d tackled in months.

(Note to Paul Harris; While nothing as severe as our Gerung Kerichi `experience` in Sumatra, Indonesia, it made Kota Kinabalu in Borneo look like a stroll in the park). I know I`m not as fit as I was 18 months ago. A Japanese proverb says �A wise man climbs Fuji once. A fool climbs it twice� but after a long soak and a cold beer, I felt that a second attempt would be worth the effort in better weather.

I was nursing my wounds at the Youth Hostel when James walked in, the new London teacher from my school. He knew I`d be here over the weekend and after a heavy night out with Danielle and her friends in Tokyo (`You don`t want to know how much I spent. Don`t even ask`), had caught a bus over to Fuji to see a Japanese girl he`d met in Australia. �Christ, you`ve caught the sun� he concluded. It wasn`t until I had a shower that I saw how sunburnt I was from the climb. That night we watched the World Cup Final on TV.

Another night of heavy rain. At 7am precisely, classical music boomed out of loudspeakers. This was the old man`s way of waking everyone (I`d missed it yesterday). There was a series of loud announcements in Japanese. God know what he said, but it made no difference because none of the 3 other guys in my dorm spoke Japanese and we were the only people in the hostel. �Have I just woken up in the middle of `Merry Xmas Mr Lawrence?� (a movie about a Japanese POW camp) I asked. �I can`t believe I`m paying 20 quid to stay in a youth hostel to suffer this� whined James now rudely awakened. �Right. The escape committee meets in 10 minutes� I concluded. There was also no hot water in the mornings.

I was away before James had even left his bed. He hummed and harred about climbing Mt Fuji, but the continual drizzle was enough incentive not to do it. I think he escaped the hostel, just before everyone was rounded up for the 21st century version of the Burmese railroad. He spent the day on the fastest rollercoaster in the world at Fuji Yoshida; compressed air forces it up to 107 mph with a 52m drop. Just what your stomach needs.

Matsumoto

Four hours north, Matsumoto was `the gateway to the Japanese Alps`. En route, I passed lots of groups of old people dressed in smocks and conical hats trimming the grass edges as part of volunteer community group work. Well, at least they got out. I am still amazed to see so many old tiny Japanese people who are stooped over double yet still put in a full day in the fields.

Matsumoto`s main claim to fame is it`s splendid castle (`Crow castle`), the oldest in Japan dating from 1595. In the centre of town, it remains hidden from view until the very last moment (because it was built at ground level). The black brooding six story high wooden facade was surrounded by a wide moat full of huge gaping carp fish looking for food. I also checked out the attractive Kaichi Gakko, the oldest western style school building in Japan dating from 1876. It had a handsome pale blue facade, decorated with ornate plasterwork and a central tower. And, that, er, was Matsumoto.

Heading west, I had about a quarter of a tank of gas left. I figured I`d see a garage along the way. My destination was Kamikochi, a small resort nestling in a valley. To get there, I had a wonderful twisting road following a river valley which had three major dams creating beautiful reservoirs surrounded by lush forested mountains. There were dozens of tunnels along the edge of the valley, with one side open for views in between the concrete girders. I rated it as the most attractive road I`d used in Japan to date. There were no ugly McDonalds, 7-11s or, as it turned out, garages. Then the rain lashed down.

At the entrance to Kamikochi, a little man waved me down with a flag. No cars were allowed into the resort. `Bus` or `taxi` he said, `8 kilometres back`. I scrapped the idea. No views in this weather. However, I was dangerously low on fuel having assumed that Kamikochi would have a garage (wrong!). There were two choices; pay £5 to use a toll road through the valley, or take the now rarely used old twisting 30km highway up around the mountain. I might be low on fuel, but I was still cheap enough to avoid the toll road.

The 15km climb to the pass drained the fuel tank and at the summit, I was forced to turn the engine off and freewheel all the way down the other side. Of course when you turn off the engine, your brakes no longer work, but that was a technicality; a 80kph, wet surface, oh my god this curve looks tight, why is the car on two wheels?, what happened to the road? technicality. A small village lay at the bottom where a lonely, but welcome garage waited . It was a close call.

After paying my respects to the small but perfectly formed Chioti Waterfall, I continued onto Takayama along the continuing spectacular drive and drying afternoon. There were endless sets of roadworks. Half of the road system I used over the week was being repaired. There were lots of little men in helmits, bowing and waving batons and flags at me, telling me to stop or go. At the end of the roadworks, a small digital sign had the image of a roadworker with his head bowed, thanking me for my cooperation (`you have our glatitude`). Which was nice.

The Japanese also seem to have a preoccupation with the weather. There are digital read outs of the current temperature everywhere and in the middle of nowhere. I don`t necessarily feel the need to know the temperature has risen a degree in the last 10km. But they do. There are also large overhead digital boards. A large umbrella flashed on the board during a downpour. Thanks, but I already guessed it was raining when I could no longer see through my windscreen.

Takayama

Takayama wasn`t even on my original itinery, but it turned out to be a real gem. Lying in the ancient Hida district tucked away between the mountains of the central Alps, it has managed to retain something of its traditional charm. It was once an enclave of skilled carpenters, employed by emperors to build palaces and temples in Kyoto and Nara (the old capitals). Now a sprawling town of 60,000 (small for Japan), its old merchant houses and tranquil temples and shrines are clustered into a compact area. Nearby was a youth hostel that was attached to the Tensho-ji temple. This was a first. I removed my shoes before entering. The monk in charge asked if I`d booked. No. `Oh I`ll have to change the rooms around`. (I never found out why. The place was empty). He fussed on `You should have telephoned` (I didn`t know it existed). But it was the cheapest place I`d stayed in (£16) and was a beautiful building.

The hostel part lay to the side of the main temple. Corridors of polished wooden floors, beautiful art works and woodcarving prints on the walls. There was a kitchen and lounge area with TV. The rooms had no beds, just tatami mats. You just grabbed various duvets and mattresses to make your own futon on the floor. It was very comfortable. The bathroom outside in an ajoining annex had a stainless steel soaking bath with 2 ft deep of piping hot water and after the pre scrub down, you could climb in, stretch out and relax.

The hostel lay in the middle of the tranquil Higashiyama Teramachi area where 13 temples and 5 shrines were dotted among the soaring pine trees. There was a pleasant walk that linked all the sites together on the edge of town. Every day at 7am, the country women come into town from the surrounding mountains to sell vegetables, fruit and flowers at a Morning Market. I pottered down there as it was kicking off (the first street market I`d seen in Japan and not exactly a rival to the usual ones in SE Asia).

Then I explored the nearby `San Machi Suji` area of old merchants` houses; dark wooden buildings dating from the mid 19th Century in a tightly compact area. Outside the saki breweries, there were giant balls of cedar leaves hanging in front of their entrances. They looked like huge hornet nests. While nothing like Dali City or Lijang in South Western China, this was the nicest area I`d seen in Japan and no wonder it draws in the tourists. The main shopping street had only small shops with arcades over the pavements. Not a shopping mall in sight. Every spring and autumn, there are parades with multi-tiered and elaborately decorated `Yatai` (floats). Some of these were housed inbetween the merchant houses in tall storehouses.

I failed to see the Hida Folk Village (a smaller version of the one I`d seen in Hokkaido) but I did see the 10ft tall `Hello Kitty` statue outside (don`t ask). I also saw the `Main World Shrine`, headquarters for the religious sect, Sukyo Mahikari, with it`s large imposing golden roof, topped by a massive red snooker ball.

As I left Takayama around 8am and headed north, the rain came down by the ton. It was like driving through a car wash. Cars were pulling off to the roadsides because their windscreen wipers couldn`t handle the amount of water. Expecting to aqua plane at any moment, I took advantage of the clear roads and kept going. My destination was Furukawa. The `Rough Guide` said �gan area of old storehouses by the canal, some charming temples and several good museums�h. But nothing looks quaint under a foot of water. I didn`t even stop. The rain eventually did. I followed another spectacular twisting valley road through a never ending series tunnels. I could cruise at 80kph (F1 speed for local roads here), overtake everything and still enjoy the scenery.

Kanazawa; Kenroku-en Gardens

Kanazawa, inland from the Sea of Japan, is famous for it`s `Kenroku-en` gardens. It is a major tourist draw. One thing I have never mentioned is that there is no street parking in Japan. You have to pay to park everywhere (even renting a parking space with your flat). I have had a quest never to pay for public parking in Japan and had succeeded so far. I find company car parks, temples, wasteland, anything. The difference is that I don`t mind walking. The Japanese would rather pay if it means walking time can be minimized. Kanazawa was a real bastard for parking. Every space was a public car park. I drove round and round and finally squeezed into a tight carpark in front of a backstreet shrine. I couldn`t imagine the monks calling a towtruck.

Today, midweek, with the non stop drizzle, Kenroku-en was relatively empty of visitors. It was developed over two centuries from the 1670s, originally the outer grounds of Kanazawa castle (still there, but most of it virtually rebuilt) and opened to the public in 1871. It is generally regarded as the best garden in Japan but having seen it, I`m sure there must be something better. It`s name, `Garden of the Six Sublimities`, refers to the six horticultural graces that the garden embraces; spaciousness, seclusion, artificiality, antiquity, water and panoramic views. To this, I`d add one other; the garden of never ending rain, which took in the entire area. It was miserable.

The garden was a lesson in Japanese control. Every tree and bush had been manicured and cut back into perfect shapes. Gangs of workers trimmed the moss beneath the bushes. The Japanese prefer moss to grass and in this weather, it was no wonder. Old trees had their drooping knotted branches propped up by wooden poles and looked like they had numerous artificial limbs attached. The streams had all been controlled to run in certain directions. Stones and rocks were placed in strict lines.

Despite the weather, the lack of crowds made it an enjoyable stroll, but I was surprised how compact it was. An ingenious pumping system kept the hillside ponds full of water and fat carp fish. I took in `Guord Pond` (a funny shaped guord if you ask me), Japan`s first fountain (1861), wooden tea ceremony houses set by the sides of the ponds, numerous stone lanterns (an indispensable component of Japanese gardens) and the Flying Wild Geese Bridge (flat slabs of rock laid out over a stream in Geese Y-flying formation).

The blurb read �Welcome to Kenrokuen. You have now come to one of the most beautiful Japanese landscape gardens in the world. As you may know, Japanese landscaped gardens are reproductions of natural scenery within a given space. Trees, flowers, stones, paths, streams etc, should be represented as they appear in nature. The ideal is to live in harmony with nature, not to conquer it as seems to be the tendency in the more artificial gardens in other countries�(bit of politics there). Personally, I think that Japanese gardens are the least natural gardens you`ll ever see because of this manic need to trim every leaf. Are these people anally retentive or what? (Definitely the former, in many aspects of their lives). Yes, it was interesting and cute, but they should check out the Kandy Botanical Gardens in Sri Lanka. This place paled in comparison. Compactness and neatness does not equal `natural`. So there.

Escaping Kanazawa was an experience in itself. They may be able to design a garden but they can`t design a traffic system. There were no traffic signs for anywhere I wanted to go. I drove round and round in circles trying to flee south east. All road signs were for north and south west. I used my compass to negotiate backroads and finally about 20km outside Kanazawa found a traffic sign for my destination. It wasn`t as if I was looking for something ordinary. I was trying to reach a World Heritage Site and you`d think it would be well sign posted. Wrong.

Hida Valley World Heritage Sites

There are three villages with their distinctive, thatched A-frame houses set in idyllic valleys surrounded by forests and mountains, which were once almost entirely cut off from fast modernizing Japan. But the rivers in valleys were being damned and the villages would have been submerged, but for a partition to save them. This was so successful, that they were moved and made into a World Heritage Site. `Gassho Zukuri` is the style of architecture preserved here. Fewer than 200 examples are left in the Hida region. It means `praying hands`, because the 60`c slope of the thatched roofs is said to recall two hands joined in prayer. But they were probably designed to counteract the effects of heavy snowfall in the area. No nails were used in construction of these large houses which held many generations of the same family. The upper stories were used for home industries such as making gunpowder (Big mistake! No wonder so few have survived) and cultivating silkworms.

I stumbled across Ainokura village, one of the three and definitely the best. A compact, tidy complex of the famous wooden houses set off by colourful summer flowers such as hollyhocks. Tourist levels were minimal. A 30 minute stroll in blazing sunshine sufficed. I viewed the second village, Suganuma, from the main road high above the village, but stopped at the third and largest, Ogimachi. Many houses had been moved here when threatened by the damming of the Sho-kawa river. The problem was the modern ugly houses in between. It looked like the traditional houses had been dumped in the middle of a Japanese council estate full of souvenir shops selling tat. I have come to the conclusion that the Japanese idea of fun is to find anywhere where they can buy something. No matter what. Just spend that Yen.

After another very comfortable night at the Tensho-ji temple youth hostel in Takayama (`oh bugger, I forgot to call again`), I knew I had a hellish 500km drive home back to Tsukuba and estimated about 10 hours. When I awoke at 4.30am, it seemed sensible to get going and get a head start against the traffic. I had enough petrol to reach Matsumoto and I was able to hammer back along that picturesque river valley route, running every red traffic light at the empty roadworks for the first hour, until trucks started coming the other way. I retraced my `lets run out of petrol in the middle of nowhere scare` and cruised into Matsumato at 7am, to find, wait for it, every garage closed. I couldn`t believe it. They have 24 hour convenience stores, it`s only the biggest place within 80km in any direction and people were driving to work! I drove round and round for 30 minutes on fumes until I found one opening up. `In your own time, son`. It was a slight hiccup to my plans.

Onioshidashen Lava Fields

Heading east, I had one more stop to make; the lava flows at Onioshidashien. The dominant feature of the area is the Asama Yama vocano which last erupted in 1973. Today it was completely covered in mist. Onioshidashien was the scene of a cataclysmic eruption in 1783, when ashes from the blow out were said to have darkened the sky as far as Europe and a 7km wide lava flow swept away a village. When the lava cooled, it solidified into an extraordinary landscape of black boulders and bizarre rockshapes.

The locals had a great exploitation racket. First you paid £1.40 toll fee to travel 6km to the sight. Then an entry fee to the site. Then they charge you to use the toll road to get out again. I could see everything from the road and avoided the entry fee. It looked much the same as the solidified lava flows at Mt Fuji (which were free). Don`t bother with this place.

From this point on, I was stuck behind traffic for hours. This experience was only enlivened by a raining cats and dogs thunderstorm which flooded the roads. Arriving back around 3pm, pretty much dead on 10 hours, I was mentally exhausted. My `Mr Whippy` 660cc car had taken me 1800km on mostly slow local roads over a week and had held up well (better than my body). I had covered an awful lot of sights, bagged Mt Fuji and experienced a real Japanese wet season. I was ready for a holiday but tomorrow I had to go back to work.

Finally, Matt in Queensland sent me this recent radio news item; `Japan's Killer Baths` (which I`ve edited)

"Statistics can easily boggle and this one's so staggering it's very hard to believe. Every year, more than 10,000 people in Japan die in the bath, eclipsing car accidents, which are a major cause of death in the country. Doctors are now trying to find out why something with such great cultural importance is so deadly.

Taking a public bath can be hair-raising enough, not only do you have to strip off in front of strangers, there are important ancient rituals to be followed. If you make a mistake you can find yourself in very hot water. There's another reason to be nervous too. It's one of the most dangerous things you can do in Japan. Every year, 14,000 people die in the bath, significantly more than are killed on the roads.

83 year-old, Kenji Tanaka, is one of the lucky ones. He was taking a public bath when the blood suddenly rushed from his head and he passed out. He would have drowned except for the quick thinking of a co-bather. "He rescued me from the bath and I was put in an ambulance," he explains. "I was unconscious for 10 to 20 minutes. When I awoke I was afraid but then I thought if I am going to die, I don't know a better way to go.

Doctors aren't quite sure why Japanese baths claim so many victims but they are trying to find out. It's thought the temperature differentials are at the heart of the problem. Japanese bathrooms can be very cold particularly in winter, while most baths are extremely hot 42 degrees is considered normal. Also, when people become old, blood pressure change is very quick so it causes heart attack or stroke or arrhythmia�.

So think about all those risks I am taking whenever I have one of these onsen baths just so you can experience Japanese life. I notice that Doctors have not researched the effect of ice cold beer while soaking in one of these hot baths. It always works for me.

I think going back to work after the roadtrip was the hardest three days I`ve had in Japan. It was hot and humid and my mind was elsewhere. I went through the motions until the next Sunday off

On morning I was sitting in the free Community Internet Cafe at the Information Centre when about 6 Japanese males dressed in colourful lycra suits and science fiction helmits and swords walked in. Not something you see everyday I thought until I realised a TV programme was being shot in the concrete bowl/shopping arcade outside the cafe. It was like a Japanese version of Power Rangers. The hero and villian dressed in seriously badtaste clothing would do closeup fighting shots while 30 lycra clad youths would dance in formation behind them during the fight scenes. Why was it being shot in a modern shopping mall? What was the dancing all about? Different battle scenes with increasingly strange weapons. I sat and watched them sweat it out in the heat for about 6 hours. Japanese TV must be seriously shite.

We were given new summary report cards to fill out for any child/teenager student for their parents to read. There were no guidelines so I marked them however I wanted. Consequently I gave all my students at Ami school straight A`s for everything. `You can`t give them all A`s` said the Teaching assistant. `Why not.? They are the keenest kids with great attitude so they deserved it`. I gave my dozier, less interested kids at Shimotsuma B`s and Cs and the most disruptive student D`s. Forest apparently gave some of his students E`s (needs thorough review). Headquarters called and said `You can`t give a student an E grade�. Forest; `then why the hell is the grade on the report?` I never did work out how I mark my kindergarten kids for handwriting. They have never tried it.

At Shimodate, my hours have been reduced. Originally, I was doing a 2pm until 10pm shift every Saturday, but from now on, I am finishing at 8pm. Which is a relief because from 3 until 4pm, I have 4 x 7 year old girls, then my 7 Kindergarten kids for an hour, then another 4 x 7 year olds. Three hours, 15 kids and no break between the lessons. It will be nice to be able to go out earlier on a Saturday night. But other days have had extra lessons added. I`m currently doing about 27 hours a week teaching, but have cut back my lesson planning dramatically, trying to do as many as possible at the schools themselves.

A couple of weeks ago, Saturday midnight, we were all sitting around at Danielle`s, drinking and bitching at the school`s antics. Around 1am, we decided to head for the `Frontier Bar` (the foreigner`s bar). Teetotal Aussie Keith offered to drive. When we parked up, he left his window open and forgot about his wallet on top of the dashboard. When we returned at 5am, it was still there. That`s Japan for you.

Despite the fact that I had been up all night, I drove down to Mt Tsukuba for an early morning assault at 6am. Unfortunately, two thirds of the way up my 70 minute ascent, a rain cloud descended and along with being soaked, there was no view from the top. I headed straight down. I was amazed to see hundreds of Japanese all climbing up this early in the morning and in this weather. I was home and asleep by 9am on Sunday morning. That afternoon, I played tennis with Chieko, her friend and US Jeff whom I`d met a few weeks ago. It was a hog roasting day on the court. I sweated so much that when I lay on the court a `murder victim outline` appeared in water beneath me. Jeff and I repaired to a restaurant where Jeff bought the beers. He was working at a public school and was about to have his 6 week long summer break. Intending on visiting Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, I drew him maps of hotel locations and gave him the handy hints for undertaking the trip.

The weather turned vicious here in July. Absolutely sweltering humid days of 36`c, followed by all nighters when the temperature never dropped below 24`c. The other teachers locked themselves in their rooms and turned on, bugger the cost, the expensive air conditioning systems. I survived with my 3 speed multi fan which I found abandoned but I still sweated buckets. I wake up in pools of water on my futon. I was downing gallons of liquid only to see it sweat right out again. If I could be bothered to have a jog, I was drinking water from the paddy field taps on the way round because I was so dehydrated. I`d been warned about the Japanese summers, but this was extreme stuff. I don`t know how the country functioned before air conditioning. I have filled one freezer with ice popcicles and suck my way through a dozen a day. I have also become addicted to Calpis (cowpiss?), which is a white watery/yoghurt combination that is very refreshing. I have just heard that Japan is attempting to increase its available ice cream flavours. Three new ones are coming out; eel, squid and cactus. I`ll let you know.

The stifling heat had various males looking for a haircut. They are so expensive here that Danielle offered, after a few drinks to cut James hair. She shaved off most of it, but it looked ok. By the time Forest walked in, she`d had a few more drinks. `Could you cut mine?` he stupidly asked. `No worries mate` and out came the razor. Unfortunately, a little worse for wear, Danielle`s attempt on Forest was someone comical. Lets just say that everyone now calls him `Black Adder` (from Rowan Atkinson`s haircut in the first series). I think I`ll just let mine grow longer.

On top of the heat, we got a couple of typhoons. Usually, typhoons do not appear until September, and this is the first time since 1959 that Japan has witnessed July typhoons. The first 5 were small, but on July 10th, warnings came in that Typhoon Number 6 about to hit. The Japanese don`t name their typhoons, just give them numbers. I was down at my Wednesday evening company class at Yuki City, 40 kms away, and the company had a TV turned permanently to a non-stop typhoon weather report. As I drove home in the dark, it hit us and the roads were immediately flooded within minutes. It was like driving into a fireman`s hose at full spray. While other cars pulled over, I plodded on and got home before the howling winds started. It gave us all another excuse to stay up all night drinking while the windows rattled and the trees were blown senseless in the terrible downpour. Japanese public schools had closed early and stayed closed until the following afternoon. Days later, some areas south of us were still flooded by the amount of water that fell and filled the rivers. Three days after Typhoon Number 6, we had a minor earth tremor. On July 15th, Typhoon Number 7 hit us. It arrived at 4am when howling winds awoke me. By 7am, all was calm. Then a downpour hit us big time. It kept up all day and driving to work was atrocious. I was completely soaked everytime I left the car or a building. I apparently slept through another loud earth tremor.

In between the typhoons, the Hound From Hell has been making the most of the sunshine and the peace and quiet and howling away. But a new menace has appeared on my block. The Jogger From Hell. Check this clown out. Some Japanese guy has taken to running around the block at 5am. He pants loudly (like he`s in the Marines) and then stops nearby and all I can hear is, at 5 second intervals, him yelling in pain. It sounds as if someone is kicking him hard in the stomach (`AAAAAAIIIEEE!) I have no idea what he is doing, but don`t try it at home. After 10 of these, he pants off around the block and comes back for another 10 `if it hurts it must be doing me good` grunts. I keep meaning to sneak down and see what punishment he is going through, but standing on the balcony behind the trees, it is more entertaining to imagine what he is doing to himself. And in the deadly silence of early morning, hundreds of other people must be wondering the same thing.

The hot humid weather has left me a little lethargic. I abandoned my final Japanese lessons. I found the teaching method a little frustrating, wasn`t learning much and it didn`t help that I was doing no practice on my own. Its sad to say, but its almost possible to live here without knowing much Japanese. You don`t need it in supermarkets or garages and we speak English all day at the schools. I use stock phrases to get things done but eventually you think, is there much point in spending hours learning a language for a country you will only spend a year in and never be able to use again anywhere else. So I get by with what I have and look up anything else I need.

To my collections of abandoned goodies, I added a third fridge/freezer (for the balcony, saving at least 2 seconds in finding another ice cold beer), another chair for the balcony and went stealing bicycles. Well, not technically. Over the past few weeks, Tsukuba Council has been rounding up abandoned bicycles. Why over 200 reasonable bicycles have been left lying around, I have no idea. The council have left them yellow tagged at the Tsukuba Information Centre and everyone was told that they had until July 14th to claim their bikes. They had been there for a month. Any unclaimed bike would be destroyed or auctioned off. So on July 13th, I figured, they`ve had a month, noone is going to claim them now and whisked off a couple to my Mr Whippy car and back to Grandale for communial use by the other teachers. It makes a pleasant change to go cycling through the flat countryside instead of jogging. Japanese pears are coming into season. They look and taste like apples. So why are they called pears?

I started to research the possibilities of getting a flatshare. At Grandale, we all have our own rooms and pay 61,500 yen a month. I visited an estate agent and found a 3 bedroom apartment for 75,000 Yen a month. But in Japan, there is a lot of upfront money. First you pay a two month deposit (no guarantee of getting it back), then a month`s rent as a `present to the landlord` (non refundable), a month`s rent as commission to the agency and a month`s rent in Advance. So you have to stump up 5 months money with only a guaranteed return of 1 month. Then you are supposed to sign up for a two year contract (negotiable) and get a Japanese citizen to sign who will agree to pay the outstanding rent if you do a runner. It was all very complicated and expensive and since I only had 8 months to run, a lot of effort. James and Danielle were interested (we calculated that in 8 months we could each save over 800 English Pounds in accommodation). But everyone seems to take it day by day here. James flies off the handle once a week and threatens to quit over something and in the end you think, I can`t be arsed. I enjoy my own room and privacy and I am responsible to noone but myself.

After another all nighter at the Frontier Bar, which had a Japanese punk rock band that sounded as bad as they did in the 1970s, I picked up Canadian Joan at 9am on a Sunday morning and we headed off for the beach while everyone else slept off the night before. We drove north east through Ibaraki Prefecture towards the coast and after finding a couple of surfer dominated beaches, stumbled across deserted Kyochigama Beach. Don`t get excited. Japanese beaches are not exactly like English beaches. They are composed of dark sand, and are covered in rubbish, pollution and driftwood. Very unattractive places but there are lots of shells. In a strong wind, we sheltered behind an abandoned fridge/freezer and went body surfing all afternoon. It was nice to have to area to ourselves, but the current was strong and we kept getting dragged out. On the way home, we drove past the Kashima World Cup Stadium where I had watched Argentina/Nigeria and popped into Kashima Shrine which was deserted at 5.30pm. It is one of the three oldest shrines in eastern Japan, but the centrepeice was covered in green tarpaulin and being restored. The grounds with towering cedar trees everywhere were beautiful.

I don`t know if it was the bodysurfing, or the hard jog the next morning or the hour`s cycle ride afterwards but my back collapsed a day later. I had strained something and it plagued me for the next two weeks. No physical exercise but I still managed to lift a few small kids. It is no fun to put a hot water bottle against your back in 36`c temps.

It didn`t stop me from visiting the Kirin brewery on the Wednesday morning. I did a magical mystery tour of the farmlands until an hour south, I came across a massive brewery run by a major Japanese brewer, Kirin. At 10.30am, I was the only visitor and got my own private tour with a female tourguide (who could speak minimal English, but I had a leaflet to refer to). We even had our own private bus with nodding bus driver and white driving gloves (they wear these to avoid getting sunburnt hands - sad but true) to take me around the complex. There were the usual sights of mash tubs, fermentation tanks, bottle washers and inspector machines, fillers, labellers and casers. The whole place was mechanised and I saw few staff. The machines could fill 600 pint bottles a minute (slightly faster than I can drink the stuff) and 1400 pint cans. A free 20 minute tasting session followed where I had my own private barmaid who poured perfect Japanese beer (30% head/70% beer). After four of those I thought I`d better go to work! But it was my Company Class day which wouldn`t start until 5.30pm. Word must be getting around the Company. Two new employees joined my class this month.

We had a long weekend break in mid July. I had originally intended to leave at 4am on Friday 19th and head north for a roadtrip. But on the Thursday night, a spontaneous gathering of teachers in Grandale lead to an all night bender to celebrate freedom for 3 days and I didn`t get to bed until 5am, let alone get in the car. I eventually got going Friday midday while the other teachers slept off their hangovers in preparation for a night out in Tokyo a few hours later.

I wanted to check out northern Honsho. I didn`t think I`d find much and for all the driving I did, I was right. The Friday afternoon roads were thick with traffic and it was slow going up Route 6 following the coast. The interior forested mountains looked scenic and it was nice to get glimpses of the sea, but by the time I reached the major city of Sendai, 8 hours later, it was dark and the city was gridlocked. I abandoned any idea of finding a youth hostel and crashed at an overnight car parking area along with a dozen other Japanese people who slept in their cars.

When I awoke at 4.30am, the whole area was covered in thick fog and there was zero visibility. I slogged my way through it 3 hours north to Tono. Set in a bowl of low mountains in the heart of one of Japan`s poorest regions, Tono takes pride in its living legacy of farming and folk traditions. Magariya or large L-shaped farmhouses are the dominant feature. The most popular character from the folk tales is the Kappa, an ugly water creature; long skinny limbs, webbed hands and feet, a sharp beak and a hollow on the top of his head which must be kept full of water. Apparently he used to pull young children into ponds and rivers. His image was everywhere in this region - carved in both stone and wood.

Tono itself, is a small town set among flat ricelands, with orchards and pine forests clothing the surrounding hills. I drove around the pleasant empty roads through quiet farming villages with gardens full of summer flowers (sunflowers, hollyhocks). No shopping malls or urban sprawl. I paid my respects to Fukusen-Ji, a modern 1912 temple with its 17m image of Kannon, the Goddess of Mercy. The slender, gilded statue with a blue rinse hairdo was carved from a single tree trunk. After a morning soaking up the scenery and sunshine, I headed south again to Hiraizumi.

For a brief period in the 11th Century, the temples of Hiraizumi, now a quiet backwater 120km north of Sendai, rivalled even Kyoto in their magnificence. The majority of monasteries and palaces have since been lost but at the Chuson-Ji temple complex, there is still some evidence of the area`s former wealth. These wooden shrines and buildings have somehow survived war, earthquakes, fire and natural decay for over 900 years.

Chuson-ji, full of sweating Japanese tourists on a national holiday of humid 36`C temperatures, sat on a forested hilltop. Of the original 40 temples and buildings, only 2 remain; Konjiko-do (Golden Hall (1124)) and the nearby Buddhist sutra repository, Kyozo (1108). I strolled past various minor temples, sheltering under towering cryptomania (look it up) trees.; all plain wooden affairs with quiet secluded interiors and the odd monk banging his gong. Konjiko-Do had been rehoused in a modern ugly air conditioned building. It was a tiny affair, only 5.5 square protected behind plate glass. The whole structure gleamed with thick gold leaf and the altar inside was smothered in mother of pearl inlay and delicate gilded copper friezes set against dark burnished lacquer. Personally, I think the Japs were paying the 800Yen just for the air conditioning. In true Jack style, I snuck in around the side for a free quick look. I enjoyed the grounds but you could get a feel for the place without shelling out on the `highlight`.

Having finished the sights, I had a long 10 hour journey back home through infrequent heavy rainstorms, endless traffic lights and tedious Japanese driving. I am coming to the conclusion that it takes a lot of effort to see Japan`s famous sights and after all the struggles, you don`t get much for the time spent dealing with exhausting traffic. No wonder they stay at home, take coach tours or travel abroad, It was bliss to just spend the Sunday sunbathing on my balcony and lobbing empty beercans at the Hound from Hell. During that weekend, after the night out in Tokyo, James, Forest and Karl made an assault on Mt Fuji, climbing at night to see the sunrise. They collapsed 500m from the top, freezing and exhausted and turned back which earnt me `Respect` for my solo success.

7 dogs, 7 cats, 2 birds, 1 bird of prey, 1 fox, 1 frog, 1 UFO (unidentified flattened object)