For The Love of Travel

It started raining about 10 minutes after I started driving. Mountains I was passing swirled with fog. I thought museums first today and lets hope the weather improves in the arvo – as it happens, GREAT thinking and plan by me!! 🙂

The POLA group, a skin care and beauty products company, opened the POLA Museum of Art in 2002 to display the extensive private art collection of the company’s late owner, Suzuki Tsuneshi. The museum was built amid a forest of 300 year old beech trees in Hakone, and although constructed of concrete and glass, it is designed so as not to disrupt the natural environment that surrounds it. To achieve this, the majority of the building is located underground.

The museum features modern and contemporary paintings, sculptures, ceramics and glassware by mostly Japanese and European artists. Saw a lovely exhibition today “Modern Times in Paris 1925: Art and Design in the Machine Age”. In addition, some art I really liked – (1) Sonia Delaunay co-founded the Orphism art movement noted for its strong colours and geometric shapes; (2) Guerlain perfume bottle 1920’s; (3) Raoul Dufy’s ‘Paris’ in 1935; (4) Sugiyama Yasushi’s ‘Sharpness’ in 1973; (5) Mounir Fatmi’s ‘Modern Times: A History of the Machine’.

While in the area, had to visit the Hakone Venetian Glass Museum, Japan’s first art museum specializing in Venetian glass, and exhibits works from the fifteenth to nineteenth centuries and also modern pieces. (1) Compote with 2 sea horses 19thC; (2) Miniature of furniture in millefiori glass 19thC.

Noticed a special exhibit of some of Dale Chihuly’s works – so gorgeous!!

On my way to see Mt Fuji, at Lake Kawaguchi, I saw this incredible row of cherry trees in Gotemba, and driving towards them, found the Higashiyamako Fishing Area. Well, what a sight, a pond surrounded with glorious cherry blossoms. Quite a few fishing persons there, enjoying the hanami.

My first sighting of Mt Fuji was when exiting from the freeway…looming impressively but shrouded in fog, concealing its upper cone.

When I arrived in Kawaguchiko, the town, was spilling over with slightly crazy tourists…doing really silly things, like dashing across the road at the last minute to greet a friend, never mind traffic. The cable car entry area was worse…people wanting to get best in queue, as it snakes a fair way down the hill and around the corner. Crowds are epic. Kept on driving until I found a quiet part on Lake Kawaguchi where I could pull over and stretch the legs, take some pics. Fog completely gone, sun is shining…yay! And some cherry trees to do some arty farty shots.

Fabulous day of art and nature!

I got up super early and was out the door at 6.45. First to launch droney over the the samurai residence, Aizu Bukeyashiki, which served as the quarters of the region’s most important and highest ranked samurai, as well as his family, employees and servants. The original complex was burnt down during the Boshin War in 1868, but has since been reconstructed and furnished to replicate its appearance in the Edo Period. Because of the high rank of its former inhabitants, this samurai residence is quite expansive. There are dozens of different rooms and sections, including gardens, guest rooms, a tea house, an archery range and a rice mill.

On my drive back to the hotel to have brekkie, saw this incredible Disneyesque-looking place with a cherry tree overload and discovered it was a wedding chapel – wow!

Onto the freeway for a 117kms drive south west to visit Kanmangafuchi Abyss, by the Daiya River, a small gorge created by an eruption from Mt. Nantai around 7,000 years ago. From the riverside path, you can see several small statues of jizo, a bodhisattva said to protect children, women and travelers. There are around 70 jizo, but legend holds that the number changes each time you try to count them.

A few minutes up the road, the Nikkosan Rinnoji Temple, founded 1,200 years ago by Buddhist monk Shodo, who served as the first head priest of Nikko. Sanbutsudo Hall, the temple’s main building, is one of the largest wooden structures in Nikko. Inside this building are three great Buddha statues which are 7.5 meters high and covered in gold leaf. These represent Amida Nyorai (the Buddha of Infinite Light), Senju Kannon (the Thousand Armed Goddess of Mercy), and Bato Kannon (the Horse-Headed Kannon, Protector of Animals). I also really enjoyed walking around the delightful Japanese garden Shoyoen.

The lovely red Shinkyo Bridge is a Daiya River crossing set on the edge of forest. I met a delightful couple and their indulged fur baby there 🙂

A full day, quite tired on arrival at Sagamihara. My first experience of congestion on the freeways at peak hour and progressive delays in getting to the destination. Oy vay! On arrival at hotel, discovered I had booked myself into a “love hotel”. I truly can’t believe this! Catalogues of scantily-dressed women greeted me at the reception counter. Too tired after a LONG day to even think about rebooking elsewhere, I stayed the night. Very comfortable bed :)!! And its a hotel that worries about discreteness for clientele…there’s a separate going-up lift, and a going-down lift. Hahahahaha.

My Sakura App tells me to head for the Mikamine Park in Miyagi, so off I go! And its glorious weather today, yay. Planted with 750 trees and 48 types of Yoshino cherry, weeping cherry and Yaezakura, the park features the most cherry blossom trees in downtown Sendai, allowing viewers to enjoy hanami (cherry blossoms viewing) for a month. I met Ernie and his owner, and got permission to take the pooch pic…adorable! Felt like the ‘female dogist’ in Japan, rather than NY 🙂

Yamadera (山寺) is a scenic temple located in the mountains northeast of Yamagata City. The temple grounds extend high up a steep mountainside, 1,000 steps. Well I probably don’t need to tell you that I didn’t climb, but sent droney up instead. The temple was founded over a thousand years ago in 860 as a temple of the Tendai sect under the official name Risshakuji. I would like to spend more time in the area generally (lots of lovely villages) and in Yamagata too in future.

Just after leaving Yamadera, saw this scene I liked on the Tachiya River ….

You drive through heaps of tunnels as you meander through the hills, and there are babbling brooks with ice melt flowing down the river systems. I was struck with the beauty of the NICCHU hydro-dam, and I loved the female sculpture, in the Otoge Pass. It was built between 1979 and 1992 to serve three purposes: energy supply; a water reservoir for agriculture and serves as a very important barricade against flooding water from striking the local area and its inhabitants.

Last stop for the day @ Tsuruga castle in Aizuwakamatsu which is surrounded by cherry trees. Castle was built in 1384 and changed hands many times between different rulers of Aizu. It was destroyed in 1868 in a rebellion against the newly formed Meiji government which had put an end to Japan’s feudal era. The castle was one of the last strongholds of samurai loyal to the shogunate. I can see ‘Shintaro’ (reference from 1960’s childhood TV program) battling it out! As it happens, the castle was rebuilt in the 1960’s too. I’m always tempted to do an arty farty shot…this one below leapt out at me as I passed the lake to the side of the castle.