I can't be lucky all the time and my prayers for a good weather as opposed to the wet weather forecast were unanswered. At least I slept better than the night before. Sadly, I have sore throat (as expected) thanks to the fantastic BBQ dinner last night.
Koyama-ike and Aoshima
Today we journeyed to the western part of Tottori preferecture. My guide made a brief stop at Koyama-ike. An interesting fact shared by my guide that despite the size, this body of water is still smaller than the minimum size of a lake in Japan. So although it feels big enough as a lake, Koyama is still considered a pond. I hope that helps to minimise the confusion when you google and find Lake Koyama instead of Koyama Pond. Lol.
The rain was not too bad (no need umbrella) but the wind was strong (umbrella would be blown away). There is a small island (Aoshima) in the middle of the lake and we walked across a bridge from where we parked the car. The view is pretty: sakura trees are still plentiful in this island, pink sakura against green grass and leaves and blue water and blue sky. Unfortunately because of the weather, we did not spend too much time here or we would be drenched in no time. Walking back across the bridge against the wind was like walking in the middle of a storm.
We bypassed Hakuto Shrine for now. The weather was expected to be better in the afternoon so we would visit on our way back. The journey to Mt Daisen was through the same way from Conan Town yesterday. That means we would pass by Conan Town. No brainer so I asked to make a quick stop at Conan's House Beika Shopping Street and Gosho Aoyama Manga Factory again for me to shop. I decided to just buy all the plushies which are only available in Tottori, the expensive Conan t-shirt from Beika Shopping Street, and a pin to commemorate 2nd anniversary of the Beika Shopping Street. I also Heiji plushie since it is quite a rare find. Second time visiting Hokuei Town and I still return with regrets of not trying the purikura T_T I was a self-conscious to do that since the shop was quite crowded.
Mt Daisen
Okay no more hiking on foot today but by car. Haha.. Mt Daisen is much higher than Mt Mitoku and at the higher altitudes, sakura has not bloomed yet and snow was still visible covering the peaks. Sakura trees are still available at the lower altitudes and I was brought to a 'secret place' with only sakura trees around, fallen sakura petals on the ground, and flying sakura petals in the air as the wind blows. It was amazing and I did not mind getting drenched a little bit to enjoy this sakura environment. Sigh.. if only it was not raining.
Mt Daisen is usually busy during winter as there are ski resorts around. However with spring, the whole place feels deserted. We hardly saw other cars visiting here. The good thing is that I got to enjoy the sakura place all by myself. At the higher altitudes, I saw the ski resorts. Although currently there is no snow, I can imagine how amazing the areas will be during winter time. I am never interested in ski resorts but after seeing and imagining how this place is in the winter, I think I am ready to give ski resorts a try. Another glimpse of what this place looks like in winter is from the red-and-white poles at the roadside. These poles serve as markers of the road when everything is covered in snow. Those poles are taller than me so just imagine how thick the snow can be. Minus the rain, I also enjoyed the coolness and the windiness here.
For lunch, I was offered the options of seafood don or traditional food with mostly vegetable for lunch. I chose the later. I expected a table restaurant with a spread of vegetable meals but it turned out to be a buffet restaurant. Although the food options had a lot of vegetables, staples such as udon, curry rice, ramen, etc were also available. All these for less than 1000 yen. Wow.
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| At the 'secret' sakura spot on the journey up to Mt Daisen |
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| Ski resort in spring. Snow is still visible at the mountain in the background. |
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| Ski resort in spring |
On the way to Sakaiminato, my guide stopped by to show me the other option for lunch. I am so glad I did not choose that as the eatery is in a fish market. I am not a fan of fish smell haha. We also stopped at a beach which I cannot remember the name. I only remember there is a jetty as well. Based on what I can recall combined with the power of google and google map, I think that place is Yumigahama beach.
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| Not sure if this is Yumigahama beach |
At Sakaiminato, we only went to Mizuki Shigeru Road. I never follow the anime GeGeGe no Kitaro so I am not too familiar with this. Although I know that this is one of the famous attraction in Tottori, I am okay to miss it if there is no time. My priority is Conan. My guide saw how excited I was with Conan and hence he brought me here as well.
Mizuki Shigeru Road is just a straight road. Google says is it about 800m long. However I feel that it is much shorter than at Conan Town from Yura station to Gosho Aoyama Manga Factory which is only about 1300m long. Nevertheless, Mizuki Shigeru Road has more bronze statues depicting the various youkais. They are definitely more interesting that Conan plaques of manga covers. I find the bronze statues rather small (except for the main characters) although some have impressive design surrounding the statues. There is Mizuki Shigeru Museum and when we passed by, there was a character mascot of Neko Musume. I don't know the character but since it was not busy, I still took the opportunity to take photos.
There are hundreds of statues but I don't think I even saw half of them. I did not explore the whole stretch since it started to rain quite heavily and I decided we should just return to the car. I will not be posting a separate post on Mizuki Shigeru Road so I will just share some of the photos here.
There are more than one statue of the main character, Kitaro
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| Nezumi Otoko |
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| Just to show that not only the statues are interesting but also their pedestals |
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| With the light, the atmosphere of the road will be very different in the evening |
Manhole covers with GeGeGe no Kitaro characters
I was hoping that I would pass the famous steep bridge at Sakaiminato but I don't think it was the bridge that we used to cross to Miho Shrine. Despite it being pretty late in the afternoon and the rain, my guide was really amazing. Since we were already so far here, he insisted on recommending me to visit the Miho Shrine. Miho Shrine is located in Shimane prefecture which is neighbouring to Tottori.Miho Shrine
My guide told me that Miho Shrine is regarded as the bigger and more important among several Shinto shrines in Japan. The temple was already closed by my guide taught me how to pray in a Shinto shrine. After dropping a coin (the amount is up to the person), bowing, clapping, praying, and bowing again, we got a piece of paper with a 100 yen coin wrapped inside. I can't understand the writing on the paper. My guide advised me that I should spend the 100 yen coin from the shrine in Japan and not to keep them as souvenir. We went to a souvenir shop nearby and I spent the coin to get a small plushie of the mascot of Shimane prefecture: Shimanekko.
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| Torii of Miho Shrine |
Miho Shrine marked the end of the adventure today and we returned to Tottori. Although it was getting quite dark and it was still raining, I still requested to drop by to Hakuto Shrine since we had to pass it by to return to Tottori anyways. It was raining quite heavily but not heavy enough to open umbrella. Hakuto Shrine is a famous place to pray for soulmate but that is not my main reason of visiting. My main reason for visiting is the legend of white rabbit behind the Hakuto Shrine.
Hakuto Shrine has rabbit stone statues lining the steps and it is nice that there are lights in the evening. I have been thinking to get a new digital camera after this trip. My camera 'knew' it and it surprised me with the photos taken at Hakuto Shrine. It was already quite dark but the photo quality shows otherwise. As it was raining, I did not walk towards the big statue depicting the white rabbit and Okuninushi across the car park area. I had to miss Hakuto beach as well. Oh well, can't have everything.
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| Taken past 6pm under pretty heavy drizzle. Good job, camera! |
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| The lights were switched on on my way back |
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| Love letter box :p |
Another great day today which really exceeds my expectations. To be able to visit places that I thought I would have to miss is great. To be able to visit the neighbouring prefecture is simply wow.. I am hyped for tomorrow and I hope it will be another great day. The paragliding shop says that the weather should be okay and there is no need to cancel. And surprise surprise: my tour guide knows the owner of the paragliding shop who is the person who has been in contact with me. My guide says he will try to use his 'connection' so that I can try to fly longer. Hehe.. I have to admit that I feel pretty sad that tomorrow is the last day at Tottori :( It has been fantastic experience here so far.
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