Matsumoto Castle

We’re on a journey around Japan, so we needed to leave Tokyo for other parts of the country. Today we caught the train to Matsumoto. We bought bento boxes from one of the bento box shops in Tokyo station

and headed out of Tokyo.

Matsumoto is known for some of its old streets and its frog statues.

With the restoration of the emperor in the late 1800s, all the old castles were destroyed, except twelve. Matsumoto Castle is one of the twelve. It was saved by some very determined locals who didn’t want their heritage destroyed. It had become derelict, but years of restoration have returned it to a place where you can walk through it to the top. It once had the top floors leaning like the tower of Pisa. The castle looks like it has five floors from the outside, but there’s actually an extra floor inside, between the second and third floor. 

As it was a long weekend, there were hoards of people and the journey through the castle was one long queue winding up through the castle and back down.

The castle is the definition of defensive. The bridge across the moat has a kink so attackers can’t run across. 

Unlike European castles, it didn’t include living quarters, but was used for storage unless it was being attacked. The stairs up have treads that are very high, and are like ladders, so it’s difficult to climb up between floors. 

It has slits in the floors so that the defenders could pour rocks and other things onto attackers. The castle was built around the time that guns were invented, so it has slits for guns 

and different slits for arrows, 

all carefully calibrated to allow shots to go particular distances to hit attackers at the other side of the moat. There are very few actual windows and hidden floor has little light. The floor plan was confusing for attackers. The castle has displays of the very quick adoption and development of firepower once Japan started using guns, 

and a lot of military information related to the castle. Samurai wives and daughters made shot for guns. 

They also made their armour.

There was a chrysanthemum display at the castle.

After we visited the castle, we went to the Matsumoto City museum of art, 

where there’s a permanent exhibition by Yoyai Kusama, who was born in Matsumoto.

Mount Fuji

Today we visited Mount Fuji. Actually, we didn’t. We visited Kawaguchiko Lakes, where you can get gorgeous views of Mount Fuji. This was the first day of a long weekend, so, although the weather was auspicious, the traffic wasn’t, and the bus took one and a half hours longer than expected to reach the lake. During our trip there, we could see the mountain most of the way - even when we were still in Tokyo! Most people don’t see Mount Fuji when they visit it, because the weather is rarely auspicious.

When we got there, we were in the middle of town, so Fuji wasn’t visible. 

We then caught the local bus took its last stop at Oishi Park, where you can get really good views, and took pictures. 

They have a lot of different flower plantings in this park, and it’s very popular with tourists. 

We were overwhelmed by the numbers of people here.

We gradually worked our way back around the lake, taking pictures of Fuji as we went, 

but we ran out of time when we reached the bridge over the lake. So we walked across the bridge and caught the bus back to the bus station. We didn’t miss our bus to Tokyo, but it took longer to get back than it should have, and picked us up half an hour late, so it was a very long day.

We did do things other than take photos of Mount Fuji. We visited the Lake Kawaguchiko maple corridor.

We found somewhere to have lunch. 

At the bridge we visited a shrine. 

But the day was really dedicated to Mount Fuji.

Wandering around Tokyo

Today Leona and I started by visiting the Tokyo national museum. It was different to other museums I’ve visited. Most cases had only one or a few items inside. Other places give you a number of items so you get a broad overview of the range. Each item was superb. For instance, there were only a few kimonos (they are changed so that they reflect the season), but the workmanship of each was superb, and I could have viewed them for a long time. However, it would have been nice to see how kimonos change throughout the year. 

There were many more items associated with the samurai, including their armour, 

whistling arrow 

and swords. Most of these were unsheathed and weren’t able to be photographed, but this one was.

By lunchtime there were an enormous number of people at the museum and it was difficult to see things. There were gardens associated with the museum, but we were both disappointed with them. However, as we went through the Ueno park, which surrounds the museum, zoo and gallery… we saw this incongruous sight. The avenue we were walking through was of cherry trees that are used to identify cherry blossom season in Tokyo. This tree had cherry blossoms. It also has an American totem pole behind it!

We then caught trains to asakusa where we found a dumpling/yum cha type restaurant and had lunch. We then hurried across the bridge to the boat, where we were very lucky to secure two tickets on the boat which was about to leave (outside it had said none were available). As we were the last on board, we had the worst seats, so we didn’t have much of a view as we went downriver to the harbour. 

But we were on a very impressive looking boat!

We then walked to the monorail and passed a Statue of Liberty (one of three in Japan - this one commemorates the friendship between Japan and France). 

The monorail trip goes around the harbour and over the very high bridge you can see in the last two pictures. To make it down to land level after the bridge, the monorail does a complete loop, making it a spectacularly impressive ride. We then changed trains to go home. When I got back to where I was staying, I remembered it was Halloween.  We had some Halloween food at breakfast.

First day in Tokyo

Today I met up with Lorraine and Leona, and went with them to the Meiji Shrine by train. The shrine is located a fair way inside the park, and the path to it is lined with trees. 

On the way were a number of kiosks showing chrysanthemums, 

including bonsai chrysanthemums. 

We were all very impressed by these. After we visited the shrine, which was crowded, Leona and I went to the inner garden. It is probably very impressive when the azaleas are in bloom, or when the maples are in colour, but we weren’t as impressed as we expected, so we left it fairly soon.

We then caught two trains to Koishikawa Korakuen which was an absolutely beautiful garden. It is the oldest garden in Tokyo, and is representative of other gardens from both Japan and China. I really liked the various different paths in this garden. We both spent a fair bit of time here because it was so beautiful, despite this being the wrong time of year to see it in its full glory.

There was a patch of rice, which the original owner included in the garden to show his son how difficult rice farming was. This was in the iris valley. The trellis is growing wisteria.

The full moon bridge was created by one of the Confucian master builders. The reflection in the water makes a full circle.

We then caught the trains back to our starting point. Trains in Tokyo are very regular - I think we may have waited two minutes for one of them, but that was the longest. There are a large number of lines, both above and below ground, and there are tunnels that join the different lines at stations. Fortunately, these are well signposted. Once we had to walk through a platform for a different line to get to the correct line.

Going to Japan

I visited Japan in winter in early 1984. Now, I’m visiting again. I expect a lot has changed in forty years, but that there will be a lot that’s the same as well. To get there, I left early to catch the 6am bus to Sydney, then the plane to arrive in Tokyo at about 8:30pm. 

It had been raining heavily all along the east coast of Australia, so I wasn’t surprised to see nothing but clouds until we reached Tamworth where the clouds began to break up and I could see patches of land below. The route goes inland and we reached the coast somewhere between Tully and Townsville, where the clouds stopped. Soon we were seeing faint puddles of different colours which were parts of the Great Barrier Reef, but these disappeared and we were just flying over ocean - the Coral Sea.

They darkened all the windows and turned off the lights, but I undarkened the windows, and saw the Osprey Reef. The photo is bad because the window was still lightening, and there were light reflections, but the reef itself was amazing to see.

I managed to undarken the window again when we crossed the coast into Papua New Guinea, 

and again as we crossed the highlands.

When I arrived in Tokyo, I caught the train to the nearest station on that line to where I was staying, and then managed with some difficulty to find my accommodation. It was difficult to find because I had no wifi and had photographed the google map of the walk, but it had alphabetical lettering, whereas all the streets were in Japanese characters. However, I found a very helpful Japanese gentleman who assisted me to get there.

 Deborah is safely in Japan and having a good time, but is having technical difficulties making blog posts. We hope to fix this soon. Stand by for future developments. - Alan