Saturday, August 2, 2014

Hiking in Japan

Jeff and I decided it would be fun to get out of the city this weekend so I scoured Hiroshima trying to find a book that has places to hike in Japan and around Hiroshima.  I went to 5 stores and couldn't find any in English.  I did manage to find information at the tourist information desk for a hike that was about an hour away from Hiroshima in an area called Sandankyo.

Jeff got some practice driving on the wrong side of the road.  The countryside was really interesting.  Any place that was flat was densely housed.  Everything else was really steep densely forested hills.  The steep hills caused the roads to be really interesting.  Because the hills were so steep the road often went from a tunnel through the hill directly onto bridge and then back in to a tunnel.  It was a really scenic drive.

Once we got to the hike we were surprised to see that the trail was paved.  We were pleasantly surprised that the trail was not overly crowded.  We saw maybe only a dozen people through out our 13 mile hike. 

The hike ran parallel to a stream that cut through a steep and narrow valley.  When we came to the first waterfall, I pulled out my camera and was getting it set up for a picture and the more I fiddled with my settings, the worse the picture looked!  I soon realized that the camera had steamed up due to the heat and humidity after being in the air conditioned car.  Here is what it looked like.

Steamed up camera
And here is what it looked like when the camera de-fogged.

Water fall feeding the stream.
 
The stream running through the steep forested canyon
 
The trail above the crystal clear water

The trail winding up a little hill

Some big rocks in the water

A bridge across the river - we crossed two of these
We stopped here for a quick break
This was the big waterfall and our turn around point
On the way back we started seeing some clouds roll in and started getting a little nervous.  It wasn't long until it started sprinkling.
 
Sprinkling rain made pretty light
A big toad that came out with the rain
We saw one big toad and many small frogs - the frogs moved pretty fast!  Our little sprinkle turned in to a total downpour in a hurry.  I'm sure the reason why the path is paved is so it doesn't wash away!  Before we got back the trail turned into a small stream in it's own right.  It was often 3-4 inches deep in water.  It is safe to say that I was just as wet at the end of the hike than if I'd gone swimming with my clothes on!

There was a nice public restroom where we parked so Jeff and I took a couple minutes to wring out our clothes before hopping the the car and going back to Hiroshima.  It will be a good thing when we get our rain jackets next week.  :-)  It was a fun a beautiful hike even if it was a little soggy.

2 comments:

  1. That toad is HUGE haha! Wow, I would have never thought about a camera fogging. That picture difference is pretty funny! The landscape there seems just gorgeous- lots of water and vegetation. Is your hair doing funny things in all that humidity?

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  2. My hair is fine but my face keeps breaking out and is oily. On the plus side, all of my fine lines have disappeared. I dropped about 5 years - lol!

    And yes, that toad is huge and scared the crap out of me when I almost stepped on him and he moved. A little Jaba the Hut!

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