Shirahama beach - They imported the sands from Australia

Another holiday post!, it looks like I've been on a holiday every month. The last two months was more like a business trip rather than a true holiday. 

In August my lab don't have the routine meeting we do every tuesday and friday, because it's summer holiday even the professor take holiday in August (usually during お盆). I almost never take the holiday in August since I started my study, but this year I decided to take several days. I wanted to go to Okinawa actually, but my friend said she couldn't come with me. Instead of Okinawa we decided to visit shirahama; a city in Wakayama prefecture just 3 hours bus ride from Osaka. Having a late summer holiday apparently was not a good choice, the bad weather ruined half of our holiday.

I read that the sand's beach heri is imported from Australia. I didn't know that we can import sands, LOL!!!. it was saturday when we visited the beach so yup it was really crowded, the water is a little bit cold and no wave like beach in Bali. I was expecting a wavy beach since it is a pacific ocean sea, guess I need to manage my expectation next time. Been live here for 3 years and had my expectation betrayed many times.

Shirahama 

The Australian sands at night

We stayed at the japanese ryokan (hotel) it's pretty expensive 11.000 yen/night/person included dinner and breakfast. The hotel has a semi open air public bath (温泉) which is not bad in my opinion, though maybe not as good as kinosaki onsen. For dinner we had seafood BBQ like squid, shrimp, scallops and some veggies. Not many things to do at night in this small city, I would suggest just make a one day trip to this city. We were bored to death at night, we walked around the city for like one hour then came back to the hotel and just read book (Thank God I brought my book)

Seafood BBQ for dinner

Second day was pretty much hampered by the rain. We went to the sandanbeki, a rock cliff by the sea. there is an elevator to go down the cliff and see inside the cave which used to be a naval base. To visit the cave was a unique experience to me. they turn the cave into a temple and museum. You have to pay 1300yen if you wanna go to the cave.

5 minutes walk from sandanbeki is senjojiki, which is a wide flat sheet-rocks formation that you can walk on it. it s located along the coast, it's really wide. It was rainy day when we visited but still it's safe to walk. 

Another place to visit is 円月島, a rock islet in the sea with the hole in the center. from far away i looks like a 円 kanji.

One day trip is enough to explore this city, the three major tourist attraction are not located away from each other. The shirahama beach and engetsu islet is only 5 mins walk from the shirahama bus centre, while sandanbeki is 10 minutes bus ride from the bus centre. there is another place name Adventure world, which is a zoo i think, I did not visit this place more like i did not plan to visit adventure world, the admission fee to adventure world is 4000 yen, too expensive for a zoo but you can see a panda which is rent from china. 

Shirahama can be reach by plane, train or bus. If you are coming from Kansai Area bus is the best transportation choice. return bus from Osaka cost 5500 yen, one way train from Osaka to shirahama cost 5000 yen. it's 3,5 hours by bus and 2,5 hours by train from Osaka to shirahama. Resort hotel mostly located around the beach area and it's expensive.

In september we have this silver week holiday from from saturday to wednesday, I don't have any plan yet for this holiday but for sure I will not just stay in Osaka. ;)

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Kawachi fuji garden (河内藤 園) ~ A Secret Garden in 北九州 (Kita-kyushu)

This is a 3 weeks late post. I've been caught up by my 'soon to be publish' paper, some new research project and a couples of academic conference right as soon as I finished my Golden Week vacation.

My friend and I had planned this trip since January, we wanted to visit the 河内藤

園(Kawachi fuji garden) in kita-kyushu to see the Wisteria tunnel. We saw the photo from the internet, it was beautiful. the flowers only bloom from mid-April to mid-May, Since my friend had to go back to Indonesia at may 11th, We decided to go to this garden during Golden Week.

We took a night bus for we both never experience it before but the most important thing is because it's the cheapest mode of transportation to go to kita-kyushu. We left Osaka at 22.00 on May 5th, the bus was very comfortable that we fell asleep immediately. We arrived around 7.15AM at Kokura station. If you go by shinkansen you need to get off at this station too. from kokura station take JR train to Yahata station It takes around 15-20 minutes to go to yahata from kokura. from yahata station there is a free shuttle bus to the garden. the shuttle bus goes to Ajisai onsen near the garden, from the onsen it'll only take 10 minutes walk to see the wisteria.

So here goes the silly part of this trip. As I mentioned there is a shuttle bus to the garden, but you can go to the garden with city bus too, you have to pay 240 yen. Since the shuttle bus is crowded wit local and some Chinese tourists, we didn't want to be cramped in a small bus with them so we decided to take the city bus. it turned out that the city bus stop 7 KM away from the garden and what we didn't know is that the garden located at a mountain, so yeah we have to walk (with a little bit of climbing) around 1 hour to reach the garden. That Long?..Actually if you walk fast and not distracted by the view you can get to the gaden by 30 mins. But it wasn't a mistake at all taking the city bus, since on our way to the garden there is this Kawachi reservoir, this a big lake  surrounded by the green hills.

 View along the sidewalk to the garden

 Kawachi reservoir

Kawachi reservoir

After 1 hour of walking we finally arrived at the kawachi fuji garden. Since it was golden week there were so many tourists and the admission fee were expensive too, we have to pay 1000 yen. 

Inside the garden, the view just beautiful not to mention the flowers smells good too, but be careful with bees. There were a lot of bees flying around inside the tunnel. the tunnel is about 500 M (not so sure if it's correct) and consist of not only the purple wisteria but also the white, pink and light purple color flowers.  Since it was crowded with many peoples taking a good photos were not easy. I made promise to come again next year during weekdays so I can get a good photos.

The wisteria tunnel

purple color wisteria is the main flowers

in this garden

The pink colour wisteria

The wisteria tunnel as seen from outside

We left the garden at 2PM, before going to hakata city we paid a visit to the kokura-castle. It is a small castle 5 minutes walk from JR nishi-kokura station. After that we walked around 20 minutes to kokura station, then took shinkansen to Hakata then check in to the our hotel.

Kokura castle

Honestly 1 day was not enough to explore kita-kyushu. There were so many places I wanted to see. I will surely comeback and visit again next year. And next year I will save more money so I can take shinkansen/airplane to Kyushu. despite the bus was comfort enough, still I want to sleep and rest well at night. 

continued on next post....

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Short post

Two weeks ago I went on a trip to Kyushu, an island southern of Osaka. A wonderful city, a short but fun trip. But, I've been busy with my research after i came back to Osaka, so i have not write about the trip in this blog.

I wish to make post about the trip this weekend. 

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