JapanNewbie

A Trip to Yakushima

Posted on 22. May, 2009 @ 2:29 pm by harvey in Travel

I realized about a week ago that I never blogged about my trip to Yakushima in October 2007. It’s a shame too, because Yakushima was one of the greatest trips that I took during my entire 6 years in Japan! I think blogging on it slipped my mind because I was a bit busy right after the trip.

It took me a while to finally travel to Yakushima because it’s a fairly out of the way place (though it still gets about 300,000 tourists every year, according to Wikipedia). First you must travel down to Kagoshima, and from there it is another boat ride before you arrive on the island.

People visit Yakushima for its natural beauty. The entire island is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and the old yakusugi trees found on the island are legendary. Miyazaki Hayao is said to have modeled the environment in the movie Princess Mononoke after Yakushima.

If I remember correctly, we stayed on Yakushima for 2 nights. Our main goal was to climb up to Miyanoura-dake, the highest point on the island (1,935 meters). We also went to some other areas on the island the next day after that major hike. We rented a car, which is pretty much the only way to get around the island.

We grabbed some essential supplies as soon as we arrived, including the famous shouchu brewed on Yakushima known as “Mitake” 三岳. Supplies were low at the time (maybe they’re always low?) so sales were limited to one bottle per customer. Mitake Shochu is 25%, so one bottle was plenty! Once we started seriously hiking the next day all we would drink was water anyway. The streams were so clean that we could refill our bottles right there.

After loading up we started on the trail to Miyanoura-dake. We hiked for just a few hours before darkness caught up with us and we reached Yodogawa Koya (淀川小屋), one of the first public cabins available for camping. The cabins are decent dry places where you can spread out your sleeping bag and get a nights rest. There are no lights so flashlights are a necessity. The cabin we stayed in was bunked. There was only one other older Japanese man in the cabin when we arrived, and he gave us some snacks and even more shochu as we pulled out our gear to start making dinner.

The rest of the hike was smooth. We left early in the morning even before sunrise, and we made it to the peak just about lunch time. There was a nice breeze on top and the view was spectacular. We were quickly joined by a huge group of older hiking ladies (obaasan) who befriended us (as obaasan usually do) and shared their food.

The hike back down was nice, and that night I believe we stayed in a pension back near the center of the city. The pension was basically just someones house with a couple of extra rooms, so it was a great environment.

We also went to a tiny Onsen in Yakushima that is connected to the sea. It was tiny. There was only a flimsy bamboo divider to separate the men from the women, it didn’t go down into the water and wasn’t very tall, so it was really easy to communicate back and forth across the barrier. Strange feeling. I had been to public baths and onsens a ton before, but this was kind of like taking off your clothes in the middle of no where and jumping into a hot bath with all your friends. Great bonding experience. Our group was the only one using the onsen when we arrived so we had a nice private bath by the ocean.

Another thing I remember about Yakushima was the star filled night sky from that first night at Yodogawa Cabin. It was absolutely incredible. I had never seen so many stars in my life. Especially having traveled from Osaka where the city lights are so bright you hardly ever get to see stars.

Yakushima is really a beautiful place. If you’ve been in Japan for a while and are looking for a new adventure, grab some friends and plan a trip to Yakushima! Highly recommended.

- Harvey

Tags: japan, Travel, yakushima