Continuing on from yesterday's post...

On the second and final day of our trip we woke up and ate a light breakfast followed by some udon and soba at a nice little restaurant on the way to the Kirifuri Highlands 霧降高原.

We were originally planning on hiking up to the observation deck around 880 meters up the mountain, but it proved to be a little farther than we thought it would be an had to stop at around 650 meters as there was a massive staircase to reach the observation deck and not everyone in the group was up for the challenge lol.
Not having the proper gear didn't help much either.
Most people had on snow shoes and they could easily trek through the snow but wearing just boots or tennis shoes we were a bit under-equipped and decided it'd be better not to overdo it.
We got to see some really amazing views and talk to an 85-year-old man who told us what gear we should buy if we're planning on hiking in the snow, about how the dam located on the mountains across from us rises and falls during the day/night, and how this was his ~60th time climbing the mountain but the woman he came with has done it more than 300 times.
She had to turn back early that day, but those are some impressive numbers!

After enjoying the outdoors we headed over to Nikko Edomura/Edo Wonderland 日光江戸村 and had a blast exploring the theme park.
We arrived at about 2pm so we got a nice discount on our all-day passes.

Walking around we got to see all of the different buildings that gave the theme park its Edo-Period-feel.
We also got to see the oiran procession 花魁道中 which was really awesome as well.

It seemed like they tried to make it as accurate as possible too.
The way the courtesan walked was in the traditional figure eight style which, from what I've read, is not easily done, so I assume that this is a sort of special type of profession as she was doing it to my untrained eye perfectly.
One funny thing was that the girls in red in front of the courtesan had to slouch somewhat because they were too tall and the theme park obviously can't employ children to play the role like they would have traditionally.

We also got some temporary "tattoos."
They got some cute Nyan-mage tattoos and I got a Shinsengumi tattoo lol.

After that we watched a really awesome performance inside of the ninja theater, but we weren't allowed to film or take photos so I don't have anything to post unfortunately.
It was really cool seeing the ninja actors jumping off of rooves and fighting though.

On top of that we also tried out the ninja maze where I was unfortunately the last one to make it out as I got unlucky and hit a dead end at the last part of the maze.
This was a really fun experience as there were a lot of hidden and revolving doors that you had to find to escape the maze.

We also did the shuriken experience and I managed to get 3/5 but I gave one of my shuriken to my girlfriend in the hopes that she would stick one in the target but unfortunately she wasn't able to lol.
I guess I was technically 3/4 because of that.

Overall the whole trip was a blast and we got to make some awesome memories out in Tochigi.
I definitely recommend it as a travel destination!

福岡県北九州市にある恵比寿神社でのお宮参りの様子です。
赤ちゃんの健やかな成長を願い、生後一ヶ月頃に御参りします。
その後も、七五三や成人等、人生の節目に御参りする人が多いです。お宮参りは、その1番初めにあたるもの、神様への初お目見えです。
見守ってくれる神様がいると思うと、何だか心強いですね。

初めて上まで登れた金比羅山!!
めっちゃ筋肉痛で痛いけど
登れて良かったなー😁
リベンジ成功✌️😆

岡山県の美観地区をお散歩しに😆
昔の事は全然分からへんけど
歩くだけでワクワクする
何回行っても大好きな場所☺️
美味しー物食べて飲んで幸せしかない♡

鬼踊り 節分 廬山寺

福井市の一乗谷朝倉氏遺跡の城下町を再現した「復原町並」内に、色鮮やかな和傘20本と風鈴300個で彩られた とっても可愛い場所でした。
風が吹くと風鈴の音色が 心地良く 夏空と風鈴の音色と和傘の彩りに 暑さも忘れて 来場した人達は 楽しそうに夢中で撮影されてました。

Decided to donate some clothes I wasn't wearing anymore over the weekend so I decided to go to the Second Street in Minami-Senju.

Managed to find some cool stuff along the way.
I was walking from Minowabashi and saw this nice looking temple, apparently called Koshunin 公春院.
It was a really lovely spot and I would have liked to take more photos but I had some luggage with me and also wanted to avoid taking any photos of the tombstones as I thought it might be rude.
It seems the temple focus on memorial services though and looked like a nice place.

The next spot I came across was just a really small shrine that seemed so randomly placed that I wanted to take a picture of it.
There wasn't much space inside the shrine are so it was quite difficult to get a decent photo, but I did the best that I could and tried to take a photo from the side street next to it which was also incredibly narrow lol.

The last thing I ended up finding was a statue of Matsuo Basho!
I'd not been to Minami-Senju as I've never really had a reason to go there, but I saw the statue from the corner of my eye and thought "Hmm I wonder if that's Basho" and sure enough it was.
It even has "The Narrow Road to the Deep North" 奥の細道 written below it.
Also, apparently there is debate about which "Senju" he started at Adachi or Arakawa, so this is one of the statues depicting the place where he started his journey!

It ended up being a pretty interesting walk.
I'd like to visit the area again as there was a ton of cool stuff.

”炎舞の始まり”
鬼すべ
日本三大火祭りのひとつ。寛和2年986年に菅原道真公のひ孫の菅原輔正によって始められたそうです。
災難消除・火除けの神事で災い事の 象徴である鬼を退治するというもので、
毎年多くの参拝者が、燃え上がる巨大な炎に一年間の幸せを祈るお祭りです。

岐阜県本巣市で行われる 『馬かけ祭り』
毎年8月1・2日に行われる長屋神社の例祭である。神社創建時の頃から行われるという。岐阜県の重要無形民俗文化財に指定されている。

稚児の舞、山車が曳かれる。祭りの最後には、羽織袴を重ね着した乗り子が馬に乗り、花傘や扇子を開いて境内を回駆け回る、馬引き神事が行われる。重ね着した羽織は徐々に脱いでいき、花吹雪を撒き散らす。

コロナ禍で2年間中止ですが地元の高校生が走る姿は勇ましく映ります。

日本の行事 成田山新勝寺

【春、満開】
日本の春の行事と言えば、、なんと言ってもお花見！！福島県二本松市にある安達ケ原ふるさと村では、満開の桜と五重塔が作り出す絶景を楽しむことができます！

Managed to stop by Ueno Zoo the other day for a little bit and while I didn't get to see much of the animals because we were short on time, we did get to see a few of the attractions around the park.

The first one is "Sala Thai" a gift from the Thai Government to mark the 120th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Thailand and Japan, as written on the plaque.

The second one is the five-story pagoda of the former Kanei-ji Temple.
The pagoda was built in 1631 and rebuilt in 1639.

Besides that are just some photos of the scenery around the park, and you can see some of the autumn colors on the trees and even in Shinobazu Pond.

We also managed to get some tasty lunch.
This looks like steak but it was actually like a pork-steak cutlet type of thing. It tasted great though.

Hopefully I'll have some more time to actually see the animals next time I go lol
It's was registered as an Important Cultural Property in 1911.

『大阪市北区』
季節が移りゆく自然な日本の風景。

『冬景色 大阪市北区』
季節が移りゆく自然な日本の情景。

岡山県の吉備津神社の誰もいないこの道は吸い込まれそうな程
不思議な感覚に陥るのは何故だろう🤔
ゆっくり歩いてる人、ジョギングしてる人、ウォーキングしてる人
色々おるけどみんな気持ち軽そうに見えた😆
神聖な道なんだろなー😊

The last of the photos that I took at Asukayama Park.

The first one was a nice statue of Shibusawa Eiichi and the second and third were taken at a shrine inside the park.
I had to do a little bit of research to learn more about the shrine, but I was already quite sure it was an Inari Shrine because of the fox statues, but apparently it's called I believe Kabuto Inari Shrine Ruins 兜稲荷社跡, although I could be wrong about the reading for the first kanji.

I liked that the shrine had a really small wooden shrine of what I believe was what the original shrine actually looked like, and the stone lanterns were aesthetically pleasing as well. I foolishly forgot to take a picture of the torii gate unfortunately...

The last two photos are the statue of Shibusawa Eichi which took us forever to find lol and the plaque below it. I can only make out a few characters that are written on the plaque but there's another plaque on the back of the pedestal which I forgot to take a picture of, so if you're visiting the park be sure to look at that if you're struggling to read it as well lol.

Some more photos from Asukayama Park!

The first monument is a bit difficult for me to read so I had to do a bit of research, but it seems to be a commemorative monument signifying the planting of various trees throughout the park to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the Meiji Restoration, and as such, was constructed in 1968, so it's about 50 years old, probably one of the newer monuments of its kind within the park.

When I was walking back around the area I saw the dance stage from a different angle and managed to take a photo of the participants through a nice gap in the trees. There were a lot more participants this time so I stopped and watched it for a little while again.

At the other end of the park I found this statue of a woman which is actually a statue of the "Goddess of peace" and it was erected in 1974 to wish for world peace and happiness.
Even cooler, it was erected by the famous sculptor Seibo Kitamura who erected the "Peace Statue" at Peace Memorial Park in Nagasaki.
Really cool to see his works all the way in Tokyo as well!

Some more photos I took at Asukayama Park the other day. I really liked this statue of Avalokitesvara, as I felt like it was really well crafted. I included the description to this monument as it's hard to read what is carved onto the stone and it's written in older Japanese too so my friends couldn't even read it lol.

I think it has something to do with a poem about cherry blossoms although I could be wrong about that.

It's pretty cool seeing the older Japanese from hundreds of years ago though. Even if I can't read it it's interesting to see how the Japanese language itself has evolved throughout the years. I'll be posting more photos of this place tomorrow as well!

Went to Asukayama Park near Oji Station yesterday. I've passed by the area many times and seen the gondola leading to the top but never knew what was up there until now. It's a really big park dedicated to Shibusawa Eiichi, known as the father of capitalism in Japan.

The park has a bunch of monuments and cultural properties to check out so I managed to take a lot of photos and I'll be uploading them over the next few days. I chose a good day to go it seems too, as there was an event going on. It involved some traditional dances I think from the Oji area, and it involved some sort of sash that kind of reminded me of a kimono obi, but I'm not sure exactly what it is. They had a taiko drum as well but it seems I didn't make it in time to watch them playing, I only heard it in the distance when I was walking to the park.

I thought it was really cool seeing all the different monuments though. Many of them were several hundred years old and the Japanese on them was also and older form, so it was hard for me to read a lot of them lol. It was a really enjoyable experience though, so I'll upload some more photos tomorrow!

『大阪市北区』
夏が終わり蝉が死に、季節が移りゆく自然な日本の情景。

小田原城の天守閣から見た、秋晴れの空。
鳳凰が空を飛んでいる様な雲の流れがとても美しい。

Another photo from Kumagaya. This is a big map outside of Kumagaya Station's North Exit, depicting, from what I understand, Kumagaya and the surrounding area in 1936. It's a bit difficult to see, but if you zoom in you can see Kumagaya on the left side with Tokyo in the upper left behind it, and to the right of Kumagaya you can see Kami-Kumagaya, from there, if you look to the bottom-right you'll see Kumagaya City Hall and furthest to the right is Ishiwara. Underneath Ishiwara you can also see several schools elementary, middle, high school and a hospital.

It's quite difficult to see in this photo, but the mountain at the far back right is Mt. Asama, and you can see Nagatoro as well. On top of that, there's the Arakawa River running through the background of the entire map and a bridge connecting to Onuma Park as well.

There's tons of stuff to see in just this one map, I love looking at old maps and historic things like this. I could stare at it for hours and still find new and interesting things.

渡月橋

里山とからぶき屋根

葛城一言主神社にて。

コスモスとお寺の塔

Some photos I took during my visit to the Edo-Tokyo Museum. I really enjoyed seeing the recreations of the Edo cityscape and seeing what the city would have looked like back in the day. I like that you can also get a feel for what life was like at that time and you can even see people doing various jobs or holding tools related to them. I enjoyed seeing the boats as well, as it showed how shipping would been carried out at the time, and you also get to see the architecture of the ships, which was really awesome in my honest opinion. I also tried getting a decent photo of Tokugawa Ieyasu but I was really short on time when visiting as the museum was about to close, so I definitely need to go back there again. I wanted to see some of the other exhibits as well, stuff like the Great Kanto Earthquake exhibits, etc. so I have an excuse to visit again lol.

お寺の紅葉と塔のライトアップ

お寺の紅葉のライトアップ