Just off the coast of Takehara, there’s a small island in the Seto Inland Sea.
The island is called Okunoshima.
The 15-minute ferry ride from Tadanoumi Port is a beautiful journey, especially on a sunny day, when the inland Sea is at its beautiful, sparkling, beguiling best, with the islands hazy in the morning sun.
Stepping off the ferry, the island feels peaceful, and deeply relaxing.
(more…)Some of the ‘shinkaisoku’ special rapid services between Himeji (Aboshi) and the Osaka/Kyoto area have ‘A-seat’ carriages. The seats in this carriage recline and have tables. The atmosphere is more like a long-distance express train than a commuter service. The seats have to be reserved (a flat fee of 840 yen), though, and can’t be bought on the train. The A-seat carriage is normally carriage 9 (it’s a different colour to the other carriages).
If you don’t have a reserved seat, avoid this carriage: the conductors are quite aggressive about making sure nobody uses the carriage without a reservation!
The lines in the north of Okayama and Hiroshima Prefectures are very local, but wonderful for precisely this reason. I take trips on the Geibi Line, which links Hiroshima and Niimi, in the north of Okayama Prefecture, often, but I don’t get the chance to travel along the Kishin Line, the line east from Niimi to Himeji, so often.
So, today I decided to take a trip along that line, albeit from Tsuyama (not Himeji) to Niimi.
(more…)If you take the Nankai Koya Line, on the long climb from Hashimoto toward Mount Koya, most passengers are focused on the destination, or on the wonderful views from the train windows.
Few people notice the small stations that slip quietly past the window. One of these stations is Kii-Kamiya Station, just one stop from the end of the line at Gokurakubashi. To be honest, if you blinked, you’d miss it.
(more…)Trains are a great way to see the scenery of Japan, but they can quite often be busy and crowded, especially in urban areas. Bear in mind these guidelines to make travelling by train as stress-free as possible, both for you and your fellow passengers.
Many of the guidelines for travelling by local train are the same as for travelling by Shinkansen, but there are a few differences. Anyway, here are some rules or guidelines you should be aware of.
(more…)I used to love Tonomi Station because it was old, a little bit ramshackle, but it was how it had always been, and it was wonderful. But a few years ago, the station building was completely rebuilt. It’s very bright and airy, and really it is a much nicer building, but it’s much simpler and it lacks the rundown, old-fashioned charm of the original station building.
And then on platform three (which is actually the only other platform) there used to be a big wooden shelter, almost as big as a barn in a way, with seats inside it, but now that’s gone completely, and all that’s left is just three rows of seats out in the open on the platform, which is fair enough, but if it’s raining, you can’t use them at all. At least on platform one, there is the station building which provides shelter. It’s progress in one way, I suppose, but, in another way, very much not so. Sometimes with the JR Sanyo Line west of Iwakuni, I get the feeling that for the lesser stations, it really is a case of managed decline. I very much hope that I’m wrong.
For a few years now, JR West seems to have been into ‘character’ Shinkansen: Shinkansen trains in a livery that evokes the character in question.
The first of these was the Evangelion 500-series Shinkansen (still the best, in my opinion), and then came the Hello Kitty Shinkansen (which is great if you like kawaii).
And now there’s a third ‘character’ Shinkansen: the ONE PIECE train. Actually, there are going to be three of these ONE PIECE Shinkansen, unveiled roughly one month apart. Only the first train, in the ‘Setouchi Blue’ livery, is running yet. The remaining two trains are due to be unveiled in May and June respectively.
The Setouchi Blue train makes one round trip between Hakata and Shin-Osaka a day (at present), and it’s quite striking. If you’re waiting for a Shinkansen somewhere between Hakata and Shin-Osaka, keep an eye out for this train!
If you’re in Hiroshima and looking for somewhere very scenic, and very off the beaten track, then the journey between Miinohara and Izumo-Sakane on the JR Kisuki Line is a wonderful journey with some spectacular views. It’s a long journey from Hiroshima, more because of the slowness of the trains than because of the distance, but a day trip is possible- and well worth it.
Miyajima is famous for its great shrine gate (otorii) at Itsukushima Shrine, but did you know that there’s actually a second one on the island? It’s the otorii for Nagahama Shrine.
When you leave the ferry port in Miyajima, just turn left instead of right, follow the road, and it’s just a five-minute walk.
Koborebanashi 