To tour western Honshu, we got a room in a Ryokan right at the train station
in Okayama. Normally tourists don't spend much time there, so the place
was cheap, and just a short walk from the Shinkansen. With our rail pass,
we were able to use it as a base to explore the area. 22 minutes to
Hameji and the castle. 45 minutes to Hiroshima. 10 minutes to Kurashiki.
An hour to Kyoto if we hadn't already been there. Well worth it to avoid
packing and repacking.
In addition, the Okamisan (matron) of the Ryokan was happy to guide us
to restaurants, walking us all the way there in spite of our insisting
we just needed it pointed out on the map. We had the local Sushi and it
was just delicious. Even the cheap late night restaurant, while not
stellar, was quite decent for 11pm.
Okayama also has one of the "three great" gardens of Japan, and in this
case they actually list the three so it's not an idiom.
(I've decided to list the three great sets of three of Japan, which are
of course the three most scenic places, the three finest gardens, and
the set of the great sets of three itself.)
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A painter paints one of the old houses on the canal in Kurashiki
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A solo red tree in Kraku-en Garden, Okayama
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The view of Himeji Castle, judged the best still-original castle in Japan
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Another view of Himeji. This one you can climb inside. A woman at the gate offered free tours in English. We met up with some other people from San Francisco who do Thanksgiving Tourism (it's cheap) and took the tour.
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From the top of Himeji Castle, you can see the Shaci-gawara fish which, they claim, would hopefully spout water in a fire. Somehow I doubt they really thought that, but they look cool.
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Kurashiki's main tourist attraction is not the old downtown, but its Denmark-Land. The Japanese love theme parks that recreate foreign places. I didn't get to the one that has the Canadian village
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Along the canal in Kurashiki
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More of the canal in Kurashiki
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A pretty canal, though that's about all. The rest is souvenir shops.
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Koi in the canal
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It looks like an impossibly thin building in Okayama, but it's really triangular.
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Okayama castle (the black castle, to contrast white Himeji) from Koraku-en garden
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Another view of the castle from the garden
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Pretty trees in the autumn garden
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Workers rake the ponds in the garden
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Bamboo forest in Koraku-en
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A pond with bridge and fields of plants in Koraku-en
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