Sunday's trip was to Kazusakameyama, a small village lost in the middle of rice paddies and bamboo forests, at the end of a little old narrow-gauge railroad line. And I have become a total fan of that place. This is why....The biggest negative point is that it's a bit in the boonies. It takes about 4H from Oppama station, 5 if you happen to miss the little train that runs only once an hour. And it only runs once an hour because most of the way there is only 1 track and so the trains can only pass at 2 stations.
There are however sooooo many positive points that the travel time just dwindles into nothing. It's like griping about the time it takes to get to paradise.
According to wikipedia Chiba prefecture is the peanut heart of Japan. Well I would just like to say that I did not see anything that might even closely resemble a field of peanut bushes.
What I did see was real japanese countryside: small wooden houses in clumps amongst the rice paddies, wading birds galore (some wonderful white herons and small ginger pheasants), all the little connecting roads and paths between the paddies, and the rounded hills surrounding the valley with lush bamboo forests, agremented with cherry trees in blossom and japanese ceders, with now and then a steep canyon carved by a river, with the bamboo forests kind of waterfalling down into them. And down the middle of the valley goes clickety-clacking the little 2 car narrow-gauge diesel train.
When I arrived at the station where I was to catch this adorable little train I found that I had nearly an hour's wait before the next train. Well that was no problem, except that I was stuck in a, frankly, quite ugly port town on Tokyo bay. There is absolutely nothing positive to say about that town, which will remain unnamed for it's own good.
So an hour later I arrived back at the train station, a bit discouraged, and there! THE TRAIN! I knew right then and there that I was into something good. There was the little train puffing to itself, and there was a whole throng of japanese folk taking photos of it. And the whole way along the track there were folks with tripods set up along the roads and bridges, waiting for the train to go by so they could get photos. Now it's a cute little train, but not really spectacular. It's not really that old-fashionned, although the "air-conditionning" system is a bit rustique. But the japanese really have a train-freak side. On week-end TV they have train-spotting info, on which places are best every week, depending on what flowers are in bloom etc...
The train trip lasts an hour but it seems like 15 minutes.
At the end of the line is Kazusakameyama, and as I got off the train I was greated by the near deffening sound of frogs. It's a small village, with only about 100 houses, suoounded on one side by rice paddies, on one side by a dammed up lake, and on one side by forested hills. The perfect paradise.
The frogs it turns out inhabit the rice paddies. It seems dumb, but I had never thought of frogs in rice paddies. I have never actually thought much about rice paddies anyway, but what thoughts I did have did not include frogs. From now on they will, although, and this is very vexing, I did not once set eyes on any frog. I was so close to one that the sound hurt my ears but I could not see him! When I go back to that wonderful valley I will go prepared for a frog hunt!
One you have seen the rice paddies and been deafened by the frogs you realise there isn't much more to do with rice paddies. So off to the lake I went. One thing you don't realise from looking at pictures on goole maps is that the lake is about 200m below the rice paddy level. 200m straight down. Which makes picnicking on the side of the lake a bit difficult. I did finally find a small bamboo outcrop a bit flatter than the rest and had a nice lunch looking at all people fishing. The lake seems to be THE place to go fishing on a sunny Sunday, and frankly I can see why (I actually COULD see why as the fish were quite visible from up on the bridge). And these were not sport fishermen with style or anything. These were folks out for an afternoon in the fresh air, and were happy just to get the lure in the water. As you can see from the next photo and with a close-up of the overhead wires (just above the clump of darker trees, slightly left of center), we have enthusiasm=100%, actual technique = close to 0%. But it's the fun that matters, and there was a lot of that.
Along one bank of the lake runs a small road no trafic on it. The sides of the road are full of wonderful irisis, picher plants and ferns, and of course bamboo. And also along the side of the road are monkeys! I saw a couple in the forest, and then the male went out onto the bridge to cross the the other side. It was really great to see them just wandering around in the forest, free. That made an already wonderful trip simply fantastic. After staring for 10 minutes at the male monkey sunbathing on a tree branch I managed to tear myself away. I still had the forest side to investigate before I went home.
The forest path was somewhat muddy, but thanks to that I now know there is a quite large deer family inhabiting the forest. Of course due to the mud the forest was filled with the sounds of thousands of totally invisible frogs, accompnied by a few invisible bird melodies. As a consolation prize, I did see some nice big gurking toads, and some turtles (thankfully silent). All too early I had to leave the forest to head back to the train station. With only one train an hour, you can quickly arrive home very late if you miss it...
So regretfully I left this wonderfully forgotten corner of paradise. But I promised to go back, and I surely will.
