This Wednesday I'll be heading off to Tokyo for five days, but I figure before I do that I should post about a little trip I had to Kobe a few weeks ago and maybe get this blog back into gear again.
It was a fantastic Spring day, so I took the opportunity to get a few snaps of the Cherry Blossom trees in bloom.
I'd been meaning to visit Kobe for ages but had never gotten around to it. So on what turned out to be an absolutely stunning weekend I headed out there to find out what Kobe has to offer. I arrived shortly after midday and immediately made in the direction of the Shin Kobe Cable Car that runs up the mountain behind the train station. My plan was to purchase a one way ticket up the mountain and then walk back down to the station. An easy thirty minute walk according to Lonely Planet. That was the plan anyway.
The view going up in the cable car was impressive if a bit smoggy at times, that didn't stop me taking a ridiculous amount of pictures though.
After arriving at the top I was faced with two choices. Pay 200 yen and walk down through the Nuno-biki Herb Garden or take the free hiking trail instead. Now I'd seen this herb garden from the cable car and it did look rather nice it was a bit tame. Paved walkways, manicured gardens, wheelchair access, souvenir shops, etc. It was a bit of a tourist trap.
"No" I thought. I am a man, a man of action a man of adventure and definitely not the sort of man who goes traipsing through herb gardens! Besides, knowing Japan "hiking trail" probably just means a slightly narrower paved path that gently winds down the mountain. Right?
Wrong. Hiking trails here are exactly the same as back home. Very narrow dirt tracks with bits of wodod stretched across them at odd intervals to give the impression of stairs or just to give you something to trip over. But I wasn't worried, I was walking down hill. The path, while steep, was easy to follow and I'd be back down at the station in no time.
Then I cam across the awesome bridge. I really wish I had bothered to take a photo of this bridge (I took soooo many others). It was the sort of bridge that makes you want to know whats on the other side. Crossing it would mean taking a detour from the trail back to the station, but I figured it could only be about 10 or 20 minutes extra so I dashed across it see where its path lead.
Shortly after crossing the bridge the path started winding back up mountain. No worries I thought, it's probably just leading to some awesome look out point just a bit further on. The path kept getting steeper and steeper and I kept heading further and further up the mountain. It was tough going. After a while I started passing small sign posts reminding me that in case of heart attack Japan's emergency number is 119. Despite feeling like I may have gotten in over my head I kept on going regardless, convinced there had to be something at the end of this trail.
A sign your casual stroll might not be so casual anymore...
Half an hour later I found out I was now following a different, not so well maintained and more difficult trail back to the station. One that connected up with some of the more serious hiking trails that covered the mountain. Well at least I'd get back to civilisation, it just wasn't going to be the cakewalk I'd expected.
It may have been tough going, but it was a great walk. There is something quite odd about wandering through moutain forest but still being able to see the outlines of 60 odd storey skyscrapers peaking out from behind the trees every so often.
I got back to civilisation sometime before 4pm. This adventure taking somewhat longer than I had originaly intended I had just enough time to grab a coffee and something to eat and then go for a quick wander through Kobe's "Foreign Town". Which isn't particularly interesting if you're foreigner (it's like a European version of Chinatown). Then it was back on the train and back to Osaka.
