The island of Kyushu

Our dear host Mie really outdid herself this time as our tour guide and event planner for our field trip to the island of Kyushu, the 3rd largest island to the south-west of Tokyo. We flew a little over an hour to the capital of Kumamoto, rented a car and drove to Shimabara to visit the Mt. Unzen Disaster Memorial Hall. (This excursion was mainly a work-related one for Miles and Mie to study volcanic activity.)

Viewing debris-under-glass from a pyroclastic blast

This is an excellent, modern, interactive educational center dedicated to Mt.Fugen, the dominant peak of Unzen National Park which began its volcanic activity for the first time in 198 years, from 1990-1996. Repeat pyroclastic flows (a large mass of heated volcanic gases, ashes, pumice stones and lava that falls down the side of a mountain at a high speed, destroying extensive areas) resulted from the growth of the lava dome, destroyed many houses and fields and killed 44 people. We needed to learn a lot because we were going to climb this volcano the following day!

Mt. Fugen--our destination for the next day

And off we went, early the next morning, first hiking an hour up, up, up to a shrine (what else?) and then walked an hour through brush, finally reaching the base of the volcano.

At the marker/shrine before the "big climb"

We donned hard hats and thick gloves because we were going to climb over huge boulders...and I mean HUGE...that were thrown here and there by the blasts. Did I mention Mie needed to get special permission from the research institute for us to climb? This is a off-limits area to the casual climber and we were lucky to be allowed in. Lucky or stupid? Hmmm...I'll let you decide.

Do we look like we know what we're doing?

We passed many fumaroles (clouds of hot, sulfur vapor escaping from the rocks) and climbed, using skills I didn't know I possessed, to jump from rock to rock, lifting myself, being careful not to twist an ankle or cause a rock slide due to unforeseen instability of the rock pile, climbing higher and higher, all alone, totally desolate, no trees up here. Get the picture?

On the way up...

And up, up, up...following the trail marker...

View on the way up...

The sky would fill with clouds and we couldn't see where we were going, so we sat, ate a snack, waited a while and miraculously, the clouds would pass and we could see the amazing view (and more importantly, where we were going).

All fogged in---Mie checking the GPS


Walking around...

We made it! Miles at the peak

Returning took just as long and I had to be vigilant about where I placed my feet. My mantra was "concentrate, concentrate" because one wrong step and either I'd twist an ankle, slip on unstable rocks or smash into a boulder. This was not a trip for the faint of heart. Or those with fear of heights.

Pure concentration

But we returned safe and sound and relished our victory ice cream.

To relax even more, we went to yet another onsen (hot thermal pool) at our hotel. Our room had a separate Japanese-style living room with tatami mats looking out over a garden.

View from our room

Our hotel room, wearing our yukata robes

Soaking in hot water never felt so good! And then we wore our yukata (Japanese robe) to dinner in the hotel--delicious fish tempura, duck and eggplant, miso soup, delectable small dishes of pickled vegetables, topped off with a bottle of some distilled alcohol that Mie ordered. I don't know what it was, but it sure made me forget my tired muscles!

Shrimp, squid, fish, pickled vegetables...and rocks!

Lots of thermal activity near the hotel

Day 2: Luckily, this was a non-hiking day. My bod needed to rest. We visited sites that were affected by the blasts: a school completely gutted and houses buried by the debris. We also saw many dams and slews (civil engineering projects) built to help direct the mud and debris away from populated areas in the event this kind of blast would occur again. And it will, but nobody knows when. The research for eruption prediction continues.

Destroyed school
=

Buried house

We then visited Nagasaki, the site of the 2nd atomic bomb. The peace park in Nagasaki has many thought-provoking memorials/statues and a real sense of the hope for peace.

Main statue in Nagasaki Peace Park

Explanation of the statue's symbolism

Fountain in the shape of dove wings

The museum is smaller than the one in Hiroshima and perhaps had more graphic pictures of the human devastation. It was really strange to witness 2 kinds of devastation in one day: one natural (Mt. Fugen's volcanic erruption) and man-made (Nagasaki).

Our stay that night in the Aso volcanic caldera was a real treat. We drove up, up, up into the mountains and ended up at a ryokan (Japanese-style inn/hotel) that was 120 years old. This was a half-timbered lodge with tatami-mat rooms, bathrooms down the hall and an onsen (of course!) Dinner was a special experience: in a huge wooden dining room we sat at a low table with a grill in the middle of the table. To my delight, there was a "canal" of water running by the tables that would have floating pine-bough trays passing by holding skewers of various meats, fish and vegetables that we cooked on our grill. Dinner was completed with dessert and tea brought to our rooms. I was so charmed and delighted! I liked this.

Here comes the tray down the canal

Grilling our food...Kampai!

Next morning a buffet breakfast was in the same room and we toasted bread and cooked our eggs right on the grill at our table. Like camping, only a lot easier.

We then visited the Aso Volcanic Research Center located at a corner of one of the largest calderas in the world created about 90,000 years ago. We're talking 18 kilometers by 25 kilometers. The "valley" is full of homes, cities, farms and is surrounded by peaks of various sizes formed by eruptions, some as recent as 20 years ago. Of course we HAD to visit Mt. Naka which is only one part of this entire area. This one is really different than Mt. Fugen because the main feature here is a crater filled will boiling water (which comes from underground) and lots and lots of rising sulfuric vapor. The water is bright green due to the iron in the soil. There were also some fumaroles on the side of the crater that emitted plumes of smoke and were LOUD like jet engines.

Yudamari Lake in Nakadake Crater

Mie once again left no stone unturned. She got special permission to allow us to enter the "restricted" area. Not only did we have hard hats, but we also used gas masks because the vapors are toxic and if the wind is blowing the wrong way...In fact, just as we were getting started, an alarm went off, the security rounded up all the visitors (a few hundred) and sent them packing. We stayed, of course. We had permission. And gas masks, so what was the problem? I wasn't the least bit worried. We walked all along the edge of the crater (keeping a safe distance, don't worry--I'm not THAT stupid). What an experience.

All alone in the restricted area

Along the edge--click on this picture and you can really see the scale of this thing

We then visited the Aso Volcano Museum, visited with the curators (friends of Mie's) and drove to the airport and returned to Tokyo late Thur. night. Wow. What a trip!

A contact at the Aso Research Center told us to watch the BBC docu-drama called "Super Volcanoes". We watched it last night on the Internet and not only was it excellent, but we really understood it having just visited these sites and talked to so many experts. Just go to You Tube and type in "Super volcanoes bbc" and you can watch all the episodes in 10-minute increments. Now we understand that Yellowstone National Park is just like what we saw: a HUGE caldera with an amazing amount of thermal activity. Walking along the thermal basin there is literally walking in a volcano. Amazing!