Takao-san & Yakuoin Temple

Another trip to Tokyo, and this time the weather co-operated. For the last few weekends I have been looking forward to photographing fall colours, but every time I ventured out there wasn’t much to come back home with — just some shots with a hint of scattered browns and yellows — not the torrent of blazing red like I keep seeing in all the travel posters in the train stations around Osaka.

Taken last year

Despite the allure of cosmopolitan Tokyo, I kept to my custom of seeking nature on the weekends and asked the smiling clerk at the Haneda airport tourist office for good places for nature hikes around Tokyo. This would actually be a first for me: avoid the Tokyo magnet and head for the hills.

After a few suggestions I decided on Takao-san, a 600-metre high mountain about an hour west of Shibuya on the Keio line. Takao-san is well known for the diversity of plants one can see on its well maintained hiking courses. (There are six courses, each with a different theme). Again, the blazing reds would escape me. Another few weeks, I guess. By then the trees would be bare and under twenty centimetres of snow in my home country but Japan –and it’s FOUR seasons– is different. Wait more I must.

Takao-san chair lift

It was another pleasant hike. Or –to be honest– it would have been, had it not been for the chair lift. R had on her high heels so a climb was out of the question but I wasn’t about to complain about missing a climb — we both had been up before dawn to get the early flight to Tokyo and would have to be active until late at night with an engagement in Odaiba. I managed to get a few shots during the 12-minute ride halfway up the mountain, but that was a real challenge, with a bag of sweetened roasted chestnuts fighting for my attention the whole way up. Gosh, amaguri is delicious!

Surrounding hills

At the end of the ride, after a few minutes walk, we were rewarded with a spectacular view of the smog that engulfs distant Tokyo. Following the path and mingling with many other day-trippers, we came across Yakuoin Temple, a Shinto-Buddhist site built in 744 by Emperor Shomu. It is noted for its connection with Tengu, a winged, long-nosed deity with special powers who resides in mountains. A number of statues of the mythical being can be seen here, since Takao-san was considered a sacred mountain and thus a centre for mountain worship.

Tengu statue

Yakuoin temple is the main attraction of Takao-san. There is also a monkey zoo, and many interesting trees along the paved paths. Takao-san is also home to a kind of flying squirrel, but I didn’t spot any. The views are supposed to be noteworthy, but on this day we could only see smog creeping over the nearby hills. We didn’t make it to the mountain peak because we ran out of time. I found this temple somehow different to others I had visited, and I lingered around to take some pictures:

More information on Takao-san can be found here (Japan National Tourist Office).

More like "Hopeless"

Now just what would a smoker be hoping for…? Lung cancer later rather than sooner…?

 

Fantasy on Maishima Island

It is surprising how few Osakans know of Maishima. Admittedly I didn’t know about it either until recently –even after having lived here for seven years. But it is a real gem, as I discovered on the weekend. Maishima is one of a few artificial islands lying to the west of the mainland, in the Osaka Bay Area. (On the other, better-known islands can be found Tempozan Harbour Village and The World Trade Center). Although Maishima is huge, there are no subway or train lines providing service there. Instead, it is accessible by bus from either Osaka, Nishikujo or Sakurajima stations. I say it is a gem because there are few other places in Osaka where you can plop down on a patch of grass and have a nice picnic or afternoon nap without the din of traffic or other urban nuisances nearby. And –to my knowledge– there is no other patch of grass with a seaside view.

The northern edge of the island is grassland, bordered by a few trees on one side and cement pylons on the other, half submerged in the water. No pretensions here, just grass. That’s all I need. I sat down and took in the view of the mouth of Yodogawa River, dotted with a dozen or so small sailing dinghies from a nearby sailing school. Every now and then one of the sailboats would flop sideways into the water and the unlucky student, after an unscheduled swim, would have to cling to the keel before the instructor raced over in his motorboat to help set the vessel upright.

Close by there is Hokko Yacht Harbour, with a surprising number of tall, luxurious yachts moored there. Next to the harbour there is a gleaming white suspension bridge connecting Maishima to Konohana-ku in Osaka proper, and next to the bridge, just on the edge of Maishima, a pair of buildings that can’t fail to catch your eye. They proved to be the main attraction of this island for me. The colourful buildings, crowned with huge golden orbs and covered with nonsensical windows and curved red or yellow stripes, seem completely out of place, like a gigantic LEGO building or a set piece from a children’s fantasy movie.

They are the Osaka City incineration and water treatment plants, designed by celebrated Austrian architect Friedensreich Hundertwasser, and built around the time Osaka was bidding for the 2008 Olympic games during a frenzy of government spending in an effort to boost its image as an international, forward-looking city. I guess that meant making an otherwise unpleasant, unwanted utilitarian site into a playful, spirited and fantastical hulk of architecture. It succeeded, at least from this photographer’s point-of-view. Rarely have I found a public building so interesting to look at.

At a cost of around 61 billion yen it infuriated most taxpayers, and also failed to help nab the Olympics. But it is a feather in Osaka’s hat, a point of creative frivolity for an otherwise ho-hum city. That’s proven by the constant attention it receives from out-of-town visitors, especially those interested in architecture. It is also acclaimed for its ambitious attempt at balancing efficient waste treatment with environmental conservation.

I am still puzzled as to why I didn’t know about it until recently, but maybe that’s because there is no real attempt to promote it to the general public. Perhaps the city government is still smarting from the scandal it generated years ago when it first opened. (Some consider it just another white elephant in a city where other pressing urban issues have been ignored.) Ironically, that was shortly before Universal Studios Japan opened, and passing motorists on the nearby highway 5 often mistook it for the colossal theme park on the mainland to the east. See a map of the Osaka Bay Area.

Well, I was more inclined to walk around these buildings than go to USJ. What a visual treat. Tours of the buildings’ interiors are available too. Bring your camera.

Maishima Island deserves more attention for a weekend getaway. There are stadiums, sports fields, small parks, a seaside promenade, a pottery village, rental lodges and camping sites. No shopping malls. Yet.

For more information on the Maishima plants, see Laura the Explora’s write-up for Kansai Scene magazine and the Maishima Incineration Plant home page.

For more information on the Osaka Bay Side Area visit the Osaka Visitor’s Guide.