Planetarium in Niihama

After the stop at the castle, we continued on to the planetarium and museum. This planetarium held the top spot as the largest in the world until March, 2011 when the new planetarium in Nagoya was completed. The planetarium in Niihama is 30 meters (90 feet) diameter and can seat 300 people. The one in Nagoya is 35 meters (115 feet) diameter and can seat 350 people.

Entrance to the planetarium and museum

Once inside you have to go down some stairs and walk a path underneath the water (seen in the picture below). They have plexiglass so you can look up through the water, which gave a nice effect while viewing the building.

What self-respecting planetarium director in Japan would start a program without first showing Hello Kitty pictures? This planetarium has the ability to project 25,000 stars at once.

At the bottom of the stairs that leads to the dome, there is a representation of the relative distances of the orbits of some of the planets in our solar system.

Space suits

A chunk of iron that arrived as a meteor.

They also had a nice dinosaur exhibit.

 Along with many fossils

These are bones, teeth and husk from an ancient type of elephant.

 For those that think all the above is boring, the museum also has a number of more fun for kids style exhibits.

A race car and its engine

 Information on trains

Kawanoe Castle

On July 21st we headed to the museum and planetarium in Niihama. On the way, we stopped off at Kawanoe castle in Shikokuchuo. The castle was originally built in 1227, and fell to Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 1585. The castle was torn down in 1611, so this is a replica castle that was built in 1988.

 The gate leading to the castle

 The castle itself, or at least the reconstruction of it.

 A wooden door which I can only guess would have been the entrance to the original castle

 Some old sword blades that are on display inside the castle.

 Samurai armor and weapons, on display inside the castle.

 a view from the top of the castle. The castle is situated on top of a small mountain, so there is a complete panoramic view of the city and the Seto inland sea. This city has a lot of paper factories which were clearly visible from here. 

The view from atop the castle showing the castle grounds with the Seto inland sea in the background.

Tokushima

On July 15th, we headed to Tokushima with Tokuda to see our friend Kohno.

The first thing we did was go to the top of Mt Bizan. From here we got a great view of Tokushima. There is also a ropeway from the Awa Dance Museum to the top of the mountain. We didn't take this since we drove most the way up.

After seeing the city from above, we went back down along the shoreline.

 Then we went to a place that makes all kinds of pottery. From large pots to small plates and tea cups.

 We even were able to go inside one of the furnaces they used for firing the pottery. It is hard to see in this small blog-sized picture, but the brick inside was actually melted.

We then went to a museum for the Bando POW camp. During WWI, Japan held up to their treaty with Britain and attacked German territory in Tsingtao, China. 3,900 German troops surrendered there and were held in camps throughout Japan. At this particular camp, they were given pretty free reign to do what they pleased, and many of them formed orchestras, produced plays, etc.

On June 1, 1918, the POWs performed Beethoven's ninth symphony. This had never been performed before in Japan, and they were able to do this with many instruments that were made by the POWs while in the camp.

When the war was over and the camp was closed, 63 of the German POWs chose to stay. This is how well they were treated. To me, an amazing contrast to the ferocity that Japan would display less than two decades later.

After we left the Bando Camp Museum, we headed to Oasahiko shrine.

One thing setting this shrine apart from many others of its size was the lack of steps.

There were two bridges here that were built by the German POWs from Bando camp. This is the other bridge made by the German POWs.

And with that we left the shrine, said goodbye to Kohno, and headed back.

Konpira

The next day, July 10th, we went to Konpira shrine.

The roads leading up to the shrine and the bottom area at the lower parts of the steps are all shops selling everything you would think. Shirts, funny looking straw hats, key chains, swords, paintings, etc.

 Of course, anybody who has been reading this blog knows they don't have temples and shrines without a lot of... stairs.

And more stairs

 And more stairs

Finally a building. But this is not the shrine, which is at the half way mark.

 There were some smaller shrines all along the way

Here you could pour water over your hands, symbolically cleansing your soul.

 But there were plenty more steps to go before making it to the shrine

 Only 785 steps and we were at the shrine. We were not done though. To reach the top, we had to keep climbing stairs.

 View from the main shrine

 More steps of course...

To get to the top, we had gone up 1,368 steps in the summer heat.

The view from the top.

 Konpira is a shrine to a god of safe seafaring. So, there are many pictures of boats, from crew who want to remain safe.

There are also other statues and monuments, such as this huge propeller.






So, having reached the top, we headed back down the 1,368 steps. It is a lot of steps, but well worth the journey for any who want to try.

Ogijima

Right after we were done with our 4 hours of traveling around Megijima, we hopped on the ferry to Ogijima. This island is much smaller than Megijima, so we only spend 2 hours here.

Ogijima has a very small fishing village. The population here is declining as the younger generations opt for the city life. We saw a number of abandoned houses that were literally falling apart.

One of the first things you will notice is the entrance to the shrine. We decided to visit this last if we had time, as we wanted to go around to the other side of the island to view the lighthouse. As it turns out, we didn't have time to walk up this mountain to see it, otherwise we would have missed the last ferry off the island.

Since this island is much smaller than Megijima, we were able to walk to the lighthouse.

 The lighthouse is situated on a nice stretch of beach. Unfortunately, due to the strong currents, you cannot swim here. There is a nice swimming area over on Megijima for those who want to swim in the Seto inland sea.

 It was a short trip, and while on the ferry, heading back to Takamatsu, I got this photo of the elementary school, where my friend Tokuda use to be the principal. As a result of the declining population and younger generations on this island, the elementary school was closed down.

Megijima

On July 5th, we headed to Megijima. The island can be seen from Takamatsu, as seen in this picture taken from the port.

Megijima is seen in the background

When arriving at Megijima you are greeted by the Oni statue.







Megijima is the scene of a Japanese folk tale about a boy named Momotaro. He, along with a dog, monkey and pheasant, rid the island of the Oni which lived in a cave. Many people believe this to be the site of that story and refer to the island as Onigashima. Oni literally translates into demon, but I have seen translations of the story that call them ogres.

The first thing on our list was to reach the top of this peak where there is a statue of Nichiren. He was a founder of a sect of Buddhism, who lived in the 11th century.

We rented bicycles and headed up the mountain. Sometimes we were able to peddle, sometimes it was too steep and we had to walk the bikes up the winding road to the top.

 A view of Takamatsu from part way up the moutain.

After about 45 minutes or so, we reached the top and got an up close look at the statue.

From up here there is a good view of the Seto inland sea.

 The next thing we wanted to do was reach the peak you see here. This is where there is the Oni cave and an observation deck.
Another 45 minutes or so later, and we reached the Oni cave.

We continued on to the observation deck. From here, with the help of a 250 mm telephoto lens, we could see the full statue of Nichiren.

We also got a nice view of Takamatsu...

...and a panoramic view of the Seto inland sea.

Again with the help of the telephoto lens, I was able to get a photograph of part of the Seto Ohashi. It's total length is 8.1 miles.

We then headed down the mountain. It took about 1 1/2 hours up, and about 7 minutes to get down, and two pairs of brake pads.

We traveled around the island and made it to the Moai statue, which is the type of statue found on Easter Island. A crane company in Japan had the statue made for it to do some testing before heading to Easter Island to assist with restoration projects.

We made the loop around the island and back to the port. It was time to say goodbye to this sleepy fishing village, and head off to our next adventure... Ogijima...