Thursday, May 03, 2007
April 14, the Kobe vegetarian tour.
Here’s a quote from my journal:
“Okay, let’s get this out of the way. I didn’t try kobe beef. I’m sure it’s spectacular and all, but I didn’t get around to doing it. Why?
1) Couldn’t find a restaurant near the Hostel.
2) It’s just beef, I doubt I’d *appreciate* it.
3) If I really wanted to, I’m sure I could get some elsewhere in Japan, or even LA
4) It’s expensive
5) Of course I’d like it! I like eating! You’ll slow down and taste anything if it’s supposed to be ‘great’.
Sure I would have tried it, but it’s relatively low on my list of things to do in Japan.”
I did get some eventually, but that’s a later entry.
So we woke up at the stupid, uncomfortable, awful hostel and rearranged my joints back into proper working order. Then it was off to the station and then to Kobe.
Our first order of business was to lock up our enormous backpacks in coin lockers (we did this a lot, really nice to get rid of all that weight). After that, we hiked up behind the station and into the undeveloped mountains behind Kobe in search of, reportedly, waterfalls.
Boy did we find them! There were four of them within 20 minutes of the station, and some of them were fantastically pretty. Let me tell you, though, that was a seriously steep 20 minutes. It’s rather intimidating to look up at this enormous, huge, tall waterfall, then do some walking and later discover that you are higher than that waterfall was. That burns right in the quadriceps, let me tell you.
But yeah, waterfalls and nature. This was Jessie’s favorite stop of the trip.
And while we were hiking, what did we find? Could it be another gondola right, right next to the rail station? It is! We shuffled over there and got ourselves some tickets, taking a fantastic gondola ride up the mountain. There wasn’t anything like the first one, with that huge span over the volcanic valley floor, but it was still nice to get a view of the city and a ride up the mountain. We also got to see the very waterfall we had hiked past mere minutes before.
The top of the gondola ride was just a neat little place with some things to see, but we only bothered to walk through the ‘fragrance museum’, which was neat because they had lots of different smells to smell. I’m sure if we could have read the text that the history of perfume would have been gripping, but, you know, Japan.
After that we took some metro lines to near where our hostel was supposed to be. Then I got us hiking the *wrong way* to our hostel. Nice. Jessie got me back on track. Glad to have her along.
We got out and walked around near the hostel, but none of the recommended sights were near, which was okay by me because none of them seemed particularly gripping. (Chinatown? We have one of those back home. America town? Now you’re just being silly.)
Instead, it turns out that our hostel was near Sake breweries. Very neat. We got to try some sake, see the tools used to make sake, both in the past and today, and then walk through a tour to see how sake is made. Unfortunately, we walked through the tour backwards, so as near as I can tell; sake is taken out of bottles then allowed to ferment until it is steamed rice. Then they soak it until dry, polish it until the outer husk is back on, and then plant it in the ground. I don’t know where the alcohol comes from.
Our tour through…whatever neighborhood of Kobe we were in finished up with some local flavor. We saw some sort of Japanese percussion orchestra practicing, then a bunch of people playing baseball in a park, a guy walking some cute puppy-dogs and a supermarket, where we bought dinner. We took our meal back to the hostel and ate it in the main room while we watched some Anime with the other guests and the host. Then sleep.
-N
Here’s a quote from my journal:
“Okay, let’s get this out of the way. I didn’t try kobe beef. I’m sure it’s spectacular and all, but I didn’t get around to doing it. Why?
1) Couldn’t find a restaurant near the Hostel.
2) It’s just beef, I doubt I’d *appreciate* it.
3) If I really wanted to, I’m sure I could get some elsewhere in Japan, or even LA
4) It’s expensive
5) Of course I’d like it! I like eating! You’ll slow down and taste anything if it’s supposed to be ‘great’.
Sure I would have tried it, but it’s relatively low on my list of things to do in Japan.”
I did get some eventually, but that’s a later entry.
So we woke up at the stupid, uncomfortable, awful hostel and rearranged my joints back into proper working order. Then it was off to the station and then to Kobe.
Our first order of business was to lock up our enormous backpacks in coin lockers (we did this a lot, really nice to get rid of all that weight). After that, we hiked up behind the station and into the undeveloped mountains behind Kobe in search of, reportedly, waterfalls.
Boy did we find them! There were four of them within 20 minutes of the station, and some of them were fantastically pretty. Let me tell you, though, that was a seriously steep 20 minutes. It’s rather intimidating to look up at this enormous, huge, tall waterfall, then do some walking and later discover that you are higher than that waterfall was. That burns right in the quadriceps, let me tell you.
But yeah, waterfalls and nature. This was Jessie’s favorite stop of the trip.
And while we were hiking, what did we find? Could it be another gondola right, right next to the rail station? It is! We shuffled over there and got ourselves some tickets, taking a fantastic gondola ride up the mountain. There wasn’t anything like the first one, with that huge span over the volcanic valley floor, but it was still nice to get a view of the city and a ride up the mountain. We also got to see the very waterfall we had hiked past mere minutes before.
The top of the gondola ride was just a neat little place with some things to see, but we only bothered to walk through the ‘fragrance museum’, which was neat because they had lots of different smells to smell. I’m sure if we could have read the text that the history of perfume would have been gripping, but, you know, Japan.
After that we took some metro lines to near where our hostel was supposed to be. Then I got us hiking the *wrong way* to our hostel. Nice. Jessie got me back on track. Glad to have her along.
We got out and walked around near the hostel, but none of the recommended sights were near, which was okay by me because none of them seemed particularly gripping. (Chinatown? We have one of those back home. America town? Now you’re just being silly.)
Instead, it turns out that our hostel was near Sake breweries. Very neat. We got to try some sake, see the tools used to make sake, both in the past and today, and then walk through a tour to see how sake is made. Unfortunately, we walked through the tour backwards, so as near as I can tell; sake is taken out of bottles then allowed to ferment until it is steamed rice. Then they soak it until dry, polish it until the outer husk is back on, and then plant it in the ground. I don’t know where the alcohol comes from.
Our tour through…whatever neighborhood of Kobe we were in finished up with some local flavor. We saw some sort of Japanese percussion orchestra practicing, then a bunch of people playing baseball in a park, a guy walking some cute puppy-dogs and a supermarket, where we bought dinner. We took our meal back to the hostel and ate it in the main room while we watched some Anime with the other guests and the host. Then sleep.
-N
Labels: Japan, Kobe, Kobe Beef, Sake, Waterfalls
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