Autumn trek to Mt Shiratori

Mid October should be the best Autumn colour season up in the mountains, but we apparently have a late Autumn this year because of the summer heat. On 23rd Oct, we enjoyed a beautiful trek to Mt Shiratori where one of the “Heike” clan was thought to have settled down in around the beginning of 13th century after they were defeated by their rival Samurai clan “Genji”. It takes around 30 minutes to get to the trail head from Momigi by car and the trek is an easy and comfortable walking on the mountain ridge. Unfortunately it was a rainy day though, the trek offered us some beautiful leaves in the fog. Our goal was “Miike” and “Byoubu Iwa”, very sacred place for the locals and even trekkers. On a sunny day, this trek offers some beautiful landscape and flowers, you should try this some day with me.

Landslides

We have had some landslides here in Gokanosho after a downpour. Better not visit here at the moment. But no worries, the pavement will be maintained soon, hopefully within a day. Because the local construction companies are well prepared for working on taking care of it.
We get used to this situation as it happens every year during a rainy season starting around early June and finishing around the middle of July.

Trek for peony

In the middle of May, it’s PEONY season!
We have beautiful peony flowers in a wide range of a hill with limestone, somewhere in Mt Shiratori. The trek is not hard, one hour and a half walk on a mountain ridge will take you to this beautiful spot. But as it’s located in a hidden place, so highly recommended to hire a guide.
I’ve got to visit here again this week!

Fukujuso (福寿草)

One of my favourite flowers “Fukujuso” (“Amur Adonis”) is about to be in full bloom! This flower has really auspicious flower languages, such as “Eternal happiness” and “Bring happiness”. Off I went to “Shirakue-daira” (白崩平) located in the middle of the mountains in Kureko village, one of the five villages, to admire these flowers as a trekking guide for a couple of Japanese guests who are from Kumamoto city.

It took about an hour to get to the destination, the colonies of Fukujuso, from “Kureko Kodai no sato“. They seemed to be almost in full bloom and welcoming us with its beautiful petals shining yellow and light green under the sunshine.

Normally, Fukujuso flowers start coming out in the middle of February and fall in the beginning or middle of March. It’s not a very hard walk to the place, and I have not seen any foreign trekkers in this beautiful trail before. Uh, sorry I am wrong. I saw one who was from a neighbouring town on this day.

Winter has come in Gokanosho

We have had a really weird weather this year in Japan. We had long rainy days even in April and May, though we usually have it in June and July for around 6 weeks. And we had a comparatively warm autumn which brought a short Koyo (=coloured leaves) season to Gokanosho.

Finally, we had some snow in Gokanosho yesterday, yay! It seems it’s time to change our tyres.

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icy road on R445