Travel Japan - Japan Package Tours, Cheap Flights to Japan, Japan Hotels and Japan Rail Pass

From here we head some to Takachiho, located in Miyazaki prefecture.

Takachiho has a beautiful gorge where you can do some short walks and row a cute boat along the bottom of the gorge. It is not a big area but very quaint.

Next stop was Mt Aso

Now this is a remote area with very few buses running to the lookout and no English signs. For the first time ever, we hitchhiked up as we had to wait 2 hours for the next bus!! Luckily for us a grandma and grandpa couple picked us up in their flash sedan and even though we could barely communicate we were treated so kindly with continuous supplies of chocolates and hot chips being passed over the back seat! Only in Japan……If the weather is not good, then you can not take the ropeway to the top and not much can been seen – this happened to us. But friends who have also visited Mt Aso were in luck and raved about the walks and views from the top.

FUNNY TALES….. 

Hitch-hiking

In most countries I would never think to hitch hike but Japan (in a rural area) I think can be a great form of transport. Had the day planned to see Mt Aso, volcano in Kumamoto Prefecture but be warned the transport in the this area is very few and far between hence we found ourselves in the freezing cold with nothing open with a 1 hour wait for the next bus to take us up. 3 young girls thought `Should be okay to hitch hike or at least try…’ At first hesitant to put the finger out soon came more easily. After only 10 minutes a lovely sedan pulled up and to our surprise and relief an elderly couple greeted us. We could speak enough to let them know where we wanted to go and they seemed more than happy to drive us there. As if this wasn’t good enough, from the front seat the `obaasan’, grandmother, proceeded to pass over hot chips, chocolates and Japanese sweets. After a short trip up the hill, a brief photo op and a smiley thanks, we waved them goodbye.

Ahhh…sweet memories!