A tiring but well-spent vacation

About a month ago me friend Lindsay told me she was going to Beppu and invited me along. She used to live in Ube and will be leaving Japan soon, I wanted to see her before she left and I've wanted to go to Beppu since leaving Japan, so I took her up on it. For those unfamiliar, Beppu is the most popular onsen destination in all Japan. I left Sunday, the 28th, after work, caught the train down to Beppu and made it in around nine thirty; just time for a nightcap and a recap of the plans for the next day.
We awoke in the morning to a knocking at the door from one of the number of tiny women that ran our hotel. They were evicting us for the day, apparently it was imperative that our sheets be changed exactly at ten. After a hearty breakfast of toast, salad, egg and coffee, we made for the first bath of the day - a sand bath. One is buried up to the neck in sand for fifteen minutes then a nice rinse and soak. Quite the way to re-energize before lunch. Lunch though, was a long way coming. A trek through the seven hells of Beppu lay between us and food. Although, to be fair, we could've eaten sooner if we had wanted to.
The jigoku are a geothermal phenomenon of boiling pools and geysers, similar to what exists in Yellowstone. However, in this case they are located in the middle of the city and fenced in. Moreover, they are furnished with all of the modern necessities, gift shops, aquariums and horrible, horrible zoos. Finishing our tours of the first two, and it being a nice, even, beautiful day, we chose to walk the some kilometers to the next group of hells. We realized–as we dodged frieght trucks on blind corners and walked up steep inclines on wrong turns–that the bus may have been a better choice.
Lunch, after the hells, was nothing special, but it was substantial and much needed. Thus fortified we made our way to the last bath of the day. An outdoor mudbath at an onsen called Hoyo Land. However, I expected this to be a more viscous experience. The mud did not constitute the bath. Instead it was a murky, sulfurous grey water with globs of mud laying at the bottom. Nonetheless, invigorating and refreshing, three baths, a steam room and a waterfall.
On our return to town a fairly standard dinner including raw liver and octopus. From dinner it was to what I believe may be the shittiest karaoke parlor I've ever visited. For two people they gave us a room for perhaps twenty that was flush with feedback. Microphone style. Moreover the nomihodai (or all you can drink) menu had no beer on it and the drinks were watered down. A whiskey rocks came the same color as an iced tea. We stayed though. No sense in wasting a booked room.
The next morning after our old woman wake up call we checked out and made for lunch. Lindsay had found a special deal at an onsen just outside of town where one could buy a lunch and an onsen together for only ¥1000. A deal indeed. The onsen was spectacular. Named Ichinoide, it had two baths, alternating odd and even days men's and women's. One was carved into the rock, with a waterfall and grotto-esque structures; the other, with a commanding view of the city, having three baths, one hot, one scalding and behind a warm swimming pool.
Perhaps the most relaxing lunch break I've had finished we made for the ferry. I had decided before I left for Beppu that I would join Lindsay on the fourteen hour overnight ferry from Beppu to Kobe. We collected supplies (not from a chandler unfortunately) and boarded the Sunflower Nishiki found our, shared, cabin. Many people discuss the best ways of traveling, whether it be biking, hitching, trains or driving. In Japan the conversation usually boils down to driving, riding the train, or taking a plane, the proffered option depending on the start location and the distance to the end. However, if I am to have my say, I would recommend heartily, time permitting of course, traveling second class on an overnight ferry. We shared our room with some eight people, growing to fifteen or so as the ferry made its stops. In the early stages of the journey we met the man sharing the bed across from us. A short digression here lest you misinterpret the surroundings we traveled in. When I refer to a bed, I refer to a space of floor marked by a number above it, supplied with a vinyl pillow and a futon which brings new meaning to 'thin.' Returning then, to the man, he was a seventy eight year old World War II veteran. He regaled us for some hours with excited stories, copious amounts of cheap Japanese whiskey. I understood, being (very) generous, thirty percent of his stories. I believe my Japanese is improving. While he poured and talked, his wife sat next to us, nodding in agreement now, glaring in disapproval then and all the while foisting upon us sushi and dried squid.
A walk around the boat led us to the dining room where we met, to the best of our knowledge, the only other foreigner on the boat. As it happened he was a German, living in Beppu two years, married to a Japanese women. A freelance film critic, he had lived some years in Seattle and New York. During his time in Seattle he had operated the now defunct Pike Street Theater. We spent many hours talking to him, truly a fascinating man.
The bell rang at six thirty the next morning. On five hours of sleep I dragged myself in to Kobe, parted with Lindsay after a breakfast that leaves little imprint on my memory and struck off for Nara.
The journey to Nara is blurry at the beginning and coalesces slowly, reaching a stabilizing point around Kyoto. I met an Osaka Nova teacher in that early part, he told me that it was unusual to see a foreigner sit head down at a train stop through five trains. I explained my situation and we had a brief conversation, wherein he became late for work. Leaving Kyoto, a friendly looking family sat down opposite me on the train, I thought they might want the booth to themselves, so I offered to move in Japanese. They stared, smiled and nodded. I smiled back and noticed that the man's vest read "Taipei Astronomical Institute." A telling sign.
I arrived in Nara and among the thousand-year-old national treasures and fascinating silk road museum I found myself suffused with that ironical tourist's hate of tourists. In defiance I looked pulled out my cellphone often to look at it. To say, "I live here, I'm not that much of a tourist." Nara, though, rightly justified itself as a fascinating place, but I'm running a blog here, not a guidebook. I stayed the five hours my schedule allowed.
I found Osaka as I left it. Easy to get lost in. I decided not to look for the Japanese noise music only music store that Johannes, the German from the ferry, had drawn me a map to. Desirous as I was, I simply had no money, no time. My goal was to meet my friend Ed for a beer and perhaps a snack. I ran out of cellphone battery and had to sit in the middle of the Namba underground mall and charge it on a public wall outlet. People were in too much of a hurry to stare at me. I ate some ramen at a very well decorated, very Chinese oriented place. Twenty two optional spices on the menu. Jerk-pork in the ramen. Delicious. There were many jars on some shelves in the restaurant, filled with a red fluid. As I was paying, I asked the clerk, in Japanese, if they were filled with the blood of customers that couldn't pay. She stared at me blankly. I told her it was a joke. She laughed, two short 'ha's and then explained to me that no, they were not blood. I paid, left and went to meet Ed. We went to the Hub, an Irish bar in Namba where I had some of the first real beer I've had in Japan. No offense to those fans of Asahi and Sapporo, but it seems to me like a carbonated, yellow beverage, devoid of flavor. The Newcastle treated me nicely.
Having caught up with Ed, I said goodbye and asked for directions to the Shinkansen station. Boarded the Nozomi Super-express and walked up thirteen cars to find a seat, fell asleep and woke up in Shin-Yamaguchi around ten.