TNT Day 7 - fields of flowers

 12 Sept 

Map 4: (hotel) Hirano, yamanakako -> Hirano-san -> ohira-yama -> lake yamanakako flower park -> oshino hakkai // bus to Mt Fuji station (hostel)

Slightly cooler today, google says a high of 28, muggy with afternoon showers

After a lazy morning I set off at 9:30, first to the laundromat to put my clothes in a drier as they hadn't quite dried after the sink wash they received last night. By 10:30 I was back on the Tokai Nature Trail winding my way through the back streets of Hirano. The area is an interesting mix of fancy private homes, shut up holiday houses, abandoned houses, resorts, whose hey day was probably the 80s and 90s, and tennis courts - so many tennis courts. Most accommodation seems to be targeted towards sport or school groups.

Once I'd left the suburbs I was greeted with the sounds of birds, insects, the wind in the trees and American football. Evidently there was a game happening at the field, just 300m away through the trees, if the cheering and chanting was anything to go by.

Compared to yesterday, today was a walk in the park, there quite a few stairs but after hitting Hirano-san and Ohira-yama peaks I was spat out at the Lake Yamanakako flower park. Unfortunately Mt Fuji remained elusive.


From my viewpoint on ohiro-yama, I also spied a giant swan.

I stopped for quick bite of lunch at a soba cafe before talking a detour and walking through the flower plots. There were lots of tourists around taking their Instagram shots in the sea of flowers.

While I was chowing down on my soba the crack of thunder could be heard in the distance, maybe this explained why Mt Fuji had been shrouded all day. As I started walking towards Oshino it started lightly raining, but luckily it didn't last longer than 15 mins.

As I continued along the back streets of Oshino, Mt Fuji finally showed itself. I finished today at the Oshino Hakkai bus stop at 4:30.


I caught the bus back to Mt Fuji station, checked into my hostel and then went in search of some vegetables which I had been missing out on over the last couple of days.

Tomorrow is likely to be a low mileage day as I want to check out some of the museums, shrines and gardens in the area.

A nice easy 11.8km today.

Tiger keelback/Yamakagashi: 1

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tokai Nature Trail Maps and Resources (Tōkai Shizen Hodō / 東海自然歩道)

Image
*EDIT: I walked it and it was amazing - I've added a gpx of the route and closures as of oct 2026. I will be updating the maps and adding gpxs for the Nara route and Shizuoka bypass shortly (Sept 2026)*  Hello internet, I'm planning to walk the Tōkai Nature Trail from Osaka to Tokyo in September, October, November 2024. My starting gear list can be found here .  Below are the resources I found while investigating the route. I found that while GPS tracks and maps were available, the GPS tracks often included off track portions (e.g. detours to train stations and shops, wrong turns) and guess-timations of the trail, and the maps while informational were either in Japanese (which I unfortunately do not speak), out of date, and spread across multiple websites or not to scale and hard to follow.   I have created my own set of geo-referenced pdf maps for the main trail route which I will be testing out, these can be used as is or uploaded to Nomad Tracks/FO Maps/Avenza/et...
Read more

TNT Day 53 - these final kilometers

Image
 14 Nov Map 36: Osaka Hokusetsu Cemetery viewpoint (tent) -> Prince kaisei tomb 開成皇子 墓 -> minoh visitors center / train to hyogo prefecture (a futon in my brother's spare room) Well after yesterday's walk I am only left with 3.8km to the minoh visitors center and the end of the Tokai nature trail. I then have an 8km walk through the minoh valley to the minoh train station. I definitely have mixed feelings about ending this walk, on the one hand I will return to society and my normal life and on the other hand I will return to society and my normal life. There are pros and cons of each, but I will miss the simplicity of life on the trail and the beauty of the Japanese countryside (I won't miss the humidity or limited access to a hot shower). Took my time packing up this morning, had one last cuppa overlooking the impressive Osaka hokusetsu cemetery while the sun rose. Also took my time on the trail, taking 2 hrs to cover the 3.8km. And then just like that I was done....
Read more

A collection of collections

Image
Animals Mute Swan Black kite Grey heron Great cormorant Barn swallow Eurasian tree sparrow Large billed crow ?Great/?medium egret Little egret Japanese macaque Oriental turtle dove Barbour's blue-tailed skink ( Plestiodon barbouri ) Chinese hwamei (introduced) Green pheasant Eurasian nuthatch Varied tit Sika deer Frog sp. Robust skink sp. Red-billed leiothrix (introduced) Tiger keelback/Yamakagashi ( Rhabdophis tigrinus ) Eastern spot-billed duck  White wagtail Japanese woodpecker Little grebe Mallard Common kingfisher  Grey wagtail Copper pheasant Freshwater Turtle sp. Warbling white-eye Serow Tanuki ?Japanese Grass Lizard ( Takydromus tachydromoides ) Brown eared bul bul White cheeked starling Hummingbird hawk-moth Man holes Magome Ochiai Nakatsugawa Hachioji Akishima Mt Takao Sagamihara Yamanakako Oshino Fujiyoshida Fujikawaguchiko  Fujinomiya Fukushi Ushizuma Shizuoka Kurata Shimada Haruno-cho Futamata Kakegawa
Read more