Winter Vacation Part 2: Yakushima

The entire reason we ended up way down here in Southern Kyushu was to visit a legendary island: Yakushima. Yakushima is a small, sparsely inhabited island 4 hours south of Kagoshima by standard ferry, which only runs one round trip a day. There is also a faster and more frequent jet ferry that will get you there in about 2 hours.

You may not recognize the name itself, but you might know Yakushima as the inspiration for the setting of Princess Mononoke. It's most famous for it's twisted and mossy cedar forests, which were logged several decades ago before the island became a protected area.

Mononoke-hime

The reason Yakushima is so lush and green is because of ridiculous rainfall. They say it rains 8 days out of every week. For the three days we were there, it indeed rained on and off for both days.


We arrived in Minoura Port around noon, walked into town to get our rental car, and immediately drove into the forest. The closest site to Minoura is called Shiratani Unsuikyou, which in Japanese means "White Valley of Cloud Mist." Inside, you can get your fill of nature and see the massive "Yaku-sugi" old cedars that have been standing for thousands of years. There is even a location called Mononoke no Mori, or "Mononoke's Forest." It was beautiful, and everything I had imagined.

Tall trees...

Wide trees...

Gnarly fallen trees...

Waterfalls... (yes, this picture is straight)

...and moss galore!

We hiked for a while, but took our leave after it started pouring rain. It's just a part of being in Yakushima, I suppose.

I was prepared for the rain, mist, and beautiful scenery, but I wasn't prepared for the monkeys! Before we even made it to Shiratani, we drove past a "Yaku-zaru" Japanese macaque just perched on top of a road barrier. We pulled over at the next turnout to get a better look. We slowly approached it, trying to get a clear shot and snap some pictures. We had read up about monkeys, and how we shouldn't look them in the eye or cut them off from an escape route. We were careful not to get too close, but even at around 30-40 meters, it was agitated enough to charge us. Maybe it doesn't like having a camera lens pointed at it either.

The culprit, just before he pounced.

It growled loudly and bounded towards us, covering the distance between us in the blink of an eye. Shocked into action, we made a break for it, but there was no way we could outrun the speedy little beast (they have a top speed of over 40 kph). I turned back, and he was right on our heels. Seeing Kristin sprinting terrified ahead of me, I decided I had no choice but to stand my ground. I turned around, stomped on the ground hard, and gave a loud shout while opening my arms wide. The monkey made a detour into the forest, where it continued making growling noises. I then made my escape to the car, where Kristin was waiting for me in a panic. Welcome to the jungle, right?

As the sun went down, we drove the 45 minutes or so to our place of lodging all the way on the other side of the island near Anbo Port. We stayed at a fairly unique place called Dai-chan's Mongolian Huts. He has a collection of circular huts designed in Mongolian style that he runs as a backpacker's hostel. Inside were several bunk beds and enough space to sleep 6-8 people. Since we traveled after the winter break rush, we were the only visitors for the night.

Amazing evening view of Minoura.

Our hut in the dark.

The owner, Dai-chan, was a very friendly and talkative fellow. He gave us tips on where to go, what to do, and where to eat. We talked to him about our monkey encounter, and he warned us about how dangerous they actually are. They're much faster and stronger than humans, and when they attack, the best option is to run and pray they don't pursue. Even if we had no choice but to fight them, we stand no chance of winning. That was a reality check.

For dinner, we drive to a yakiniku barbecue restaurant a few kilometers away. While driving over, I noticed two little glints of light and slammed on the brakes as a deer galloped across the rural highway. The island deer are called "Yaku-shika" and are unique to the island. I breathed a sign of relief because the rental car wasn't insured. When we got to the restaurant, we wanted to order deer meat and try it out. It turns out that they'd run out of deer meat and would only get new stock the next day. Damn, and I was just about to kill one too! We settled for a sampler platter and some delicious kuro-buta sausages from Kagoshima.

A possibly-delicious-but-I-will-never-know Yaku-shika.

After a good night's rest in a spacious Mongolian hut, we departed early in the morning before sunrise. We originally wanted to go to a sea-side ocean hot-spring and bathe while watching the sun rise, but the spring was a bit of a disappointment when we got there so we didn't bother going in.

We continued to the Senpironotaki Falls, and were once again the only ones there. The path from the parking area to the viewpoint was very short, at only a few hundred meters. As we enjoyed looking out at the falls in the distance, I heard a rustling noise in the nearby bamboo grass. I held my hand up to get Kristin's attention and whispered, "I think there's something here." As she backed up, I peered around a rock down into the grass-covered hillside. Sure enough, I caught a glimpse of as least two monkeys making their way through the brush. We made the first move and high-tailed it out of there.

We got back in the car and drove to our final major destination: Yakusugi Land. Much like Shiratani Unsuikyou, this is a place to hike in nature and enjoy the amazing scenery. Yakusugi Land has done a bit more by building wooden over-ground paths for sightseers to easily walk through the forest. As expected, this is where many of the less adventurous travelers show up, and we saw a tour bus with some elderly people pull up.

As we were about to go inside, a little deer slipped through a railing and stopped in the middle of the road. The elderly sightseers, which many oohs and aahs, pulled out their ancient flip-phones and took a multitude of 1 megapixel photos to show their grandchildren.

Wassup, old peeps.

The park itself is set up as a loop system. The trail for all loops is the same path, but there are turn-back points you can choose depending on the length you want to hike. The shortest loop was only 15 minutes, but you could go as far as several hours or ever overnight. While you'd think maybe the wooden walkways would take away from the experience, it also makes accessing the amazing old trees easier. Besides, the wooden walkways only cover several of the shorter loops. The longer ones return back to nature and get exponentially more treacherous.

Scalp-scraping

Still on the easy course.

As we walked along, we passed each turn-back checkpoint and thought, "Yeah, we could go on the next longer one." Eventually, we ended up on the longest trail, and the difficulty level sky-rocketed. While the 15 and 30 minute courses were comparable to walking on a sidewalk, the longest trail had us tripping through root-filled paths, climbing up and down big tree stumps, and skidding down wooden logs. We wondered if we bit off more than we could eat, but it ended up being the most enjoyable and amazing hike of the trip.

Peek-a-boo!

Such a great trail!

Just soaking in the wilderness

After that extremely satisfying and long hike, we drove back to Minoura to return the rental car and get to our lodging for the night. We checked into a little guest house operating above a fishing tackle store. While checking in, I heard on the radio that there was a big storm coming, and that ferry service would possibly be canceled the next day. Kristin and I began to worry, but we wouldn't hear the final decision until the next day. We walked into the pouring rain and had dinner at a unique local diner that served Western food. We went to bed as best we could with the sound of the shutter rattling in the powerful winds.

The next day, we heard the announcement over the town intercom (yes, there's a town intercom. That's how rural this place is). The jet-foil ferries would be cancelled due to high winds, but the regular ferry would still run. Kristin and I breathed a sigh of relief knowing we'd be on track with our travel schedule.

For the last few hours in town, we headed to the visitor's center to take a look around. We sat down at the craft table, where you can fashion yourself a keychain or cellphone ornament using the wood of a fallen legendary Yakusugi. Using the provided sandpaper and files, I tried to fashion myself a little Yaku-zaru monkey to commemorate how I was nearly torn to shreds.

Finally, it was time to say goodbye to one of the coolest places in Japan. The ferry ride back was crazy choppy in the strong winds,and we got horribly seasick, but at least we made it back to the mainland.