Saturday, August 6. We got up, had breakfast, and took the train to Nagamachi Station, where we met up with one of Lisa's friends, Endo-san. She is an amateur photographer who love hiking and nature. She took us for a car ride up 蔵王山 (Zao-san), a mountain between Miyagi-ken and Yamagata-ken. It's listed as one of the "100 famous mountains of Japan," and is 1841 feet high.
On the way up we drove through beautiful country and forest scenery, and made several stops to look around and take pictures.
Here's one stop.
We enjoyed the "beware of monkeys" signs. We did not, unfortunately, see any.
Monkeying around.
The key attraction here (besides the beautiful mountains and forests) is a view of a three-tiered waterfall. The total drop is around 600 feet.
I've read that 6/7 of the area of Japan is so mountainous that it's uninhabitable. These drops give you some idea of how steep these mountains can be -- and this is an area of the country that's easily accessible by car!
A short walk from the parking area there was a temple. We didn't take time to walk up to it, but the path was guarded by Heat Miser.
Hanging out at the scenic overlook.
Another stop was farther up the road, where there was an overlook on the edge of an amazing canyon.
There was yet another waterfall. This one is probably 150 feet or so.
The terrain was a weird combination of rain forest and Craters of the Moon.
Daniel and Lisa at one of the lookout points.
Here's another lookout point. It's hard to get a sense of scale and realize that the ground just drops away and it's hundreds and hundreds of feet straight down.
We passed and got passed by these intrepid cyclists a half-dozen times on our trek up the mountain. Yumiko was itching to get out of the car and ride.
