Not Just a Big Beach

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Woke up very early to hop the various trains out of Osaka. It took a subway transfer, and a high speed (but not ultra high speed) train to get us to Tottori in about 3 hours.

The train is convenient, but we had to pay extra. The Japan Rail pass doesn't cover you for a 75km stretch of rail, so the staff cone around and charge you 1700yen to travel on the special Chizu mileage.

We paid a bunch of money for these passes, and I guess it is my fault for not doing enough research, but it was pretty shitty forking out another $34 to take the train. So if you are planning to go, really do your digging and make sure that all the rail you want to ride is owned by JR.

Tottori is much like Nara, a small, vacation spot catering to Japanese tourists. The weather was also nicer, I think traveling south, and closer to the Sea of Japan means the weather is milder.

The areas claim to fame is the sand dunes and the pear orchards. After dumping our bags at the hotel we went over to the post office, mailed more stuff back via slow-boat to US, and headed to the sand dunes.

The town of Tottori knows that it exists for tourists to eat and sleep in while visiting the attractions, so they have a loop bus that is 300yen per ride, or 600yen for day pass. It takes you from the main Tottori station, to all of the attractions that to want to go to, and some you don't.

It takes about 25 minutes to get to the dunes from the main station, on the bus we made friends with a Portuguese guy that has been traveling Japan for about a month now. We discussed US politics and it's impact on the world. And ultimately parted ways as he wanted to see the sand museum, and we wanted to wander the dunes.

When we got down the hill from where the bus dropped us off we were a little unimpressed, it looked like a big Beach.

But that just perspective fucking us up. It is not just a big Beach

From The road to the water it is over a mile of sand in some places, and elevation changes of over 250 feet. In some of the depressions you can't see the ocean or the mountains, just the sand dunes surrounding you, if it weren't for the temperature you could be in the Sahara.

Thy sand for the most part is very fine, with the wind blowing little waves and ripples. There is minimal brushy grasses, and very clean. Until you get to the actual beach, and there the sea of Japan brings up the yeah peple dump in the oceans.

That last picture is a duneside that we walked down, prolly 100 feet at least a 60° angle.

We went back to the bus stop, ate some pear soft serve, because the pear farm was 800yen to walk around, and all really wanted was the flavor at that point.

We caught the bus home. Laura wanted to go to an onsen, the Japanese public bath houses, feed by natural springs. I had little interest in being boiled alive.

We walked to the place, she went in to scope it out and I went home.

She reported back to the hotel 45 minutes later. She said it was intense, the water is very hot. But she made some little old lady friend, that showed her how to do everything.

Afterwords we went to a little curry shop. This place was great. We figured out which one was chicken, ordered that and asked for the chef's recommendation she suggested pork. The pork was divine, pork belly comes in a vat of curry for long enough to stay together but fall apart if you look at it to hard. The chicken was also good, but nothing compared to the pork.

After curry we went to sleep, as the next day would another early travel day.