Trip to Mito
Sep. 8th, 2008 12:24 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
aideMito was fun. :D There wasn't really much to see... it's a city just like anywhere else in Japan but the ride out was nice. Mito is the capital of Ibaraki prefecture so it's mostly an administrative city. I think Ibaraki is known for it's agriculture because there were lots of farms and crops along the train tracks. It looked like it was threatening to rain but it was faster than me so it was finished by the time I got to Mito.
I did a little bit of research to find out what there was to do in Mito before I left and so I went out and found a map and looked at the area. On of Japan's three best gardens are in Mito but I didn't know how far away they were so I had to check it out. There was a map that showed some walking courses you could take so I went and found the Mito Castle Ruins one and followed that. It took me an hour or so to finish it because I stopped to read everything!
Mito used to be a Tokugawa stronghold of the Mito clan way back in the day so there were statues and memorials for all these Tokugawa people all over the city. This is grave of one of the Tokugawa's but I couldn't read which one. It's just sitting there on the side of the road next to a parking lot. I walked up the hill afterwards to find the ruins of Mito Castle but there aren't any ruins left. It's all been constructed over with schools so there were just signs about what used to be there.
When I was stopped to read a sign about the Ohtemon Gate of Mito Castle that used to stand over this bridge, some old grandpa came up and talked to me! He asked where I lived (assuming I didn't live in Japan, I guess) and he told me that the gate used to be right where we stood and now it's at the other end of the road in the teacher's college and he goes there to see it sometimes. And then just walked off... hahaha. I love old people sometimes.
This gingko tree (or maidenhair in English) is at one end of the historical walking route and there are references to this tree in some documents from three hundred years ago. It's one of the historical points of Mito city.
This is Mito Art Tower. It's part of a complex that contains a theatre, art gallery and exhibition space that was built in 1990. It's the most modern looking thing around and they built it to make Mito a "modern city". There was a patch of nice green grass out front with families playing on it with their kids.
I walked a LOT that day... I stopped in a bookstore to buy a map book because it was hard to follow on the pictures I took of the big map at the station which proved to be really helpful! I'm going to get a lot of use out of it since it has some maps of Chiba as well. I walked down one of the main roads with lots of shops, old and new. A lot of the older ones were closed though, it was getting late and also Sunday. I walked 2km to the gardens but then it was already 5pm by that time... I wandered around the famous gardens for a bit but wasn't that impressed. It should be much better then the plum forest is in bloom. Then I took the bus back to the station and took the train for 2.5 hours back to Kashiwa.
The rest of my pictures are on Photobucket.
I did a little bit of research to find out what there was to do in Mito before I left and so I went out and found a map and looked at the area. On of Japan's three best gardens are in Mito but I didn't know how far away they were so I had to check it out. There was a map that showed some walking courses you could take so I went and found the Mito Castle Ruins one and followed that. It took me an hour or so to finish it because I stopped to read everything!
Mito used to be a Tokugawa stronghold of the Mito clan way back in the day so there were statues and memorials for all these Tokugawa people all over the city. This is grave of one of the Tokugawa's but I couldn't read which one. It's just sitting there on the side of the road next to a parking lot. I walked up the hill afterwards to find the ruins of Mito Castle but there aren't any ruins left. It's all been constructed over with schools so there were just signs about what used to be there.
When I was stopped to read a sign about the Ohtemon Gate of Mito Castle that used to stand over this bridge, some old grandpa came up and talked to me! He asked where I lived (assuming I didn't live in Japan, I guess) and he told me that the gate used to be right where we stood and now it's at the other end of the road in the teacher's college and he goes there to see it sometimes. And then just walked off... hahaha. I love old people sometimes.
This gingko tree (or maidenhair in English) is at one end of the historical walking route and there are references to this tree in some documents from three hundred years ago. It's one of the historical points of Mito city.
This is Mito Art Tower. It's part of a complex that contains a theatre, art gallery and exhibition space that was built in 1990. It's the most modern looking thing around and they built it to make Mito a "modern city". There was a patch of nice green grass out front with families playing on it with their kids.
I walked a LOT that day... I stopped in a bookstore to buy a map book because it was hard to follow on the pictures I took of the big map at the station which proved to be really helpful! I'm going to get a lot of use out of it since it has some maps of Chiba as well. I walked down one of the main roads with lots of shops, old and new. A lot of the older ones were closed though, it was getting late and also Sunday. I walked 2km to the gardens but then it was already 5pm by that time... I wandered around the famous gardens for a bit but wasn't that impressed. It should be much better then the plum forest is in bloom. Then I took the bus back to the station and took the train for 2.5 hours back to Kashiwa.
The rest of my pictures are on Photobucket.
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Date: 2008-09-08 08:38 pm (UTC)