High Road, Low Road

Just a real quick update to put out there to cover travels of the past couple weeks before I head out for the duration of this one (more about that later). First up is a bit of a quirky destination that came to Maia and I by way of one of her high school students when prodded about any interesting places they might know around Kitakyushu. Technically speaking, Inunaki Pass isn't is outside the city limits and closer to Fukuoka City than Kitakyushu, but it's not the pass's, uh, proximity to any metropolitan area that makes it interesting--it's the "fact" that Inunaki Pass is...HAUNTED!


The approach to the pass's tunnel is half overgrown with vines and other detritus. Scraped the car paint more than once. Getting onto and over the barrier that blocks the tunnel is ridiculously simple.

The pass's supposed haunting is a fairly well-documented phenomenon, with a short list of the ghosts inhabiting it and some background info to be found here. The newer pass tunnel has been open for some time and serves and a busy thoroughfare between Kitakyushu and Dazaifu. Can't say we saw any of the ghosts ("a woman in a white one-piece at the telephone box", fifth entry down on the bullet indexed list of ghosts at the top of the first linked page), but I did certainly feel the spirit of Robert Stack in me, yearning to understand the secret history of these man made Morlock tunnels.

Next, a trip up The Cupboard of the Gods! Let me explain. One geographic feature dominates the Kitakyushu skyline--Mt. Sarakura. Dividing the built-up metropolitan area of Kitakyushu from the sparsely populated karst plateaus to the south, Mt. Sarakura is a pretty awesome sight to have your city's back to. It's just that name is so damn ridiculous. You see, the kanji for "Sarakura" literally mean "dish storage". Dish Storage Mountain. I'm not making this up.


It's no monorail, but...wait, it's better--it's a funicular! Next, hazy in the late afternoon from all the water vapor collected after a shower, the pic here is of downtown Kitakyushu, the Kaimon Straight in the distance and the southern tip of Honshu, main island of the Japanese archipelago.

Being of infinite wisdom, and just a bit hungry, we decided to stop for lunch first and emerged from the restaurant just in time for a rainstorm. The one day we had to travel up the mountain...just lovely. We hit it anyways as a futile, symbolic gesture of shaking our fists at the heavens and paid a rather modest fee (comparatively) to ride the funicular to the top. As I get with my temporary obsessions, I literally spent hours studying funiculars of the world before stepping onto Mt. Sarakura's vehicle, and was more interested in the cable movements and passing track than the view. You really can't take me anywhere without a geek-out.


Welcome to Cafe 3po, home of the meticulously handcrafted cup of coffee and a man undoubtedly with horrendous back problems from sitting in a VW bus all day. By the way, '3' in Japanese is pronounced "san", so the name is "Sanpo" Cafe, not our favorite effeminate protocol droid.

Finally, a major breakthrough in the continuing journey of coffee exploration in Japan! Thanks to Fukuoka Class magazine we have discovered a small, but tasty network of roving coffee trucks that ply the mean streets of Fukuoka Prefecture and sampled two of them on Sunday. What's great is that these two are conveniently located in what Maia and I have decided is hands down the most awesome neighborhood in Fukuoka and, by extension, Kyushu. Yakuin (which basically means "pharmacy") boasts a strategic location adjacent to the always fabulous Tenjin district, at least one each Thai, Indian and Korean restaurant, a delicious bakery, cozy-looking bars and, as if to top it all off, the best bike shop I've found in Kyushu so far. Liked it so much I became a member.

--Matt