Shimane - Tottori Road Trip

After letting N'Bow go ahead posting some pictures and story (in Thai), now it's my turn....

This trip was totally of a sudden plan. It happened only because of Jill (big thanks, big thanks). Since Jill will start working soon, we need to make the most out of her free time now. We final confirmed our green light for the trip sometime on Thursday. I went ahead to book for the rental car. Only that we found out later one of our original trip members dropped out!!! oh shoot!!! new member finding session!!! Everyone seemed to be so busy this weekend, so the spot went to Mr.Kee who was apparently still in Tokyo at that moment!! (ใจง่ายมากๆนะคุณ.. ยังไม่ได้รู้เร้ยยยว่าจะไปไหน .. แต่ตอบมาแล้วว่า"ไปด้วย")

N'Bow and I spent a night at Jill's place in Osaka. So our journey officially started early morning of Saturday, May 20th. We swang by to get Kee who just arrived back to Kyoto early that morning at a nearby train station. It started pouring badly, but we believed the sun would shine later on cuz the weather forecast said so. And it did. We stopped by for brunch at one of the service areas on the highway before proceeding to our first destination, Adachi Mesuem of Art in Yasugi city, Tottori Prefecture.

We arrived at Adachi Mesuem of Art around 1 p.m., with total of around 4 hours drive. Jill found this museum in one of the brochures and we thought it should be quite interesting, not knowing it was ranked the best for Japanese Garden out of the whole country for consecutive 3 years (2003-2004-2005). The best part was that they give special discount for foreigners!! Original entrance fee was 2200 yen (soooo expensive!!), but with University student card, we got the student rate + 50% on top, so we ended up paying only 850 yen ;-) Bravo!! The garden part was indeed VERY beautiful. Much, much better than any Japanese Garden I have seen before. They cleverly use the mountains in the surrounded areas as the garden backdrop, enhancing the beauty of the garden itself.

one of the most famous spots of the garden
Japan's best Japanese Garden at Adachi Museum of Art
We swang by for quick lunch at the nearby Home-made soba restaurant for Wari-ko Soba, the famous menu of Shimane Prefecture. I guess it's really famous, cuz everywhere we passed by in this prefecture, we found lots of soba places.

Shimane Prefecture's famous menu: Home-made Wariko Soba
Then, we went all the way to Matsue, the capital city of Shimane Prefecture. One attraction was Matsue Castle. However, we didn't enter the castle ground, but took a stroll along Horigawa River running around the castle instead. Matsue is a small town with very peaceful street atmosphere. We loved it there, but wouldn't dare living. It's tooo quiet!! =P

traditional house surrounding Matsue Castle

old pine trees

sightseeing boat ride

Matsue is also famous for beautiful sunset at Lake Shinji. 　Timing was perfect! The sun was about to set. We rushed to the north side of the lake trying to find Yomega island, the famous sunset spot. But....... what we found was.....

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someone, please find the island for us!!!!

We honestly thought we were tricked by the guidebook!!! Or maybe the photographer to the guidebook was too good to snap an overly beautiful sunset picture for publishing! We were totally disappointed. (T_T)

But.... we hung in there, gave it another try and detoured to the south side of the lake. Great decision! No... no... they didn't trick us... There was indeed such spot!! Just by the time we reached there, there were quite a few cameramen, as well as the NHK reporters already. We were truly satisfied ^^

(credit: Kee)

Our day doesn't end just that. We still have one more stop before checking in the hotel --　Misugi Shigeru Road at Sakaiminato City. It's just a road, why go see?? Because -- it's the hometown to the writer of Q-taro little ghost (ผีน้อยคิวทาโร่). We got there quite late and everything closed already. But because it was also the opened road, we still could take some pictures with the sculptures.

here we go ... Q-Taro kun

Eventhough Sakaiminato city is one of the biggest ports for fisheries, we ended up at MOS BURGER for dinner!!! Haha. Well, still much better than bento at Lawson!! (What a poor trip!!! haha)

We reached Kaike Onsen and our Kaike Seaside Hotel to find out how cute this town was at around 9 p.m.! Our hotel was by the beachfront and people walking to and back from the beach through our hotel in Yukata. (Most of them were in couple though... -"-) The hotel, the onsen, the price and EVERYTHING were just sooo great there. Highly recommended hotel is you are to go there.


We began out new day (May 22, 2006) with beautiful morning scenery of the beach. Really reminded me of Hua Hin :) The sunrise should be very beautiful there, but we didn't even attempted to wake up to see since now sun starts rising at 4 a.m.!!! No way waking up that early!!! haha =P

highly influenced by Thai TV program last friday.
(ผลลัพธ์จากการดูแฟนพันธุ์แท้ ตอน มนุษย์ห้าสี <-- ชื่อจริงๆมันเรียกว่าอะไรนะ??)

Then, moved to Ueda Shoji Mesuem of Photography, Jill's most-wanted-to-see museum. When I drove into the parking lot, I though "Oh... what? ... here?". It was in the back of the building where we parked and it just left me with question marks in my head. But once we entered the mesuem, it was a totally different atmosphere. The museum houses series of photographs by Ueda Shoji, the famous photographer in both Japan and France whose famous sets of pictures were those of human and sand dunes. The Museum building was designed by Takamatsu Shin, also a famous architecture in Japan.

famous spot of the museum.
Similar to Adachi Mesuem of Art, this museum also plays with the natural beauty, using Daisen (大山) as the architecture background.

Then, we intended to go find something for lunch, but our lovely car navigator brought us up Daisen and went through the mountain route where we couldn't find anything as expected. But... we got to see what ski resorts look like during the off-ski season!! We went soooo high up the mountain which was quite scary ... but indeed beautiful.

some parts even gave us western atmosphere!

Lunch.. lunch.. lunch... where's lunch?!?! We all were sooo hungry, but we couldn't find any good restaurant along the way. Or well... actually.. we were looking for SUGIYA, the beef rice bowl place!!! haha.. yeah.. yeah.. "sugiya". But please don't laugh yet. It was N'Bow!!!! She has been craving for beef rice bowl for a while. Then Kee agreed. Last night after we left Mos Burger, we found one Sugiya along the way. Also this morning. So we (or well, I), didn't want to swing by any restaurant too early cuz we might find more sugiya along the way. But I guess there weren't that many eating places along Route 9 anyways, so we ended up making a stop at an unknown parking area along the way.

Just then... we found out lots of "Detective Conan" postures and scultures. Even imprinted on the souvenirs. Jill asked the restaurant cashier and got the answer why. The little town is a hometown of Conan's writer!! Whah.....~~ another interesting, yet unexpected stop. ^^

Kee and Shinichi Kudo, Conan being turn little

Then, it's time to our final and main destination of the trip .... ta tan~~ "Tottiry Sakyu" or "Tottori Sand Dune", the only sand dune in Japan. We were really looking forward to seeing this sand dune, but didn't want to hold that high expectation of it (good experience from the sunset scene the day before... whah...!) But... it was indeed very impressive and we had the perfect weather of all!!

Tottori Sand Dune
The green area in the back is OASIS

= Poor Camel =
our mission's accomplished!! =P
(original Ueda Shoji's work)
He seems to have a great rest

beautiful landscape at Tottori Sand Dune
Sandboard

I also wanted to try such sandboarding, but once I witnessed, I think I rather not risk hurting myself! Nearly everyone fell down (more or less)!! And there wasn't any ankel support either. Though it looks really fun!! Maybe if I'm brave enough, I might give it a try. hoho...

After taking some rest and tasting some Pear Products, the famous food of the area, we left Tottori aiming to go home. Guidebook said it takes 3 hours and a half to reach back to Osaka from Tottori Sakyu, but it took us 5!!! Why? Because we challenged the car navigator and followed the street sign instead. Actually it should have taken us 4 or 41/2 hours not getting on highway, but we challenged the car navigator too much during the last hour. The street went completely dark as we were driving on the mountain route, in and out Osaka, Kyoto and Hyogo Prefectures. I couldn't believe I drove 5 hours straight with only a breif toilet break. But we managed to save a fortune from high way and not loosing much time. Also, everyone stayed awake and kept me company during the whole ride, which I was and still am very thankful for. If I got on the highway, maybe noone stayed up talking to me during the drive!! haha. (actually it was my trick.. =P)

The trip was VERY, VERY fun. I really had a great time. Thank Jill, N'Bow and Kee for being such great company. I never drove that long hours and everyone stayed up singing, chatting and telling stories. Oh... and as Jill requested.. I need to post one last picture --->

Our heartbreaking 410 yen spent for parking lot fee at Tottori Sakyu!!!
(Because we didn't have to pay any parking fee at all during the whole trip.
It was only at this place that we needed to pay. BUT why it's heartbreaking?
BECAUSE .... just right after we got off the car, we saw HUGE sign saying
"FREE PARKING" on the opposite side of the street!!! sigh.. sigh.. sigh.. T_T)

ทริปนี้สนุกสนานมาก เกิดจากความไม่ได้ตั้งใจ แต่ว่าได้ดั่งใจ (หรืออาจจะมากกว่า) ฮากันแตกและเส้นตื้นกันตลอดทริป ขอบคุณจิ๋ว น้องโบว์ แล้วก็กี้ ที่อยู่เป็นเพื่อนกันตลอดเส้นทางการขับรถนะจ้ะ

ขอบคุณจิ๋ว... ที่หาที่เที่ยวให้เราไปกัน ช่วยอ่านโบรชัวร์ แผนที่ แล้วก็มีเรื่องขำขันให้ฮากันตลอดทาง (ไม่เอาๆ... ไม่พูดเรื่องหน่อไม้.. ฮาฮา)

ขอบคุณน้องโบว์... ที่สามารถเที่ยวได้แม้จะลืมกล้องถ่ายรูปก็ตาม.. (ฮาฮา.. ซ้ำเติมๆ) แล้วก็ขอบคุณในความบ้าจี้มากๆ เธอจะส่งเสียงร้องเพลงตลอดเวลา แม้แต่เวลาพูดเรื่องร้านอาหาร.. ถ้าอยากให้เธอเงียบ กรุณาเปิดเพลงที่เธอร้องไม่เป็น (ซึ่งมีน้อยมากกกก) หรือไม่ก็ขับรถให้ส่ายเข้าไว้ เพราะเธอจะหลับได้ในทันที

ขอบคุณกี้... ที่ใจง่ายมากกกกกก ตอบตกลงมาด้วยกันโดยที่ยังไม่รู้ด้วยซ้ำว่าจะไปไหน แล้วขอบอกว่าคุณอึดมาก ภายในวันเดียวสามารถเคลื่อนตัวเองจากฝั่งขวาสุดของเกาะ มายังฝั่งซ้ายสุดของเกาะได้ ไม่เหนื่อยเลยเหรอไงพ่อคุณ?? ขอบคุณเลยไปถึงขาตั้งกล้องแสนดีของกี้ด้วย ทำให้เราได้รูปสวยๆมาเพียบเลยนะ รอเจอกันอีกทีทริปหน้า ไปไหนไม่รู้ เมื่อไหร่ก็ไม่รู้ แต่ไว้เจอกัน.. ^^