Chiba-ken, first weekend of October
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The first night in Japan, and Katsu Hana tonkatsu restaurant
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The flight into Narita was amazingly smooth. We watched Sarah Kittredge the American Girl and Mongol during the 11 hour flight. The Airbus 330 seats seemed narrower than usual making the long trip even less comfortable.
We arrived around 5pm on a Saturday, and proceeded downstairs to the JR station to exchange our JR passes. Our friend BH, her husband M-san and their youngest son, S-chan, came picked us up. We were introduced to BH husband, M-san, and their youngest son S-chan for the first time. S-chan of course was very shy of strangers.
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Katsu Hana Tonkatsu
The drive home to Kisarazu went through a toll highway costing about ¥2100, and took an hour. Instead of going home to Kisarazu, we made a detour further south to Kimitsu, where we stopped for our first Japanese food experience in Japan proper, with dinner at Katsu Hana restaurant at Kimitsu City, Nakano 4-3-1 (君津市 中野4-3-1).
Click here for a map.
A specialty restaurant in Kodawari tonkatsu, the food was presented in a more elaborate manner and with special ingredients. We tried these entrees, each comes with soup, rice, tsukemono and a bowl of sesame:
- 2 beef tenderloin tonkatsu (ヒレかつ定食) (small ¥1180, large ¥1580)
- a shrimp tonkatsu tray (海老御膳), large ¥1580
- a combo platter (波奈重箱御膳) of shrimp tonkatsu, pork fillet tonkatsu, chawanmushi, and a 3-item small bowl (海老かつ、ひれかつ、茶碗蒸し、小鉢4品付), ¥1580
- a kid portion of udon for S-chan, ¥630
M-san really liked fried food.
Suribachi and surikogi, the Japanese sesame mortar and pestle
It's here that we learned of the suribachi and surikogi, the Japanese version of the mortar and pestle used specifically for grating sesame seeds. They brought out these sets and we ground sesame seeds right at the table. Very easy to use, the just grated sesame released fresh aroma, heavenly! We thought this would be a big hit for my Mom at home. Later on during the trip we found this set sold at a couple places but because of me being releuctant to lug around stuff during the day while out and about, we missed buying this set to bring home, but we found several at Uwajimaya in Seattle, and also at Daiso in Vancouver Canada (imagine that you can find Daiso outside of Japan!).
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We finished dinner and left around 8pm.
At home, BH had prepared a tatami room upstairs for us, complete with futons! What a surprise, now we could claim that we've experienced half of the ryokan experience  .
The house is pretty new, only 15 years old. We slept with the windows curtains opened to see the sky and saw the occasional airplanes flying to Haneda/Narita airports. Cicada chirped through the night, but we were fast asleep.
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The Great Buddha of Nihon-ji, and Nokogiri mountain
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The next morning, a sunny Sunday, we woke up early around 6am. We began the day with a bowl of ramen for breakfast, then we were handed a thick book of sightseeing spots in Chiba, in Japanese of course. Browsing through, we found several places that poked our interests, including the Tokyo Bay Kannon, the sandy beaches along the south coastal areas, but standing out most for me was Nihon-ji (日本寺, Nhật Bản Tự), site of the biggest Buddha statue of pre-modern Japan, so we asked our friend BH-san to take us there, with other spots as secondary based on how the day progressed. M-san had been there, but BH-san had not, so it was a good opportunity for her and her kid to go for a nature walk too. We planned to be out and about all day.
Click here for the map. From Kisarazu we followed Route 127 south, which hugged the coast in many places, and went through a couple tunnels especially when we came closer to our destination. Along the drive we saw many beautiful bamboo groves and farming towns.
The best way to get to Nokogiri mountain is by car, as public transportation is rather inconvenient and infrequent for the usual foreign tourists. Then once arrived, the steep and lengthy climbs probably are also a good deterrence to the usual group tours, as we didn't see any tour buses there that day.
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Nokogiri-yama
Nokogiri Mountain (鋸山), 329 meters (login required to view this photo) at the highest point, is a mountain ridge that runs east-west from the western coast of Boso peninsula. The name means Saw Tooth Mountain. From the Muromachi to Edo periods, this was the site of the quarries that produced the famous Boshu stone. The quarried rock faces look like the blade of a saw, from which the name was derived. Another popular feature is the Jigoku Nozoki (地獄覗き) cliff, meaning peering into hell, for its lofty and precarious position from high up looking down at the thrilling sheer precipices below.
A bit on the terminology: mountain, or hill? In Japanese everything is yama 山, so they don't really differentiate. Translated to English however and we have 2 words to choose from. Throughout this trip, I'll follow what the Japanese used when they translated their names. Mt Nokogiri at its peak is more than 300 meters, so it qualifies as a mountain, more so because it has a clearly defined ridge.
There were 3 ways to get up the mountain and to Nihonji, which lied on the south side of Nokogiri Mountain. M-san picked the most fun route, which was a 4-minute ride on a ropeway cable car (680 meters long, adult ¥900 round trip) from the north-west. On recollection, we had M-san to thank for. Being a local of Chiba, he did know how to pick the most interesting route to fit a particular schedule.
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It was quite a nice day, and because we headed out early (9am), the area was not crowded at all, which couldn't be said when we left. Before we boarded the ropeway car, everyone stood in front of the car for a group photo taken by the attendants. On the way down you could buy this photo if you liked, inserted in a postcard. We did.
The cable car deposited us high up on the mountain ridge near the higest point of the mountain at , from there we could see the town of Hota and the low rolling mountains to the south of the interior Boso peninsula, and the Port of Hamakanaya (浜金谷) to the northwest, facing Uraga Channel, flanked by Miura peninsula and Boso peninsula on either side, connecting Tokyo Bay and the Pacific Ocean.
We then walked down to the West parking lot which also was the entrance to Nihonji. This parking lot could be accessed via a toll road, but using the cable car was a lot more fun. The entrance fee for Nihon-ji is ¥600 adult, ¥400 child. The history was printed at the back of the guide, I scanned it here if you can read Japanese. At the start of the descent we met several elderly folks back from the end of their day-pilgrim, and we were very impressed by their stamina and their sense of humor.
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| Kannon and Arhat statues
Along the descent to the Great Buddha plaza, there were numerous fascinating natural grottos shaped by the erosion of nature. These caves contained a total of 1553 Arhat (羅漢彫刻), Buddhas and Kannon stone statues, the highest number in the world. Of the Arhat statues, no two bear the same facial expression of joy, anger, grief or happiness. It's said that you should be able to find one resembling you or someone you know. If you can't find one, that means it's one of those headless statue.
These statues were carved, from stone brought by ship from Izu, by the master mason and artisan from now-Kisarazu, Ono Jingoro Eirei (大野甚五郎英令), who spent 21 years of his life (from 1779 to 1798) with 27 apprentices to accomplish this feat. In China there were smaller Arhat collections, such as in Huainan (Anhui province) (中華民国壞安大中寺) with 800 arhat statues (I couldn't confirm this yet), or Luohantang (room of Arhats) in Chengdu containing 576 statues.
Many of these statues were desecrated. According to this website, the destruction started from the Shinto-Buddhism religious violences in the Meiji period, but the vandalism continued as late as in the 1930s, after all the statues had been restored in the years before, mostly due to superstition. Kaizan Nakazato (1885-1944) in his long unfinished historic novel Daibosatsutoge wrote "People could always find a face that resembled somebody they loved. If they could take that head without anyone's knowing and secretly worship it, they were supposed to get their wish fulfilled".
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| Hyakushaku Kannon (百尺観音, A Hundred shaku Kannon)
In the ravines under Jigoku-no-zoki cliff, close to the North entrance to the mountain, was Hyakushaku-Kannon (Bách Xích Quan Âm, Quan Âm Trăm Thước, or about 30.3 meters). A relief cut into a rock alcove, this image was completed in 1966 after 6 years. A memorial service for the war dead was held here once, and another memorial for the recently increased number of traffic victims took place here as well. Enshrined as the protector of traffic safety, this Kannon image had been the place for worshipping by many.
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Nihonji and the Great Buddha
This Daibutsu (大仏, Đại Phật) is one of the top 3 Medicine Buddha statues in Japan. It is a representation of Yakushi Nyorai (the Medicine Buddha, the Buddha of Healing, Dược Sư Như Lai). The sitting statue was carved into the side of Nokogiri mountain, and, at 31.05 meters in height which is twice the size of the Kamakura Daibutsu and Nara's Todaiji Daibutsu, is the tallest stone-carved pre-modern Buddha in Japan. In comparison, Todaiji Daibutsu (18.18 meters) is the world's tallest bronze Buddha, followed by the Kamakura bronze Daibutsu (13.35 meters). The Nihon-ji Temple itself dates back to 725 AD.
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Master craftsman Ōno Jingorō Eirei (大野甚五郎英令) and his 27 apprentices completed the original statue in 1783 AD after 3 years. Amazingly the statue was only recently restored after a four-year effort which completed in 1969. Getting down to the daibutsu takes 2,639 granite steps, the 2nd longest such approach in Japan. Walking this many steps gave us enough physical exercise and made us really felt like a pilgrim, at least for the day. Our bodies still felt it a coupe days later.
The vast plaza is peaceful, quiet, with people relaxing under the arbor and on the benches scattered around, calmly taking in the greatness of the place. The place was very inducing to contemplation and self-reflection.
In the plaza close by the offering well was a statue of Onegai Jizo (お願い地蔵). This Jizo granted the wish of many. The worshippers would write the name of the person they want to pray for onto the small Jizo statue bought at the shop next by and place at the foot of the Jizo altar.
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Dango
Back to the waiting line for the ropeway car trip back down the mountain, there was a stall selling dango on skewers. They were lightly sweet dumpling rice balls on skewers. When you ordered, they were then coated in a soy sauce syrup and briefly grilled on a charcoal fire. We tried 2 flavors one of which was sakura. This was our first taste of them and we thought they were fun to eat, but not something we were drawn to. Read more about it here. On the coming days we would see a lot more of them sold on the streets like snacks, with some varieties.
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Fujiyoshi restaurant (藤よし)
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| Leaving Nihon-ji, we followed Route 34 east, cutting across the Boso peninsula towards Kamogawa which was on the Pacific side of the peninsula. Route 34 ended at the junction with coastal route 128 which ran north-south along the Pacific coast. Here we headed north and pulled in for lunch at Fujiyoshi restaurant; the full name was Fujiyoshi, serving delicious food from Boso (房総美味いもの屋 藤よし, pronounce ボウソウウマイモノヤ フジヨシ).
Click here for a map, the address is Chiba-ken, Kamogawa city, Yokosuka 1222-1 (千葉県鴨川市横渚1222-1), and go here for more information including which JR train to take, phone number etc.
The restaurant served sashimi (刺身), tempura (天ぷら) and other cooked food, all using local seafood from the South Boso (南房総) peninsula. Per the website, things that can only be found in South Boso are on their menu, such as the sangayaki (山河焼き) which can be thought of as a fried mackerel burger patty: fresh horse mackerel finely minced with miso, shiso and scallions into a namero (which is edible at this stage, like maguro, if you can eat raw), then pan-fried. There is a recipe at this blog. Sashimi were fresh from the local fishermen such as maguro, bonito, warasa (middle-sized yellowtail), kinmedai (金目鯛), akamutsu (赤むつ, Doederleinia berycoides).
Well, we didn't try the sangayaki, but we sure had great sashimi and tempura. Our friend and I ordered the Osusume (¥2100), my wife had a 海鮮丼 (Kaisendon seafood don, ¥1890), M-san ordered a tempura tray (¥1680) and S-chan had a kid lunch set (¥840). It was all very delicious. My seafood soup was served in a teapot, which was kept heated, then poured into a bowl and drank with a squeeze of lemon. The miso soup bowl is a common miso soup with shredded daikon. The 2 braised chunks of fish were very good that I insisted my wife to try, which went very nicely with rice.
You could have all the rice you want, there was a serving station in the middle of the restaurant where you just took your rice bowl there and filled up with more.
Kamogawa beach
Leaving the restaurant, we continued north on Route 128 which ran along the Pacific Ocean side. Along the way we passed by Kamogawa Sea World, and finally pulled into a beach parking lot.
Click here for the location map.
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The beach was pretty nice, though the sand can't compare to that on the North Carolina Atlantic beaches. We heard that the waves here were among the biggest in Chiba, but that afternoon the sea was pretty calm and there wasn't much of a surf. We stood at the end of a sea wall that provided protection from erosion as well as tsunami. Nearby there was the Tokyu Group's Surf-Side Kamogawa Resort (サーフサイド鴨川).
That afternoon there was a beach party going on for a local high school's surfing club. The speakers loudly broadcast lively comments by the KCQS DJ's on the surfing actions, while other folks were just enjoying the weekend and having fun with friends and family. We stayed around for half an hour, long enough for S-chan to soak his pants playing in the waves. We then started home as BH had a meeting at 5pm at her workplace.
The Vietnamese community in Japan
We went home for BH and S-chan to change their wet clothes, then went to the nursery where BH worked. There are not a lot of Vietnamese in Japan, which is not surprising considering the mono-culture tendency there. The local nursery store in Kisarazu was owned by a Vietnamese family. There we chatted with the owner and learned more about the community, then just scrolled about looking at the types of plants on sale there. The nursery is not specilized in big trees, but focusing on small pot plants which were what locals buy mostly any way. The owner Mr. Minoru's wife gave us a whole box of delicious persimmons (種無し柿) as a gift.
Pears and Grapes
Talking about fruits, it's pear season, and oh my, those big pears we saw in the local markets, they easily measured 6 inches across! And grapes (budo), here we were able to eat the kyoho grapes (or one of their breeded varieties) not found in the States, they were big, the skin was almost black and chewy and thus they were normally peeled off and not eaten, the taste was sweet and different than what we are used to. Now I feel so fortunate.
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Nabe (Hot Pot, Lẩu) for dinner
On the way home from the nursery, we stopped at Apita department store to buy ingredients for nabe (鍋物, hot pot, or Lẩu in Vietnamese cooking), a comfort food often eaten in colder time. The ingredients included yakitofu, enoki and bunashimeji mushrooms, clams, 真たち (white pieces of true cod), negi (Japanese leek) and hakusai (napa cabbage). 真たち was not just good for nabe, they could also be used to make tasty tempura.
They had clay pots made just to cook nabe, you could find them in Japanese stores in the US as well.
At the end of dinner, the left over soup was combined with cooked rice and raw eggs, thoroughly mixed up, and divided up among ourselves. That was how it's usually done.
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