This weekend Yoshi and I took a long hike on Sunday from Arima hot springs to Ashiya, just east of Kobe. It was a pretty long hike, but it was not too tough. We finished the whole thing in about four hours, so not bad.
The start of the hike was actually my first visit to Arima. It is a famous town in the area because of the local history behind the hot springs. There are apparently quite a few natural hot springs there, and some of them contain a lot of sulphur which may or may not be medicinal in nature. You could certainly smell the sulphur in the air while we walked through the town.
After buying a few provisions we started climbing Mt. Rokko from a different approach than I’ve tried before. It was a long, gradual climb, and it seemed like there was a lot of foot traffic going the other way. It made sense – take a long hike and then end at Arima for a hot bath. We were going the opposite direction, and that made for a lot of chances to say hello to people hiking.
We reached the summit of Mt. Rokko after about two hours of hiking, and at the top we sat down, had a cold beer and some lunch (that we had carried up the hill) and enjoyed watching people line up in front of the summit marker for pictures. It turned out that one of my students was hiking the opposite course, and while we lunched at the top he and his friends happened to walk by. They stopped and said hello, and we had a few snacks and chatted. It was a lucky chance to catch him during our break.
Next was a long, long downhill into Ashiya. The trail weaved through rocks and so there was a lot of jumping from rock to rock. At one point we bumped into an inoshishi (wild boar) who looked at us incuriously and moved on.
Once we arrived in Ashiya it was a short walk to JR station through neighborhoods with Mercedes Benz and BMW cars parked everywhere. Then we caught a train back to Sannomiya, and killed a little time shopping and drinking beer before we could meet up with Kuniko, Mamiko and Akira. After meeting them, we took a train to Sumiyoshi, and we took our first ride on the Rokkoliner, a tram that runs out to Rokko Island. The restaurant was actually near the Sheraton hotel, site of some pretty impressive wine tastings in the past.
The restaurant was called Rico, and served mostly Spanish food, and it was really good. The place was full of customers, but Yoshi had made a reservation for a table in the back, and started to chow down on all kinds of delicious foods: tapas, steamed mussels, grilled oysters, paella, and a bubbling garlic oil with mushrooms and peppers. Everything was great – and it really hit the spot after hiking all day.
Finally we wrapped things up and caught a bus back to Sannomiya from the Sheraton, and then it was back home and early to bed. I’m pretty tired out this morning, but duty calls, and I’ll head out in the cold to catch a train pretty soon.
