It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to deduce the primary employer in Hitachinaka! This conurbation of several cities has numerous factories mostly based on construction equipment but electronics/tech is also represented.
We start by taking the shuttle bus to the shopping centre, not relevant to us of course, but a good place to start our day’s adventure. As we walk we pass an interesting shrine and spend a few minutes in it’s beautiful garden before continuing.
The are is very rural and we feel as thought we’re back on the lanes around Cawthorne, the similarities are striking. Only the occasional bamboo copse reminds us we’re not in Yorkshire, oh and the lack of hills!
Passing many beautiful homes and stunning blossom, we arrive at our first intended destination, supposedly one of the top three shrines in Japan, but really – who writes this stuff? It certainly didn’t look the part. Nonetheless we look around before heading off towards intended destination number two.
In doing so we pass an altogether more beautiful looking shrine, which we peek at from the steps, and then discover the sliding doors are not locked. We hesitate briefly, and a suited man appears as if from knowhere, and points to our shoes, clearly suggesting we’re OK to go in as long as … So we remove and then enter this exquisite shrine. A young monk follows us in, we have little shared language be he’s clearly happy that we are there.
We don’t outstay our welcome and it’s a good job too as we’ve not tied our laces before a funeral party passes us on the steps. Wonder what granny would have said about the two gatecrashers?
Our walk takes us through more delightful countryside and also some more built up areas with lovely blossom.
We eventually reach our next planned shrine quite close to the coast, take a look around and then walk the coast-road back towards the Holiday Park.
It’s not how it sounds, some kind of Butlins experience, in fact it is the Hitachi gardens which is some 870 acres of spectacular parkland, a wonderful gardens, forest, lakes and hillsides.
We wander around, covering all the different areas, and finish up on the hillside with over five million cornflower-blue blossoms, it is a wonderful experience.
All we have left to do is find a way out of the park, and walk the port road back to Quest. This involves passing numerous factories, including Hitachi’s 2 mile long digger plant, we want to get across but cannot, and have to walk past and back before we can head in the right direction.
As we walk along the dockside we see a sea of Subaru – thousands all lined up, presumably ready for export.
After pizza lunch we watch a fabulous silver band play for our departure, even marching along the quay with us as we slowly pull away. Then it’s jacuzzi until time for the the staff appreciation event – this is a very cut-down version of what used to be called epicurean, but the most important thing is we get to say a huge thank you to the staff who have looked after us these last two weeks. Of course, we will do it again in fourteen nights, but for the majority tonight is their last and they leave Quest in Yokohama tomorrow.
Dinner is a complete change of direction for us, we don’t really go to Colonnade for any food, but we are tempted to sample the Chinese menu, and enjoy duck roll, dim sum, egg-drop soup, sechuan chicken and sweet & sour prawns, all yummy!
The show is Corlea again, with her fiancée as well. it starts out great but we don’t really enjoy the change of direction – of course others may well love it!
