{"id":4677,"date":"2011-10-26T17:51:39","date_gmt":"2011-10-26T08:51:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/?p=4677"},"modified":"2012-04-10T00:18:30","modified_gmt":"2012-04-09T15:18:30","slug":"trip-to-iya-valley-pt-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/archives\/2011\/10\/26\/trip-to-iya-valley-pt-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Trip to Iya Valley, pt. 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last weekend, Sona, Roland<\/a> and yours truly decided to go do some exploring of that beautiful country we all live in. After some deliberations, we set our sights on Tokushima-ken in Shikoku<\/a>, more specifically: Iya valley. <\/p>\n

\"Awa<\/a> In addition to being a reasonably short and affordable bus ride away (2h30 from Kyoto to Tokushima city, another 2h to Iya proper), the region has a reputation as one of the last somewhat-preserved rural areas of Japan: lush nature aplenty, stunning mountain scenery and slightly less of the concrete horrors that litter every last corner of the Japanese countryside. The latter in particular was a big selling point, albeit taken with the healthy skepticism of someone who has seen his share of “scenic” Japanese countryside towns and “world-famous Unesco sites” consisting of a couple painfully preserved traditional houses surrounded by entire towns of nondescript gray buildings in all their aging 70s glory, along beaches littered with endless lines of tetrapods<\/a>…<\/p>\n

\"Miyoshi-shi\"<\/a> As it turns out, Iya valley might indeed offer some of the last shreds of unblemished rural landscape found in Japan (outside of 2-day hikes to remote mountainous parts of Gunma-ken or the like). In addition to largely unscathed landscapes, the constant mist and low-hanging clouds locked in by mountains on all sides contributed to give the whole area a distinct Lost Valley feel. <\/p>\n

Don’t get me wrong: local government is clearly hard at work finding new and inventive ways to lay down concrete anywhere they can and utilitarian, cheap & ugly<\/i> is the only zoning code local construction abides by. But on the scale of concrete addiction: if your average Japanese town is the worn-out crack whore who will blow you behind the city hall for a new four-lane expressway construction project, Iya would be the fresh-faced socialite who fashionably dabbles in cocaine but still has most of her youthful looks still on1<\/a><\/sup>In that overwrought simile, Tokyo is probably Keith Richards: pumped up full of chemicals, and oddly endearing for the sheer excess of it all.<\/span>.<\/p>\n

In short: it was awesome and a much needed break from suburban city life.<\/p>\n

It has been a while since I posted any real travel notes (instead of just plopping a bunch of pictures), so I thought I could make an effort this time. Behold: <\/p>\n

The Wondrous Adventures of Sona, Roland & Dave in Beautiful Iya Valley!<\/h3>\n

It all started on Friday night, when our bus dropped us at Tokushima station.<\/p>\n

to be continued<\/a>…<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last weekend, Sona, Roland and yours truly decided to go do some exploring of that beautiful country we all live in. After some deliberations, we set our sights on Tokushima-ken in Shikoku, more specifically: Iya valley. In addition to being a reasonably short and affordable bus ride away (2h30 from Kyoto to Tokushima city, another […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-japan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4677"}],"version-history":[{"count":26,"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4677\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5257,"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4677\/revisions\/5257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unknowngenius.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}