Japan 3.4: The hells of Unzen

Today we left early in the morning for Unzen.  It was a three hour drive, two of which was on the highway.  The toll charge ended up being $46. 

We ended up stopping at one observation platform as we went up the mountain towards Unzen.



The town of Unzen is fairly small, known for its natural hot springs.  It rained all day long and was quite breezy, so we decided to postpone our hike on the nearby mountain peaks to tomorrow, when it is supposed to rain, but not be as windy.  Instead, we walked throughout the town, visiting the hot springs.  As we were entering the area, we encountered our first temple of the trip.



The trails were beautiful, but it was strange to see tons of tubes intersecting throughout the areas of hot air rising from the ground.  It strongly smelled of rotten egg, but as we continued walking, we got used to it. 



We walked through the area twice.  Once was through a short route and once through a longer arcing route.  Our first time ended us in a central area where a group of teens were hanging around and playing with cats who were lounging about.  Miles went with Stephanie a little bit away, where people were taking their shoes off and putting their feet on the ground, to feel the heat.



We went for lunch nearby, before walking back to our hotel, to check in.



Just before the hotel, we stopped in a store that I had read gave lessons on how to make a local dessert.



This wafer waffle has been made for 120 years or so.  We all took turns making a few wafers.  Luckily, the store had a translator to explain some of the details to us.




After some rest in the room, we went back to the trails for our second go round.  We passed a cat working in an office.



To end our day, we ate dinner at a local restaurant operated by only one person, which had no English menu.  With a little help from the hit and miss google translate, we managed to figure out what some of the food on the menu was.  We were the only ones in the restaurant for quite a while.  Eventually, a New Zealander, who spoke impeccable Japanese, walked in and ordered.  We ended up chatting for a bit.  I told him about how I was surprised at the high toll costs.  He told us a story about how he drove from Tokyo to Kyushu, while sleeping in the back of his vehicle.  He said that the tolls totaled over 800, and that was decades ago!