Kyushu Part 1- Fukuoka

So Monday morning bright and early Liz and I, after a false start, walked down to Kanazawa station to begin our epic train ride. It is 3 hours by JR Express to Osaka, then another 3 hours by Shinkansen from Osaka to Fukuoka (Hakata) in Northern Kyushu.

Temple Cat

For those whose geography is a little suspect, Kyushu is the furthest south of the four Home Islands. It is the third largest in size, and second largest in population, after Honshu, of course.

Fukuoka is the population and industrial center of Kyushu, but it is not much of a tourist destination. That fact, combined with our arriving pretty late in the day, conspired to prevent any serious attempts at sight seeing. We did check out Canal City, which could well be the worlds coolest mall. I mean heck, it has a canal in the middle! We also ate dinner there, at an excellent Indian restaurant.



I awoke early the next morning, but Lizzie wasn't about to budge before 8, so I headed out into a misty wet morning to explore the area and check out a few temples that were nearby. I had a pleasent time, it was a warm morning, but not too warm. Pretty muggy though, but not to the point of discomfort. Wandering the backstreets for an hour or so was interesting, but I was eager to get moving to more fascinating places.

A rainy morning

So once we devoured a continental breakfast at the hotel we crossed the street to the rail station and bought tickets for a much more interesting and photogenic city, Nagasaki.