#52 Escaping Ochozu Falls, Saga, Japan

Transcript

Alright, this is part two of an epic, crazy, daily adventure that I had in Japan. So, see last episode for details, but if you're jumping in here, or if you just want a brief recap, so I saw a waterfall on Google Maps and I was like, cool, I think I can get there. It's in Saga. That's the area next to Fukuoka. I should be able to take a train, sort of kind of more or less there. And then the train didn't get me as close as I expected, but I was like, that's alright, I got time in the day, I'll just hoof it on foot. So, at this point, I was approaching this mountain where the waterfall is, and it was starting to get a little difficult to figure out where to go. But I started heading up through the mountain toward a campsite, to Ochozu Falls. And at this point, I was still, you know, it was pretty confident. It's like, hey, these roads are pretty well maintained, or it's like a little paved path, but then it started getting a little like, hmm, there is no one else here. And oh, this thing marked on Google Maps, this doesn't exist. And now I got to try to figure out my own method. And it was starting to get tricky. So, let's rejoin the adventure, where I'm deeper into the mountain, and things start getting weird. Oh, man, yeah, like I was saying earlier about the insane height of the mountains, and like, how could a person ever? How could you ever? I don't have a very clear view from here. I just got to sort of peer between the trees, but I do have a clear view of the top from here, though I've learned in the past that it can be very deceiving. But yeah, I'm real high up, and it just happened to sort of inadvertently. It doesn't feel like that big of a deal. I think I'm, if I had to guess, I think I'm about three-fifths of the way up this mountain. And it wasn't hard at all. It's just, just happened, while going up the path.

Yeah, wonder, I mean, I know with main Google Maps, they have the cars that drive around and take video of cities, so it's very accurate. I don't know how stuff like this gets laid out. I also suspect maybe Japan is a little behind the times. I don't know how Google Maps works, really, but I know in 2019, it was not possible to download an offline map in Japan. It was really annoying. It's nice that you can now. I kind of assume it's one of those things how like Japan is vaguely antagonistic toward Airbnb and quite antagonistic toward Uber, as I understand. So I think it was just a similar thing. They're just like, no, no, no, we don't need these Google Maps, and then they're coming around slowly. So maybe the maps are not at the point they could have been at. But anyway, I found this point where it's the first time I found something on Google Maps that is definitely wrong, and like a hundred percent wrong. So this road I was following, before I got to where the fork was supposed to be, the road just kind of ended, you know. It seemed like it was like a construction's not done, but construction's never going to be done because there's no way to proceed. It was like really steep and a big gorge and it's like, nope, this is the end of this. And then it went down from there. It did take a turn and go down. And I'm like, well, going down, that cannot be proper. So I backed up a little because there was a stone path that headed up into the woods, also not quite in the right direction, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything on a mountain. You know, you just got to go up the mountain, however you're able to go up the mountain. But it was very spider web heavy. Like no one has been here in a while. So I thought maybe again, my idea of directness was getting in my way. It's like, ah, so what if the road's going down? Maybe it goes down and loops around. Let's just go down for a bit. But I went down for a bit until it was very clear that this blue dot was going exactly the wrong way. And it was belining straight for that lake I saw earlier. So that makes sense that this connects to that lake because it seemed weird that you just get to the lake and the path would end. So that's the through line from the lake. So I just had to go back to the spider route, the stone path, and just put my faith in the gods above. So I just went up and carefully ducked under all the spider webs in it, curved and curved and twisted and twisted. And then luckily got me to the road I was trying to get to a fork to connect with. So I am on that road now. And it's got the mirrors, you know, so you can see around the corners and these like steep mountain roads.

But the sign underneath the mirror says something in an arrow pointing up at the mirror. 5:00 It is so weathered and rusted more than I've ever seen. And there's just random debris on the road, branches and stuff. I will be fucking shocked if I see a car come down this road at any point. Oh, and here's a hiking path. I think I, this is probably the one that I passed earlier. Yeah, earlier I walked past a hiking path. And now here is a hiking path exiting onto the road.

It's probably the same one. But yeah, on the old mountain road, back on the route to the campgrounds. It's three o'clock now. It's time to slip in a way more and more. I mean, I think I'm back back on the route. But this is starting to get diced here and diced here of like, maybe I'm really not going to make it. I mean, once again, now I think I will. But just who knows, who knows what's going to happen. But yeah, this little line, this little line on Google, it ain't right. That is not what happens. That line doesn't exist. And there's another line there that is not labeled at all. See, it kind of felt like way back in the day if you ever read the Steve Jackson sorcery books. I think you can get, yeah, you can get online versions of them now too. But reading them in paper, it's like a two-year-old adventure about way more intense with character sheets and stats and everything. And there would be times when it's just like, hey, you don't have the right key or you don't have the right secret word or you don't have the right whatever. And as the flames rise up and fucking envelop you, unfortunately your adventure is over. And that's what I was thinking. Like, shit, I thought everything was going well. I thought things were falling into place. I thought I was going to make it. But maybe my adventure is over. Maybe there's all of a sudden. It's just like, damn, things just aren't connecting up anymore. What's going on? Maybe I just got to turn back. But luckily it all worked out.

And if I do come back this way, it's kind of neat to see that there's that other path. And then that the road goes down to that lake. But this is a, this is a significant journey. I seriously doubt I'll be taking this route to get back because it looks like the other exit passed the fishing pond. And then there is kiseki restaurant listed. Even just the fact that they mention a restaurant.

But there are no fucking restaurants up here. I am alone in the mountains. I have not seen a single sign of anyone else ever being here. Now it's not true. I mean, before I was obviously just on some access road. And now I'm on a real road with guardrails and mirrors.

And yeah, still, man, fuck if I see a cargo by, I'll suck a monkey's dick. It's not going to happen. Thank God I started quite early today because yeah, you just cannot have too much time in the day that it's already getting to be this much of a squeeze is not what I expected to happen. I'm real close though. Surely, surely to fuck I'll make it.

Alright, I made it to the crossroads. So I can go up to the campsite.

Man, that was seriously eerie. That was the most alone I've ever felt in Japan while being on a real road. Oh, look at this too. You can't even go all four ways. If I was to continue on to the west, which of course eventually leads to a Buddhist temple.

And on and on and on to other stuff. But it's blocked off for cars. Man, so I was just saying how spooky this route was. I bet that one's fucking double spooky if cars aren't even allowed on there. Yeah, that road I was on. I mean, when I've been in the woods, obviously, obviously I'm on my own out there, but that feels natural. That's the point of the woods. That was so eerie because it's a fully formed mountain road. And not only just that I happened to be there while there's no one there, you could just tell from all the branches on the ground. And just even the leaves on the road. I mean, there were more leaves at the edges than in the center. It's clear somebody drives on that road, you know, probably a little bit every day, but not often and not in a while. So it really felt like a zombie apocalypse version of being on a mountain road in Japan. It's like, Jesus, what the fuck? 10:00 And then about halfway down, there was like a big wooden sign with like a cartoon happy family. Like, yay, there we here you are. You're at this thing. But there was nothing around. What are you talking about? What are you referring to? There were some paths that went up into the mountains that of course did not explore. I don't know. Maybe just if I just went a little bit out of the way, there was some amazing big fucking family jamboree place. But it felt like, like did somebody put this sign here as a joke? Did they put this sign here just to be scary? Because it just gave it even more of a zombie apocalypse feeling. It felt like the world had fucking ended and I'm walking down this fucking mountain road. This fucking seriously eerie.

But now I'm on the road up to a nice parking sign on Google Maps, then a campsite, then a cho-zoo falls. And as you can plainly hear, I'm walking next to water. It's only 320.

If I make it there in the next hour, I'm all good. And I think I'll make it there sooner than that. So I think we're back on track. I think we're gonna make it. This has been a pretty great little adventure. This is all right. But it was a little 50-50 there for sure. Like, is this just gonna fall apart? Is this just gonna crumble in my fingers? Oh, here's parking and here's a campsite sign.

Let's see what you got for me sign. I think I see a map. I could sure go for that instead of me trying to navigate on my own. Oh my god, and there's a car driving up behind me.

And it's not driven by zombies. Conformation, the world's okay, everything's all right.

All right, all right, all right. No English on the sign, but that's fine. I am down here at the bottom by the parking. There's a happy family walking along.

It looks like if I walk along, there will be more parking. Then a washroom, then the campsite, then some buildings. And maybe two different waterfalls, a little one in a big one. Let's see if I can translate any of these bad boys.

Metari Falls campsite, parking lot, Mount Shishidani, second waterfall, and waterfall.

All right. Let's fucking do this thing.

Pets to Metari Falls, bringing in is prohibited. No problem, one step ahead of you.

And the people walking in behind me are laughing and smiling. I think we're back in civilization now. No more scary mountain walks. Now everything's cool.

Wellie, wellie, wellie, at the very last moment, somehow I have failed to get to the waterfall. That was fucking unexpected. I wonder what I can call this episode. I can't call it visiting though whatever the fuck it was called waterfall because I technically did not. But as far as I feel, I don't give a shit. The waterfall was just the premium item in the area. I don't actually need to see a waterfall. It's fine. I got right to where the waterfall is. I did it. As far as navigating goes, getting to a goal. I did it. I was right there. However, at that campsite, I'm kind of glad those two people came in right after me because without them, the zombie apocalypse feel was not alleviated whatsoever. That campground had nobody in it, which again is early December. I guess that's not surprising, although it is super nice right now, but yeah, it's going to be cold tonight. I wouldn't go camping. See, there was nobody there. No sign of people. There were some lights that were turned on, so one little sign. Other than that, totally deserted and creepy. But yeah, as I was following, the nice little labeled cartoon path got to the old strung up sign across the path. Big exclamation point. And Google Translate said, no entry due to collapse of the trail. So I backed up a little bit and took another side trail. 15:00 And then behind me, I saw the two women who came in behind me, also heading to see that sign. But it's only like a 10 meter walk. I did not attempt to warn them. It was fun. It's not like they were going to go too far out of their way before they learned.

So I just kind of assumed, all right, maybe this other path. It's the only other one I can see. Perhaps it will take me on an alternate route to the waterfall.

I thought I heard a waterfall, but no, I think that's just the wind.

But it was pretty rough. Definitely not the main trail. And at one point, I had to scramble around sort of a fallen, uprooted tree. I wonder how bad that other path was. I mean, I got to take their word for it. It's probably pretty bad. And again, whatever, I'm not going to put myself in danger to see a waterfall. I don't give a fuck. It's a nice target. It's okay if I don't literally see it. But yeah, then it kind of connected into a much more proper trail again, or like steps, steps built into the mountain, little wooden steps, but a lot of them. It's just going up and up and up and up and up and up and up. To the point that I was like, what is going on here? Waterfall trails, I think, tend to take you to the bottom of the waterfall.

Why the fuck am I going so far up? So I finally pulled out the phone and checked. And yeah, my little blue dot was just flung off into into the dark yonder of nothingness. It's like, damn it, what the fuck am what is this? So this is not the path to the waterfall. This is the path to nowhere.

Okay, though, after those little steps, just walking around the side of this particular little, it's not the mountain top, but it's the top of this part of the mountain.

And now here's a more proper forest road that has like grading and stuff in it for water floods and such.

Because yeah, it's quarter to four. If I don't figure out soon what's going on here, I just have to turn back. But all right, if I go this way, hmm, it's vaguely in the direction of the falls, but not really. I do think at this point, since it's going to get dark before too long, and going back down all those steps, this arguably going to be even more unpleasant than going up them. Because again, going up them, just not that bad. I think I've actually like literally gotten into shape while I've been here. Just a bit, you know, when I catch my reflection in the morning, sometimes I'm like, hey, that looks pretty good. Which would make sense. I mean, I'm hiking up mountains every goddamn day, practically. Just another cool thing about having mountains around. This is definitely my favorite type of exercise. It's just functional exercise. Exercise that happens while you're going somewhere and accomplishing something and doing something, not just stale exercise in a room somewhere, which I do not enjoy. But you can't do this without mountains.

You got to have the natural resources to pull this shit off, but yeah, I mean, I'm definitely in moderately okay shape at this point. I mean, even that I'm managing to do this podcast right now while walking uphill. Obviously, I'm hopping and popping a little, but it's really not that bad.

Again, it's just the sun. The sun is my enemy. It wasn't for the sun going down. Fuck it, dude. Like if this was the summer, I mean, that would be worse ultimately. I'm already sweating my dick into mush. If it was warmer than this, I'd be hating my life. But if I had sunlight till like nine at night, that'd be great. Just keep going. Just keep exploring around. Walk down this road. Who cares?

If I know where it goes. But it's becoming more and more wild. Less and less likely that it goes fucking anywhere. And I just don't have time. I got to turn around. Yeah, so this is continuing on.

But it's not really taking me anywhere near the falls. It's just pointing me north, which has previously described is nothing. It's a 25 kilometer hike.

If I connect up to anything, the only thing near here is that creepy mountain road I was on. So, 20:00 well darn it. Just got to turn around and go back. But again, I consider this. This was fine. This was, I consider this a successful journey. I made it to the campsite. I made it to the the cartoon sign telling me how to get to the waterfall. The fact that the actual literal last leg of the journey to the waterfall was, uh, had crumbled. Anyway, my fault. I did my half. I did as much as I can do. And I'm not willing to hop a fucking danger sign as the sun is going down. Risk of life and limb like a moron, just to see a waterfall. It ain't going to happen. In fact, I'm certain that my official stance should just be fuck waterfalls. I mean, they're nice. They're pretty cool. But, uh, I haven't exactly been having the best luck with waterfalls in specific. And in some ways, a waterfall is not so different from, from a museum or from a temple or from a whatever. It is better than all those things. I mean, it is the natural world. It's kind of a nice marvel to behold. But it sort of falls into the same mental category for me of, I want to pass through a place. I want to be going somewhere. Once I get there, my ability to stop and appreciate is very small, really small. I got like 30 seconds in me. And then it's like, all right, I saw it. Let's get going. So, waterfalls really no different in that sense.

I'll give it the YouTube test though. Maybe I can get, uh, get to see it through YouTube video, although I've started to learn. That may not be the case. Fukuoka is a little too obscure. Not everybody has, uh, descended upon it with their cameras. That's funny too. Those signs definitely called it something else. On Google Maps, it's a Chozu Falls, O-C-H-U-Z-U Falls. In case anyone's wondering where I'm lost at. Ocho-Uzu, no tacky camping ground. O-C-H-O-U-Z-U-N-O-T-A-K-I.

Yeah, maybe that also explains the way. Literally no one's here.

If the falls are the fucking money-melon and you can't get to them, the only other thing I really noticed around there was a lot of spider webs. Not the, not the grandest camping spot of all time. I'm gonna head back down that way and then just take that main road that those ladies drove up as I exit. Pass the fishing pond, pass the Kiseki restaurant, and then just pass there is the big highway that circles the mountain. And then pass there is the JR line that I don't want to spend the money on. And then pass there is a river I got across. There is something called the Karumi Castle Ruins, although I've learned that castle ruins might mean nothing. And then there's the Nishi Tetsu line and I can get home. All right, adventure over. Now it's time to just unwind this fucking thing to spool up my yo-yo. Just got to get back, which means I still have many hours ahead of me, but from a podcast perspective, unless something amazing happens, I think that's it.

This is nice though. This is actually cool. It is nice to like the, when you even when you go the wrong way and you just end up somewhere weird. I mean that's been kind of the story of the day, I guess, is that I end up where I didn't think I was gonna end up, but it's very nice. This is fucking very pretty. And yeah, if you just want to be alone with your thoughts, Jesus Christ, this is definitely the part of Fukuoka you want to come to. Motherfucker.

If I was a more dedicated writer, this is where I'd come to just be alone and do writing. Although I can't, I can't chide myself too much for not doing more writing during the day because I seem to be racing the sun like every fucking day. If I stopped somewhere for 20 minutes to do writing and then it led to me getting stuck in the fucking dark, there'd be plenty of time to do writing when I'm not in Japan anymore. For now, I'll just squeeze in what I can squeeze in.

I suppose actually I won't turn off the podcast until I find those steps back down the mountain because that would be hilarious. You know, it's always much harder to backtrack than I think it's gonna be or to reverse engineer a route. If I can't find those steps, that'd be that'd be bad and just be trapped on this weird fucking mountain. Oh, I see some benches. That's interesting.

I did not pass any benches on the way but that's a clear sign of civilization because yeah, I wonder on the way down. I was thinking like if this did connect up to the waterfall path somehow, that might be a bad thing because if it's collapsed, there's a good chance that at the top they didn't bother putting a collapsed sign. So if I were to come down backwards, I could imagine that being bad.

Hmm, this is not how I came up here but there's a pink ribbon to designate. Actually, maybe it is. I've already forgotten. Anyway, it's a little path next to the good old pink ribbons on the trees toward these little benches.

Did I walk past this bench? Was I just not paying attention?

Because I'm on little steps. I'm on steps going back down the mountain. Yeah, I guess I just walked by those and didn't see them. I guess from this angle, they're a lot harder to see because they're at my eye level. They don't look like benches really from this angle. When you look at them from above, it's like, oh, yeah, those are benches. Oh yeah, here we go. Okay, heading down the stairs, all good. See, I got a solid hour before it starts getting considerably dark.

And 90 minutes till it gets actually dark. No problem. I can get back down to the campground in like 15 minutes and then walk down the road and then walk to the hook and walk to the station.

I don't know. I say it like, oh, I got to go so long. What a distance. But I mean, this is fucking awesome, dude. This has been a wonderful fucking Japan visit. I mean, it has been a bit different from 2019 where I definitely did less pick up point on the map and go crazy. It was a lot more just sort of wandering around hanging out at the fucking A on mall or whatever.

But I guess, yeah, that first one was just to kind of get me comfortable, comfortable enough with the systems of Japan and how they all work. At this time, it's like, yeah, now let's just go experiment a little, explore a little, see how it goes.

Because yeah, it's always weird when you first go somewhere. Because yeah, I still haven't got my tickets set up, but presumably, I'm going to soul after this. And on the surface, just watching people walk around on YouTube, it looks pretty similar, you know? As far as my illiterate ass goes, it's probably going to be a pretty similar experience. I suspect, but I certainly won't be doing wild shit like this. Not on my first visit. My first visit to South Korea will just be to figure out kind of how it works. And I'll probably do a lot more hanging out at an Airbnb or at whatever mall is near me or just walking around the city, not getting too crazy with it. And then who knows after that? But all this walking around through the woods and crazy shit, I think it's only in Japan that I feel like I know enough of what's going on to do that. So soak it in while I can. All right, I'll stop back in if something fucking cool happens, but I think that's probably it. Again, a technical failure, but not really because overall, I made it, I did it, I made it, I made it here. And then Mother Nature swept the rag out from under me. That's okay, Mother Nature. That's okay, that is your right. Overall, I had my back today, it all worked out.

Alright, you may hear something extremely water-fall-ish sounding. And you know what, I'm going to call this a success. I am going to call this fucking episode, visiting whatever the fuck these waterfalls are, because I think technically I did. So, I got back down to the campground and man, not only is it deserted, but all the signs are so old and worn and like this is like camp crystal lake after they shut it down. It is fucking creepy as shit here. I'm a little surprised that they do have the little lights here just to make it a little less dark at night. Because even the parts where you can kind of sit, little picnic-y type places are cordoned off and they say, don't use. And then the Japanese says, only for you, during the opening period. So, I assume that means like, you know, this is not campground time in December. But they're just cordoned off. It's just, it is just fucking creepy. But I came back to the, the blocked off, do not go this way. Trail has collapsed sign. And 30:00 no, don't worry, I didn't go up there. I did not. It really looks fine. I mean, I'm looking up it right now, but who knows how far it has to go to get to the main waterfall. And it's just one of those things like whenever you hear a story of like, oh man, so and so slipped and fell and they got real hurt. It's like, oh no, and you feel sympathy for them. Unless the story is they hopped offense, they weren't supposed to hop and then they slipped and fell and got real hurt. And then you always just think, what a fucking dickhead, what an asshole. And I think it's particularly bad if you are a tourist or a visitor. It really makes it extra obnoxious. Like in this case, it would be what a North American cunt. What a dumb Canadian dick. Fuck that guy. You know, there's just no need because as I said earlier, as I previously established, fuck waterfalls. Who cares? But I looked closer at the other signs and I noticed there was a little number one pointing up at the, don't go up these stairs section. And then a number two pointing the other way. And I realized like, oh, it's right here. It's an extra five meters away. How on that first sign? It had waterfall number one, waterfall number two. So this is not the bigger waterfall, but it's not bad. It's like, I'm not the best with distances with heights, 15 meters high. I mean, it's like not huge, but it's okay. It certainly counts as a waterfall. And yeah, there it is. It's just brushing on down the fucking rocks and then coming down some other rocks and there's a little pool here. I mean, so it's a small waterfall, but this is one of the waterfalls. This is, and I'm there. I'm fucking there. I'm looking right at it. I did it. I got to not yell too much. It's going to hurt my throat. What am I doing? All right. So now I got to get the fuck out of here because the, yeah, it is getting later and later and it is getting darker and darker. But hey, that's fucking pretty cool. I had my, my goal snatched away at the zero hour. And then I had plenty, plenty of fucking justifications for why it's all right. Who cares? Who cares? Whatever, buddy. So I didn't see the waterfall. Whatever. But then I did see the waterfall. Definitely an A plus day. This, I consider this an S ranked fucking adventure. It all worked out. And yeah, the sign for the record. No entry. Toru Goku City. Due to the collapse of the mountain trail ahead. Now that's a good translation, dude. That is fully accurate. Man, at some point, I got little prickly things, which happens to me often. I get them on my pant legs without noticing or just because I've got my hoodies, my hoodie and coat wrapped around my, my waist. They're all coated in just little whatever's from, from plants I've gone by. And I got them all over my shoes. But somehow I got them in my shoes on my socks. That's never happened before. And it's really fucking annoying. I'd just stop and pick them off my socks. Like, how did that even happen?

But speaking of that, just to end on a very Monday note after we saw the waterfall, I was complaining the other day about ankle socks and how much I hate them. Because they don't stay up. They fall down. And in this case, I'm really glad I don't have them because I mean my pant legs. Do cover my ankles technically. But like today, I would have got little prickly all over my skin. It would have been bad. But I saw earlier today. I think it was in that Lawson's this morning. They had an array of clothing options that I haven't seen at the other places. Like, they've got big, big fluffy mitts for the oncoming winter that I am not convinced will ever actually come. I'm just looking at the sign at the entrance and I'm trying to use it to determine how far it is to the main waterfall. And I mean judging by the cartoon, it's not far. I think there's no guarantee that this is to scale. Oh wait, here's a better one with actual to scale mapage. But the cartoon of the big waterfall is twice as big. Maybe a little more than twice than the little one. So it's probably pretty good. But again, hey, it's that. That's just Mother Nature, man. What am I supposed to do? Okay, so I'm here. Oh, it's interesting. I don't know that this is distance. I think this map actually shows elevation. So who knows? Whatever. Who fucking gives a shit? It's done. We did what we could do. We're out of here.

But yeah, one thing I saw at this Lawson's were invisible socks. Like really little socks. 35:00 And they're obviously for women's shoes. You know, if you want to look like you're just wearing your cool little, your slip on shoes, but you don't want to appear to be wearing socks. But of course, you do need to wear socks because otherwise you'll grind your feet into paste and get blisters and stuff. And it's like, man, what a tough life. That is one of those things about the throwback style of Japan where a lot of people do dress in kind of an old school, leave it to be very kind of way. In men's cases, it's just like, hey, suits can't be to suit. Get old suit. And most of the women's styles, I mean, I do like them. I feel like that's what I would wear. It's just like, ah, really long skirt and a nice shawl. It looks comfortable. But not the shoes. I feel bad about them having to wear these fucking mad men style shoes instead of just a nice pair of sneakers. You got to wear these tiny little cramped fucking shitty ass shoes. And then you got to wear secret hidden socks. So no one will be able to tell that you're wearing socks like, whoa, fuck that. You know, that is the one place where I would not fall into line as far as fashion goes. I think other than that, I'd be pretty okay with the prevailing Japanese women's fashion. But not those shoes, dude, I would wear some sneakers. Life's too fucking short for that shit. I mean, at least it's not high heels, but it's the next worst thing. All right, well, fuck yeah, dude, we did it. We saw a waterfall. We saw a baby waterfall, a little junior waterfall.

I am the very model lover, little baby waterfall. And it's not even pitch black yet as I leave the terrifying fucking campground of death. Yeah, this is even, I mean, this is just a man-made dam that I'm walking past, but it's actually about the same size as that waterfall. It's a little smaller, but I guess it's not, it's not natural. It's not as cool, but it's still all right. I'll take what I can get, man, whatever. Hey, here's another waterfall. This could be waterfall number four. If that was one and two, and then that dam was three, this is a little tiny pipe, just a little pipe, a little pipe with some water coming out of it. It's about, you know, my mid-sci, one little stream of water. That's pretty good. That counts. That's a waterfall. God, we saw so many waterfalls today. It's fucking incredible.

All right, I keep thinking I'm done, but I keep thinking of a little other things to say. It's 458. I wonder if there's a five o'clock song around here. I guess we'll see. You can see the sun on the horizon behind some trees, but I can't actually see the sun anymore. So it still seems bright right now, but it won't for long. But I passed the fishing pond. That was the other notable thing on this road. And it was funny because I kind of forgot about the fishing pond. I was just walking down the road looking at what was coming in front of me. And I was trying to piece it together. We're from a distance. First I saw a drink machines, but then I saw that the area was kind of fenced off. I wasn't really planning on going to the drink machines, but it's like, okay, I can't really get to them anyway. And then I saw a bunch of kids toys, you know, like little plastic, you know, cars you could pedal around and stuff. And then I saw a fish jump out of the water near there. And I was like, oh, this is the fishing pond. So that's the pond with the fish. And it just kind of cracked me up because it's so clear what's going on here is that your boring dad or your double-boring grandpa wants to go to the fishing pond, which is already, I mean, I'm not a fisherman guy. I haven't fish since I was a little kid. And we did it in a boat way out on the St. John River, which is the you just river ever. So that was my idea of fishing. This little fishing pond wasn't really that big. So it does seem a little weird to just sit there and fish and like catch fish. And I don't know. Maybe it's a lot of fun. I don't know. But the kids toys, there was a lot of them. So it just tells the story of like, you get dragged here by whatever male figure is in your life. And while he sits there and just fishes, which is the most boring shit in the world, he's just standing there with a fishing pole. Boy, at least you got toys. You and the other kids can play. And it's just kind of neat when a whole story is to environmental storytelling they call that in video games. But yeah, I am not close to the Nishi Tetsu line. I was looking it up and it's like, okay, whew, 10 kilometers I got to walk. The 25 through the mountains didn't seem so terrible. I think, too, maybe where I was going before there was an observation deck 40:00 on the map. But I really wasn't that close. But maybe that's where I was heading toward. Probably a hell of a view. But yeah, no time, no time for love. So I was like, okay, 10 kilometers, but let me piece this together. There's of course a country club right in the way. And it's like, I don't know if there's any guarantee I can go through the country club. Let's just avoid that. So I was trying to figure it out. And it's like, okay, that size a little little bad. But I'm like, okay, from here, go here to this, this major road. Go this way, head over here, go down here, go across this river. All right, it may be 10 km, but I only got to recalibrate like three times. No problem. I can do this pretty easy. And I'm back in the city and you know, fucking lights and stuff. So even though I had this long walk ahead of me and my knee is actually hurting a little bad. But this particular part I'm in, it's fucking beautiful. It's just these fields. There was a guy who had a bunch of fruit trees. I'll plant it in his yard and he was burning something. I don't know what. But there's a big highway, like the above ground highway I passed when I was walking next to before. I can see that in the distance with a truck going through the sky magically. And there's all these older houses, but some of them are just 70s old. But some of them are the cool revenge of Shinobi old, you know, with the cool old timey roofs and stuff. Like they look really old, but in good repair, they're all new and they got satellite dishes and stuff. So it's just all these beautiful buildings, the sun's going down, it's like the perfect time of day. It just looks amazing. And it's just like awesome. You know, I'm like, it sucks that I got this long walk. But I just started laughing because I'm just like, this is so awesome. Dude, this is so great. And I can even see so as I speak, it's going to say I can see across this field to the next major road. And then there's another big field behind it. And I just saw a train go by on the JR line that is not not the Shinkansen style bullet train looking train. That was a normal train. So there is a normal JR line around here. But I guess since I got a curve all the way around this mountain and go all the way up to a different whole neighborhood, I guess what are the chances that that train will take me there? The JR trains are just so confusing. I just can't figure out for the life of me. What's going on? Oh, now I'm walking by a field full of, I mean, they look like they look like cabbages, but they're not sealed up like a cabbage. They're kind of open. I have no idea what plant this is. But anyway, yeah, I just started laughing because it's like, dude, this is awesome. This place is so beautiful.

However, I'm now trapped in a mental conundrum of like, I really don't want to go deal with the JR train and try to figure that out. It's like, whatever, I don't know who cares. It's not that pleasant to get on a train and not be able to get where you're going and not know how to transfer it and not know what's going on. But it's a lot closer. However, if I do the walk to Nishitetsu, I just get to sit on a train and it'll take me right home. So we'll see. We'll see. Now that I'm not actively going downhill, my knee's not hurting as much. This has been a weird scrabble of a day, constantly trying to recalibrate and trying to figure out how to get stuff to work. But I think it all basically works out pretty good for such a random-ass plan to such a random-ass part of Fukuoka.

What the fuck? So I was just going to say, it's a shame that this sound-wise does not match up to visually what I'm experiencing. Some walking down a very dark road, but when I've got headphones in it doesn't seem that bad. But I was waiting for something with very bright lights behind me that was making a lot of noise to pass, but it was going so slow, and it's like a little tractor. Fairly well, tractor, see-later. But man, yeah, I decided not to try for the JR thing. Another train did go by, so I took a little, took a knee to watch it to study. And it looks like a normal train, but it does kind of have a shinkansen front. But that one I saw earlier really looked like a shinkansen. This one just looks like a hybrid. So I mean, as usual, I don't know what's going on, and I'm like, whatever, I'm not going to learn today. Then thankfully, I found a 7-Eleven before I got to this particular road I'm on. Should just realize, am I walking? I think I am walking alongside this country club. That would 45:00 explain kind of why I'm in such no-man's land. Yeah, that is in fact the case. Saga Country Club, SAGA, with the little tennis man on the icon. But yeah, thankfully I found a 7-Eleven before I got to this no-man's land, because I was getting pretty hungry. So I got one of those things that's like a tuna and a salmon onigiri, and they used to make them so they came with two little fried chicken balls. That was the best. Now it's a fried chicken ball, a weird little sausage, and one of those like egg things, tamago. So I don't really like the other two things as much. But man, the little greasy Japanese chicken, you could argue it's like kind of poor quality chicken. It's kind of weird. And in large amounts, it's a dubious item. But the little tiny one, just to go with the rice at the corners of your onigiri, is fucking perfect sized. It's so delicious. So I had that and I got a tiny little, this little cheesecake, tiny little cheesecake circle thing that I don't remember what it's called, but was super good. And then I got one of the packs of wasabi, rice crackers, and peanuts because it has the Ziploc top. So after I ate it, I could put all of my wrappers and the stuff I had from earlier in the day all in there and Ziploc it closed and then put it in my pocket. So I got it hidden away to throw away. And there's no moist residue that I need to worry about from the onigiri that gave me one of those nice little towels to wash your hands and toss that in there. So it's all Ziploced away, ready to be disposed of. But yeah, I got to this road to the west of the Saga Country Club and it's so dark. There are street lights, but they're very dim. They barely function at all. So you're still mainly focusing on the occasional traffic light. I'm passing one right now and there's a little, there's a little scarecrow of a kid here. I've never seen this before. Yeah, just a little kid in a yellow raincoat looking thing with the red elementary school bag. Oh, and there's a hole in the back of his bag and there's nothing in there, but old leaves. Hmm, I'm not going to reach in because that's where I feel like some kind of curse is going to happen. And there's nothing in there. I was just weird. I wonder why the bag is open. What would you do with that? I guess you could put like a plant in it? I don't know. Anyway, presumably this little scarecrow child is to alert drivers like, hey, there's a crossing here because they're sure ain't many. This is a pretty rare one. But he has just so dark and I'm just walking along and the trees on either side. At first I could see still just the vagus little bit of twilight. Now it's just just dark. You can still see the trees against the sky. They're not all uniformly black. But I don't know. It's just creepy and eerie and even though generally walking and eating is something, you know, I think people try not to do in Japan. In this case, I was like, yeah, fuck that. I am all alone. It is so dark here. I'm just on some weird street. Yum, yum, yum. I'm just going to eat. A guy did jog past and then jog by so there was one other person. But it's such a cool feeling that I'm like, definitely safe. You know, it's not at all the feeling of being in the woods or anything. There's cars going by me all the time. There's houses. But it's so dark and eerie and especially on the country club side, there's a great big field between me and there. So it just looks like a black, horrible expanse. And when cars go by, I can see it a little bit. This is like safety spooky. This is like very haunted house, you know, feel. But it's just creepy and weird and it's like, man, this is great. I'm glad I did the walk despite only being halfway there. But I also saw one of the buildings in the distance was really lit up. Almost like it was like a Christmas thing, but it wasn't Christmas themed. But it was that sort of feel of like very bright. And I was like, what the heck is that? Is there anything on Google Maps? What could this be? I'm a pre-downloaded map. And it's a hotel, you know, I couldn't see the name, but I could see the little sleepy man in bed hotel icon. And that's one thing that's cool. Is that Airbnb is quite limited, you know? The actual number of neighborhoods you can find an Airbnb in wasn't enormous to begin with and is much less since COVID. And as Airbnb becomes more of a hotel adjacent experience and the price has gone up, it's less and less of that charm. That charm of like, hey, let me just toss you $20 a day and sleep in your spare room. Like that's very hard to find now. So I wonder, relatively speaking, like I wonder how much is that hotel? I want to look 50:00 it up later. Because I've used exclusively Airbnb just because that's what I was doing in North America and that's what I was familiar with. But if I was ever to come to Japan and just throw finances to the wind, if you want to go hotel routes, suddenly then you can stay all over the place. I mean, where am I right now? I'm fucking nowhere. I'm in the dark. Next to the saga country club. I'm like in a conceptual dream right now. It doesn't even feel like reality. It's a bit like that creepy scary park I went to on the Tohu line. And then I had to walk back at night. That was more dark than this. That was fucking pitch black. But this is similar. It's like this is so fucking what a weird spot. Why would anybody come here? Why is there even a hotel here? I don't know. But there is. They're all over the place. And maybe that's an interesting route forward. You know, if I want to just go to weird neighborhoods and be in odd places, not only is it a lot more flexible with hotels, but maybe it's not even that much worse. I don't know. The only hotel I looked into was before I got that Airbnb that unfortunately had the train tracks six millimeters from the fucking house. There was a hotel near there that I tried to look up. And it was actually I guess now that I think about it. It was pretty pricey. It was I think between 60 or 70 dollars a night. And it was also all booked up. So it wasn't even an option. I don't know. Maybe hotels are more expensive than I think they are. But that's a neat idea. Man, yeah, these streetlights are ridiculous. They just don't do fucking anything. They suck balls. In North America, you would never have streetlights. This ineffective. But it's like kind of neat here. It's kind of spooky and cool. Makes this walk fun. So yeah, all good, man. I got 7-11 food in my belly. Yeah, today definitely turned into a bit of a double adventure. It was quite a fucking route to get to that waterfall. And now this walk back through the dark and then the ensuing fucking extremely long train ride with at least one transfer that I got to do on the way back. Man, by the time I get back home, it's going to be fucking tomorrow.