iya-awa ikeda-kotohira-oki matsushima

In my last post, while the bridge is in a rather remote area, Jalna reminded me about this huge parking structure that is also there.

It was built about 10 years ago to accommodate all the tour buses coming in and out of the area.

When I first saw it, I thought it was a huge hotel, but when we asked the locals, they said it was a parking structure-small shopping-rest area.

We saw many foreign tourists as well as local tourists using this area. (Thanks Jalna!)

The next morning, we were pleased that breakfast wasn't as krazy as the night before...whew!

Because the buses don't run frequently, the ryokan was kind to take us another 20 minutes to the Oku Iya Niju-Kazurabashi.

Where, you guessed it there are more kazurabashi (vine bridges) to be crossed.

I paid my 550 yen admission, but just so that I could take Satoshi's picture.

Niju-Kazurabashi are two bridges, a male one and female one.

The male one is larger and higher while the female one is shorter and lower.

The slats are closer together than the Kazurabashi we first encountered the day before, but I still chickened out.

These photos are from what Satoshi took.

Tokushima is known for naruto kintoki, a type of sweet potato, so I picked up these small bags of sweet potato chips as our omiyage.

From Oku Iya, it is about 2 hours back down the one laned winding road to Awa Ikeda station.

We grabbed some musubi for lunch from a convenience store and rode JR one station to Kotohira (about 30 minutes).

Kotohira is where Konpira shrine, a huge shrine is located.

In order to get to Konpira shrine, you need to climb up 786 steps!

The goro-awase (to use the sound of numbers in Japanese to make words from them) for 786 is na-ya-mu or "to worry" so they tell you that there are only 785 steps...hah!

It was humid, I was still a bit hungry...so I was hot, snarky and cranky.

But, there was a woman wearing 5 or 6 inch heels, that was ahead of us on the stairs and I thought, if she could make it, I could too...it never ceases to amaze me that there is always at least one person wearing heels at places like these?!

At least the stairs were spread out over several intervals.

Of course, if you go up, you gotta come down...

Man, talk about legs in pain afterwards...

our reward...soft serve!

Satoshi's was super different...kamatama which was inspired by sanuki udon...ginger soft serve topped with green onion & shoyu..meh!

Mine was a wasanbon (Japanese sugar) and shoyu mixed soft serve topped with oiri (roasted mochi puffs)...sweet and salty, this hit the spot.

I think mine was better than Satoshi's!

From Kotohira, it is about an hour by Kotoden (local train) to Oki-Matsushima in Takamatsu city.

I liked how this train allowed bike riders to bring their bikes on board (as is) during the weekends and holidays, not many trains allow this without having you fold up/bag your bicycles.

From here we needed to take a taxi to our hotel, Takamatsu Terrsa.

This facility is mostly used for meetings, but there is a floor designated for hotel accommodations.

Since there wasn't a restaurant serving dinner in the facility, the front desk gave us a map of some eateries in the area (about 10 minutes walking).

We ended up at Hitomasa, an izakaya.

The food menu was quite extensive but we were disappointed with the flow of food from the kitchen, at one point we had to wait over 20 minutes...

Also the portions seemed off. The sashimi platter seemed skimpy. The tempura tako (octopus) was delicious. Tomato avocado salad was so-so. And the kurobuta menchikatsu was the size of softballs...

All in all, another long day, but we got to see and do all that we had planned.

The next day was planned to be another long one before making our way back to Osaka...stay tuned.

Takamatsu Terrsa
2366-1 Yashima Nishimachi
Takamatsu, Kagawa
Phone: 087.844.3511

Hitomasa
2486-16 Yashima Nishimachi
Takamatsu, Kagawa
Phone: 087.814.7077
Closed Tuesdays
Hours: 17:00-24:00