See Japan's castles the easy way

A Tale of Two videos

Article posted on Monday, August, 1st, 2011 at 2:13 pm


I find it very odd that it has taken almost a full year for me to post the following two videos. I guess the thought of having to edit them was too much, and so I shelved them. Anyway, both were shot a day after the other during my Summer, 2010 trip through Nagano.

Video 1

The first is of Matsushiro castle. This video I do recommend you check it out, it’s probably one of my better efforts. The castle itself I also recommend you check out, the Jōka machi (old castle town) is one of the best I’ve come across.

Video 2

By the standards set by the first video, the following is a bit token. It would fall into the Well, it’s-better-than-nothing category. The castle is that of Takashima, and while the tower itself is a reconstruction, the grounds have a rustic charm to them that I really appreciate.

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Takashima Castle – the low down

Article posted on Monday, January, 31st, 2011 at 6:16 pm


Castles like that of Takashima aren’t that rare; there’s a fair amount of stonework, a moat & a multi-story, concrete main tower. And just to prove my point, I’ll rattle off a few more: Okayama, Hiroshima, Kokura, Nagoya, Hirado, Aizu Wakamatsu… I could go on, but I won’t.

There is something about the site of Takashima castle though, that really appeals to me. The stonework is very tidy, the inner-moat is more or less complete and the external appearance of the main tower is faithful to the one that was torn down (yes, on purpose) in 1875. How lucky that photographs taken in the earliest part of the Meiji period (1868-1912) have survived to allow the main tower to be rebuilt as accurate as has been.

The Tenshu has quite a unique look about it. Check out the long, over-hanging copper roof and the triple-windowed Kirizumahafu (切妻破風) of the top floor. And what’s the deal with the exposed wood? We’d normally see that blackened (Kumamoto castle). Heck, while I’m at it, why aren’t those eaves plastered?

I probably shouldn’t be dragging Japan Dave’s name into this, but it’s because of his excellent HDR images that I gave this a go. (Not that this is a true HDR.)

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August 2010 Trip

Article posted on Friday, August, 27th, 2010 at 9:31 pm


Well, the Summer holidays are coming to an end. As much as I’d like them to last for ever, pretty sure that’s an impossibility. Perhaps for many of you it was business as usual, but luckily for me, I was able to sneak in a little traveling. Well, a lot of traveling actually. And just to give this post some focus, I won’t talk about the three weeks I spent back in Australia.

First stop was Odawara castle. As soon as I’d landed in Haneda airport I was on the phone to @Genshin, a fellow twitterer. And before I go any further, I need to thank him profusely for making the trip possible. We racked up many k’s in the @Genshin family car, and I repaid him by breaking the car’s antenna. Doh!

Roadtrip!
I now realise that I was a little too ambitious in the planning stage. And the plan was to head North from Odawara & see everything there was to see in Nagano Pref in under 2 days. Suffice to say, we didn’t quite see everything. We did see a lot & just to give you a small taste I recommend the following link: Views of Japan for some of @Genshin’s photographs.

The route we took, took us to:

Suffice to say, the above destinations & some places in between will feature heavily in posts over the following months. Stay tuned!

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