Aomori and Akita

Last Tuesday - Wednesday, I had a trip to Aomori and Akita - two further most northern prefectures in Honshu Island. I got there by taking Shinkansen (our high speed rail system) for 3 hours. I expected a cool weather for when I visited Onogawa (where it is a bit more south) the week before, it was indeed so, however as I stepped out of the train, I was hit by 33 degrees celsius (approx. 91 deg Farenheit) air.

I stayed overnight at Hachinohe, a port city in Aomori facing the Pacific Ocean.

During my morning jog, I found this machine at a used car lot - I think this one is approx. 1970 Honda N360. This one is a tiny 4-seater car with a 354cc engine - Honda's come a long way since the time of this car!

From Hachinohe, we drove about two hours to an mountainous area in Akita. Above is an old railroad that is no longer in use. I was told that it was used to haul some sort of chemical that was produced in the area.

This is a picture of silvervine (Actinidia polygama) flowers. It is called "matatabi" in Japanese. It is well known that when cats smell this plant, they act as if they were drunk. Here's a video I found on Youtube that shows the effects.