Moving on to Day 4! We're nearly done with our trip but still have so much to do. Day 3 had us in Iwate Prefecture where we took a river tour in Geibi Gorge and spent more time in Morioka city in the rain before closing the day in Akita with a dinner filled with lots of regional specialities.
08:00 Pick up rental car, drive to Oga
09:30 Activities in Oga
Namahage Museum / Oga Shinzan Folklore Museum
Nyudozaki Lighthouse
Lunch
12:30 return to Akita, return rental car
14:14 Akita to Kakunodate station via Shinkansen (was delayed)
15:00 Samurai Residence Street, Bukemaru, Ishiguro Samurai House, Aoyagi Samurai House
17:18 - 18:55 Kakunodate to Sendai station via Shinkansen
19:15 Check into Sendai hotel, Dinner in Sendai - gyutan!
Like the Toyoko Inns we're used to, the Comfort Hotel chain seems to also include breakfast in their room rates. We were happy to have time to partake in that on the morning of Day 4 and there was actually a decent variety of items, including smoothies!
My husband and I walked from the hotel to the other side of Akita station to pick up the rental car. The car was still a bit grey and bleak after the rain from Day 3, but we were hopeful the weather might turn around.
Obviously a rental car isn't the best use of a JR Rail Pass (and believe me I thought about it a lot lol), but based on where we wanted to visit, how much time I wanted to allocate to it and what the alternatives were, this was the right choice for us to get to Oga for 6 people. Alternate train + bus transportation would be on a set schedule not quite suited to ours, take longer and actually would cost more than the car when totaling for 6 adults.
We returned to the hotel to pick up the rest of my family and our bags and headed out for the day!
Giant namahage greeting us as we enter Oga.
We got to the Namahage Museum just 5 minutes before the 09:30 show on the Shinzan Folklore side was about to start, but the staff helped us purchase tickets and pointed us in the right direction to arrive just in time.
The entire performance is in Japanese, but they provide these tablets so you can follow along with the plot in the language you understand.
The show explains the Shinzen tradition of Namahage and how the ritual is performed annually (at New Year's eve) and shows an example of how it might take place in the recreated home. It's a bit interactive with the Namahage actors coming into the audience to do their search as well.
Back on the museum side, we explored the exhibits and different displays which we had a much better understanding of thanks to the performance!
There's a dark little theater space with a documentary-style video playing on a loop that had actual footage from the tradition being carried out in the village. Seeing the true terror and hearing the screams of the children also gave us a lot more perspective of the whole ritual and was very informative.
Moving towards the last display area, there's a bunch of life size Namahage mannequins with a huge variety of masks all fiercely positioned in the snow! Each one was so unique and equally terrifying lol.
We made sure to make some purchases from the gift shop before leaving!
The lighthouse is located at Cape Nyudo which is the westernmost point of Tohoku. We paid the small entrance fee and went up the interior spiral staircase to the top.
What a great view of the Sea of Japan! I think this is the only time I've really been on this edge of the country in Honshu (usually I'm always on the east), so it was definitely a different experience for me and felt really cool.
There is also a marker for the 40 degree latitude line in the round area at the ground level.
We had a couple options for lunch (lots of seafood near Nyudozaki Lighthouse), but decided to try to go to this little cafeteria restaurant near the hospital in Oga city that I randomly found on Google Maps called Minatoya.
Luckily we were able to get a table for 6 people without waiting even though they seemed a little busy with existing customers (most of whom seemed like regulars).
Most of us ordered some sort of tonkatsu which did take a little while to cook (including me - katsu curry udon) but my husband decided to be adventurous and ordered shottsuru yakisoba! Shottsuru is a local (Akita) fish sauce made from sandfish.
From there, we were out of time in Oga and headed straight back to Akita city. My husband and I dropped off my family with our bags at Akita station and then filled gas and returned the rental car at Budget.
Our 08:00 - 14:00 rental for the van was about 6000yen with online advance payment and gas to Oga and back cost about 1300yen. Since there were 6 of us, we had to get a van, but if your group is smaller and can get a smaller car, your rental will almost certainly be cheaper. This was definitely worth it for us to get around, do what we wanted to do on our own schedule and get all of us there and back without issues.
Non-flash photography and videography is allowed throughout the performance. Having the tablets to understand what was going on in each scene was perfect for us, so we all understood what was transpiring and what was going to take place.
The Namahage Museum explains the tradition best on their website but you'll want to experience this for yourself!:
Namahage, played by young men in demonic masks and traditional straw garments, make the rounds of houses in their villages. They burst into these houses searching for new community members such as young wives and children.In an inimitable throaty scream, the Namahage encourage and order these newcomers to work and study hard, and obey their parents or in-laws.Other household members "protect" their relatives, assuring the Namahage that they are good people. The Namahage are then offered with a little sake and some food.
We all thoroughly enjoyed it and loved how they chose to do the recreation and explanation. It really helped us understand the tradition a lot better. (A crying baby in the audience also helped the ambiance a little bit since they Namahage often scare children lol.)
We made a last minute decision not to got Shinzen Shrine and instead head over to Nyudozaki lighthouse, about 15 minutes away by car.
There's only one way up and one way down which is just a bunch of stairs going around and around, so this is a bit limiting if you're not physically able to climb and descend them, but I do think it's worth it if you are able to make it to the top. There's also a small museum at the bottom next to the ticket booth as well!
Reunited at Akita station, we had some time before our next shinkansen, so we did a little omiyage shopping and stopped for a melon melon Starbucks drink.
Our train was scheduled to leave at 14:14 but once we had already boarded, we learned that there was a delay. It was only for about 20 minutes and we were already comfortably seated, so we just waited as we were.
There's a little bit of unexpected movement where the train will initially drive "backwards" for one stop from Akita and then move forward for the rest of the journey. It's a bit surprising since the seats are typically oriented in the "right" direction at the origin stops for these trains lol.
Finally, we make it to the end of the street and Ishiguro Samurai House where we stop and pay for entry, 500yen per adult.
Upon entry to the house, we were greet by staff who instructed us to remove our shoes. We told them we spoke English, so they had some signs in a flip book for us to read as introduced the significance of the house and explained each of the rooms. Then, we were able to freely explore on our own and take a closer look.
This isn't a dish that's as common for Americans, and I wanted everyone to have the best chance at a good experience, so I chose GyutanYaki Senmon-ten Tsukasa 牛タン焼専門店 司 西口名掛丁店 for dinner which had really good reviews and lots of promising information on their website.
Thank you, Akita! We had fun exploring and learned a lot about namahage!
Back on another red Komachi train.
We arrive at our second stop for the day - Kakunodate station. First, we find the lockers at the station. These are actually coin operated with a key and only take 100yen coins, but fortunately we were able to get enough between us for 2 lockers.
Next, we found a bus that was going in the direction we wanted towards the Samurai Residence Street and hopped on after confirming with driver.
Just us on the bus :)
The stop that Google Maps recommended didn't get us quite as close as I thought it was going to, but we were right next to an omiyage shop, so we stopped there for a bit. And on our way, we also stopped for this Akita pudding shop as well!
Finally we make it to the Samurai Residence Street. It's mostly empty of cars, but you do have to watch out for them occasionally since it's still an active road.
We stop when we see a beautiful Akita dog at the far end of a driveway along the road. His name is Bukkemaru, and he belongs to Satoku Garden (the shop right next to the driveway). There are certain times when you can pet and interact with him under supervision to avoid overstimulation. We missed the window for that, but were still able to say hi and he was very friendly!
The landscaping and trees along both sides of the street are quite impressive. I can only imagine what this street is like during autumn!
This is an upper class samurai family's residence and the ancestors actually still live on the property! Of all the houses on the street, the Ishiguro clan is supposedly the most prestigious and had handled finances and inventory.
The second part of the house is set up more like a museum where there are displays which explain some of the facets of life in the samurai times and how they handled the different seasons.
The exterior of the main house is also beautiful. Of course, there weren't any weeping cherry trees when we visited in late May, but the lush green color is exquisite as well. I can't imagine how old some of the trees are.
Due to our shinkansen delay and getting a little sidetracked before making it onto the actual samurai street, we were running a little short on time when we decided to enter the next door Aoyagi Samurai House as well. Entrance fee is also 500yen.
The parts of this compound open to visitors is actually much more expansive and includes multiple structures and buildings throughout. Because we didn't have much time before the next train we wanted to catch (and the operating hours coming to a close), we did have to rush through a bit and didn't see everything.
Back at Kakunodate station, we retrieved our bags from the lockers and had to go to the ticket window to change our reserved seats from our original reservation (which had passed) to the next train in 15 minutes. Luckily, this isn't a problem with the Rail Pass.
Back on board another shinkansen, and officially leaving Akita prefecture and ending a bit south into Miyagi for Sendai station.
Sendai is the largest city in the Tohoku region and has such a different feel than the other places we had been to thus far on the trip! This is the only train station I had already been to on a previous day trip so I was a little familiar with parts of the area (Summer 2017 - Day 7).
Needing to stow our bags before anything else, we headed to the hotel. Another different chain for us - Sendai Washington Hotel. It's quite a bit more grand feeling than the other budget hotels we had chosen and the last one we'll stay at in Tohoku!
We regrouped quickly and then headed out for dinner. Of course, when you're in Sendai, you must be sure to get gyutan (beef tongue)!
We got to the restaurant at around 19:40 on a Monday night and were able to be seated right away in these two tables next to each other which was fine with us.
For appetizers, we chose the grilled beef tail and the ganso shredded(?) spicy tongue dish.
And we all opted for the set meal for dinner which included the beef tongue & some vegetables, mixed barley rice and tail soup.
As someone who is a picky eater but eats most Japanese-style prepared meat dishes, this wasn't too difficult for me, and I was able to eat all of the tongue if I didn't think about what it was. My SIL and mom had a bit of a harder time getting over the texture but my mom really enjoyed the soup. My husband, father and brother all really enjoyed it though.
It was getting late but there was still a lot of life in the city! We stopped at an arcade and a Don Quixote for a little bit before ending the night with some conbini ice cream.
We did such varied activities this day, it almost didn't seem like they were all within the same 12 hour window. I'm thankful that we were able to figure out a way to get to Oga that made sense for our group and fit into our timeline, because the Namahage/Oga Shinzen Folklore Museum was definitely once of the standout experiences of the whole trip!
Recommendations:
‣ Namahage Museum and Oga Shinzen Folklore Museum - we had a great time here and learned a lot about this tradition!
‣ Nyudozaki Lighthouse - if you can climb stairs and the weather is nice, the view is worth it.
‣ Bukkemaru at Satoku Garden & Aoyagi Samurai House - say hi to an Akita dog in Akita! and even though Ishiguro seems like the more famous house, I do think Aoyagi has more bang for your buck with the displays and grounds (but do see both if you get the chance)
‣ GyutanYaki Senmon-ten Tsukasa 牛タン焼専門店 司 西口名掛丁店
What I would change: I do think it's absolutely worth it to visit Oga, but if you don't have time or renting a car isn't your thing, consider checking out Senshu Park and the Akita Museum of Art instead. Akita Dog Station was closed this day (Monday), but I would have loved to have included that in the timeline which is nearby the park and museum as well. I do also wish we had a little more time in Aoyagi Samurai House, but due to the train delay and a little dawdling beforehand, we did rush through it, so I would allocate a little more time to that.
With so much going on and constantly moving every day, it was hard to believe we had finally made it to the final "stop" when we made it to Sendai. It's such a bustling city and so different than all the other places we had been to that point - part of why I'm so glad we've been able to explore! Last day coming up!:)
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