The way up (2) Aizu-Odate

Near Yamato in Fukushima

Not so many people, but not empty either

Quite a few stations have "hiking guides" on the platform.
Nozawa 

Plenty of snow on the mountains near Kanose

Near Kanose

Tsugawa Station

Walking around Tsugawa

Waiting for the train coming from the opposite direction at Tsugawa

Between Tsugawa (Fukushima) and Mikawa (Niigata)

The snow has melted, but the green yet to emerge.

The Inaho 7 train

The Uetsu line between Murakami and Fuya

Between Murakami and Fuya

The sun going down on the Japan Sea

Getting close to Sakata, rice field country.

The sun setting near Yuza machi

Changing to the Akita bound local train at Sakata

The last leg... Odate bound.

Seishun 18 Spring 2014: The way up (1) to Aizu

An early start.. Akabane, Utsunomiya, 

At Utsunomiya - the train for Kuroiso

I could have gone a standing soba, but it was too early in the day

The train to Koriyama. It was a relief to have Koriyama as a terminal station.
Had it been a through train to Fukushima there'd have been a danger of falling asleep and sleeping through the stop.

 

Thanks to the world from Fukushima

The Ban'etsu line - not the steam train variety!

From Koriayama it was the Ban'etsu line. There is still a reasonable amount of snow. This part of Japan gets some of the heaviest falls, 3m + in winter.

Snow

And more snow

Aizu.

Aizu is somewhere I want to spend a little time in. It's a historic city &
the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Boshin War, the war that 
"restored" Japan to imperial rule.

Seishun 18: the ban'etsu line

Seishun 18 season- one of three periods when JR companies nationwide join in
cooperation to offer a ticket that gives unlimited local train travel on JR trains. It's an exceptional deal when it's used to the full, but you need to have time on your side. 11500 yen for 5 non consecutive days travel. A Shinkansen ticket to Odate takes a mostly non descript route of ugly suburbia at a round trip price of about 34,000¥ ($360). The fastest route takes 5 hours. In contrast the seishun 18 yesterday took 18 hours but had some lovely scenery and a lunch break in Niigata City with the Yamashitas. I was particularly excited to be taking the Ban'etsu line - from Koriyama through Aizu to Niigata -for the first time. Even though this is not the prettiest time of the year in the mountains, it didn't disappoint.

In order to get the lunch break in Niigata, I needed to take an express to Sakata to catch up with the local train do I could make it to Odate in a single day. The route is as follows :

Who needs hanami ...

when you can go to McDonald's this Fri-Sat-Sun and have a Sakura burger

or head into the Hachiko exit of Shibuya station adorned with blossoms?




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