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Captain Pierre-Marie Ducournau detours Ponant's Le Soleal through the Seto Inland Sea to avoid Typhoon Jangmi, resuming the Odyssey in the Heart of Japan's Subtropical Islands cruise in Kagoshima with stops at Imabari, Fukuoka, Yakushima and Okinawa.
The first typhoon of the season was scheduled to arrive at midday. If all went according to plan, the cruise would sail into its eye somewhere along Shikoku's southern seaboard.
My question: how are your sea legs? asks Captain Pierre-Marie Ducournau. Ponant's Odyssey in the Heart of Japan's Subtropical Islands alternates departures between Osaka, Japan, and Keelung, Taiwan. A nervous titter washed through Le Soleal's auditorium, where we had gathered for a pre-departure briefing. But Ducournau was just teasing.
Captain Ducournau Avoids Typhoon Jangmi
Instead of sailing headfirst from Osaka into the capricious Pacific Ocean, he detoured through the truly pacific Seto Inland Sea. It would not be the last calamity we thwarted on this trip. We can see Typhoon Jangmi will go fast up the east of Japan, he says. That will clear our path on the west coast of Kyushu, and thanks to this, we will be able to resume our itinerary in Kagoshima.
We glided westwards through the night and docked next morning at Imabari on Shikoku's northern shore. The world outside the windows of my deluxe suite was ice blue: the millpond sea, the bridges threading together islets on their journey from Honshu, and Shikoku's mountains stacked like frozen waves against the sky. It was hard to believe a typhoon was about to shred the coast beyond those resolute ridges. Shikoku is well known for its sunlight, says guide Keisuke Yamamoto.
In Japan, we have four distinct seasons, and maybe we can add a fifth, the rainy season. It is called tsuyu, plum rain, and it is arriving soon. Le Soleal received a traditional send-off. But we could ward off bad weather by paying our respects to the god of the mountains.
We crossed the Kurushima Kaikyo Bridge to Omishima Island, wandered through the torii gates at Oyamazumi Shrine, and made our petition. The mountain god to whom this shrine is dedicated is at the same time the god of the ocean and of navigation, says Yamamoto. Given Typhoon Jangmi's proximity, it is important for us to start our visit at this shrine. The sea was polished as we drifted forth overnight.
At dawn, the ship slipped through the narrow strait separating Honshu and Kyushu and popped like a cork into the Korea Strait. Rain smudged the windows of the observation lounge. Ah yes, the rain, the rain, laments Yamamoto. Kurushima Kaikyo bridge in Ehime, Japan.
But our entreaties to the mountain god paid multiple dividends by the end of this trip. We bumped along Kyushu's western seaboard, took refuge in Hakata Bay and made our second hastily planned stop at Fukuoka. Cherry blossom-pink buses ferried us to Kyushu National Museum in Dazaifu. Thank you for coming in the typhoon, the typhoon, says guide Yuko Ehara.
Kyushu National Museum Rain Visit
Usually, the typhoon season is summer time, but this springtime rainy season is very important for growing rice. Rice sprouts trembled in the flooded fields, and the glass-encased museum was spattered with raindrops. History is sealed safely inside it: earthenware vessels, sutra containers, fragile scrolls and the fossilised jaw of a Naumann's elephant, an extinct species from the Pleistocene era. The exhibit was dredged from the Seto Inland Sea in the 19th century.
We are just in time to see the typhoon passing, says Ducournau, as he eased Le Soleal out of Hakata Bay and towards the East China Sea. The active volcano Sakurajima is in Kagoshima Bay on the island of Kyushu. Kagoshima Bay came into sight right on schedule. Sakurajima, an active volcano, squats at its centre, its vent capped not with steam but with white cloud.
Once an island, it is now fastened with a collar of lava to the mainland opposite Kagoshima, from which an around-the-clock ferry service transports the residents still living in the shadow of this volatile formation named, curiously, for the graceful cherry blossom. You want to know how many times this year it erupted, asks guide Mayumi Uchiyama. So far, around 30 times.
Most eruptions are insubstantial, but some reshape the landscape: Sakurajima Visitor Centre stands on a lava field formed after an eruption in 1914. A trail skirts the volcano's flanks; up close, it looks innocuous with its cloudy scarf and skirt of spruce. But in five days' time it will erupt violently, blackening the sky and spewing effluvium. Mercifully, there will be no casualties.
The UNESCO World Heritage-listed island of Yakushima is layered with subtropical shores, temperate slopes and sub-Arctic peaks. But we were long gone by then, weaving our way through the Ryukyu Archipelago, which arches like a dislocated spine towards Taiwan. Until 1879, these scattered islands were part of the Ryukyu Kingdom. On their northern tip is the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Yakushima, a cupcake of an island layered with subtropical shores, temperate slopes and sub-Arctic peaks.
Yakushima Oldest Tree Jomonsugi Cedar
Botanists from all over the world come here, says guide Yuko Ehara. It is a miracle island. Somewhere in its mountainous middle stands the 1000-plus-year-old Jomonsugi, a sugi cedar said to be Japan's oldest tree. Sugis were once used to make shingles.
Now protected, they provide shelter as we move through the forest's damp, spongy epiphyte-ribbed understorey. Okinawa begins far south-west of here, a string of 160 isles anchored by the slender, elongated Okinawa Island. By the time we reached it, we had managed to shake off Typhoon Jangmi's residual wisps, but the sky was still chalky, the typically radiant bays a dull turquoise. The subtropical Kerama Islands in Okinawa, Japan.
The ruins of Nakijin Castle at Motobu in the north seem anachronistic amid the sugar cane and pineapple plantations, the powdery beaches and shallow oyster beds. Okinawa feels more Polynesian than Japanese, like a sliver of land that is dislodged from Hawaii and drifted into foreign waters.
theage
brisbanetimes:This story was compiled and edited by the HeadTopics newsroom and HT AI from the reports above.
Typhoon Jangmi Japan Subtropical Islands Sakurajima Volcano Ryukyu Archipelago
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