Journey to the East - Travel to Japan

28/10/2024

I was a guest of a FAM trip to Chiba prefecture, and visited Nokogiriyama mountain. It is located in the Boso Penninsula across the Tokyo Bay from Tokyo. The whole mountain is a temple called Nihonji with significant monuments scattered around the mountain. You can take a ropeway to the top and enjoy great walks (the whole loop is about 90 minutes, but you can do shorter ones, too.) You will be rewarded with gorgeous views.

27/10/2024

We posted our latest blog on Japanese traditional craft. The link in the comment..

22/10/2024

I participated in a Kintsugi workshop at Taku Nakano Ceramic Arts in Tokyo. Kintsugi is a traditional Japanese technique to restore broken ceramic using lacquer and gold powder. It comes from Japanese philosophy to cherish something old and imperfect, and find beauty in it. I love it!

19/10/2024

Journey to the East - Travel to Japan had a staff trip! Yuki and Mami travelled from Australia and joined our Japanese local team, Kaori, Yumiko, Tomoko and Kayo for the staff trip to Kawaguchiko. A few days of learning, discoveries and a lot of fun!

18/10/2024

According to ATIA (the Australian Trave Industry Association), Australians are travelling at record levels, and Japan (as a destination) recorded the highest grows, with a 103.4% rise in Australian visitors.
But don't worry about Japan being swomped by aussies (and all other international tourists)! There are plenty of wonderful less-visited sites in Japan. Journey to the East - Travel to Japan offers many tours that takes you to rural parts of Japan.

17/10/2024

I would like to share a video of a Japanese craft Tour, 2024 Artisan Tour of Kyushu Japan.

Highlights of a Japanese Craft Tour, 2024 Artisan Tour of Japan run by Journey to the East.

09/07/2024

Arita and Imari in Japan are well known for their spectacular porcelain products.
Now something different. How about biscuits with the traditional porcelain motives printed in the icing? Well here they are!

23/04/2024

The final day of 2024 Artisan Tour of Kyushu Japan was just as memorable. We started with a visit to a bamboo factory where bamboo cut from the mountains is processed ready for bamboo crafts. Once again the owner talked to us about the lack of labour to carry on this trade.
We then visited Jigoku Onsen Museum to simulate how rain drops become onsen (hot spring) water over 50 years. Onsen is a hallmark of Beppu, and we enjoyed various forms of onsen for the rest of afternoon. The farewell dinner was at a Japanese Italian fusion restaurant. It was an amazing sensory experience of visual and taste. We all commented that it could be better than Michlin restaurants in cities!
It was wonderful 12 days and I felt so privileged to showcase such remarkable Japanese artisans to oue esteemed guests on this tour. I thank you Fumiko san and Kimiko san, all our local partners and our staff who made this tour possible!

21/04/2024

Today was all about bamboo craft, which Beppu is famous for. We firstly visited Beppu City Traditional Bamboo Craft Center and saw master pieces as well as historical pieces used for daily life. Among others we admired the works of late Shounsai Shono, a living national treasure lived in Beppu who raised status of bamboo craft to an art form. They were amazing. Thanks to Japan's only dedicated training center on bamboo craft here in Beppu, there are talented young artists emerging. We made our own piece of bamboo pendant under the kind instruction of master bamboo artist.
By the way today's lunch was one of the best sushi I ever had!

20/04/2024

Japanese swordmaking has been a mysterous craft even among Japanese, and today we visited Mr Koroki, a master swordsmith. We learnt so much about the swordmaking process, the industry and market over the two hour workshop. We even had a chance to try our hand with the hot steel and the finished product, and learnt how to appreciate this art form.
The afternoon visit was slightly away from traditional craft, but still a big part of Japanese culture - a taiko drum performance. It was held at a small theater where we felt the energy of the skilled young performers directly. It was fantastic!
Driving through beautiful mountain ranges of Mt A*o and Mt Kuju, we arrived at our final destination Beppu, famous hot spring city. After long day of driving, we enjoyed a Jigokumushi dinner, steamed by the natural geothermal steam!

19/04/2024

Another day of visiting people who are passionate about their traditional crafts. Firstly we visited a local ikan workshop, weaving and indigo dyeing. It involves painstaking process but the outcome is so beautiful. The afternoon visit was to a Japanese traditional insence maker. Mr Baba is quite a character and comically talked about his aging, declining business due to increase in artificial colouring and fragrance, lack of successor, etc.
We had lunch at the top of tea plantation, at Yame. It is a growing region of high quality green tea. We walked through the plantation with a tea farmer and were lucky to encounter harvesting.

19/04/2024

Today we moved to a town called Yame. Yame has preserved its old townscape as well as its traditional craft industries. Here we visited a family business making wooden buckets, a maker of Buddist alters and a maker of chochin, traditional paper lanterns. Lunch was at a restaurant housed in an old sake brewer. Tonight accommodatiom is also very unique, a renovated old merchant house in old town.

17/04/2024

Turning focus on woodcraft today, our fascinating tour continues. This morning we visited a traditional furniture maker who uses rare Yakusugi ceder. After walking through the workshop where skilled craftpeople are working, we arrived at a museum-like showroom. Sadly many of them are the last pieces as yakusugi is no longer available.
We then moved to Kumiko workshop and admired the precision and artistic patterns of the panels. The pieces are cut at 1/100 milimeter! The lunch today was unagi (eel) as we were in unagi capital of Japan.

17/04/2024

Our last stop on the theme of ceramic was Kyushu Ceramic Museum. It is an excellent museum showing the development of Japanese ceramic and its link with Europe, China and Korea. After stopping at a spectacular azarea garden and a cute bakery cafe for lunch, we focused on another famous Japanese craft, washi paper. In the beautiful rural workshop, we created our own piece of washi. We finishef the day with mouthwatering Saga wagyu beef (which i forgot to take a photo being too busy eating!).

16/04/2024

On Day 5 we continued our study on Japan's ceramic tradition focusing on porcelain today. Firstly we visited the old village of secret kilns. At Imari and Arita we also visited kaolin quary, raw material of porcelain, and many gorgeous studios both traditional and modern styles. We met some artisans who we interacted with and talked about the porcelain production process. Being inspired by so much beautiful porcelain all day, we finish the day at a relaxing onsen rokan surrounded by prestine nature.

14/04/2024

On Day 3 of 2024 Artisan Tour of Kyushu Japan, we visited Dazaifu Tenmangu Shrine, the most prominent shrine of Kyushu and had a guided tour of unique art work related to shintoism by shinto priests.
Day 4 was dedicated to Japan's pottery tradition in one of the most highly regarded pottery towns, Karatsu. Here we visited the national treasure level gallaries, and even had chance to create our own under the guidance of a Karatsu potter. The accommodation tonight is sublime ryokan. The service, the food, the building, everything is first class traditional Japanese hospitality.

12/04/2024

Now I'm in Fukuoka, the capital of Kyushu, and I joined our another brand new tour, 2024 Artisan Tour of Kyushu Japan. The theme of today was Hakataori silk fabric, historically highly regarded fabric for kimono especially, obi. At a factory running for 160 years, we learnt the history, process and difference with other kimono fabric. It was so fascinating and informative.
After a guided walking tour of historic town center, we celebrated Toshiko's 88th birthday at seafood restaurant. (I hope she doesn't mind me mensionning her age but she looks so fabulous!)

10/04/2024

Our last destination on this 2024 Cherry Blossom Tour of Sea of Japan Coast before reaching Kyoto is Fukui. It is much less known to international tourists, but we had some fascinating experiences including zen meditation at Eiheiji, one of the most prominent zen temples in Japan, unique geological formation of Tojinbo cliff, another beautuful cherry blossom at Ichijodani archiological site, music and games with geisha at onsen town of Awara.