MY REAL JAPAN: Akayu-Onsen (赤湯温泉）in Yamagata 1

We had a short trip to Yamagata (山形） Prefecture in the Tohoku district from the 23rd to 25th of November to see colored leaves.It took 2 1/2 half hours from JR Tokyo Station by a bullet train, Tsubasa; JR PASS can be used for the foreigners in Japan.

Akayu-Onsen（赤湯温泉） has a history of 900 years and it is said the Samurai healed their wounds in the hot springs there.Actually aka is red and yu is hot water in Japanese language so it is said that the water became red after they soaked in the spa.

In 1878 ,Ms.Isabella Lucy Birdas, British travel writer was interested in the hot-spring cure when she visited Akayu-Onsen .She loved the scenery of the village nearby saying that it looked like Arcadia in Greece. She had reported it on the travel journal, the 'Unbeaten Tracks in Japan'.

This Onsen works well on the skin, weakness, neuralgia , high blood pressure,diabetes, the organ of digestion and women's diseases .
Amazingly you can drink it, too!

We reached JR Tokyo Station before noon on the national holiday of the 23rd November.
The first thing we did was buying bento after we queued up in the crowd !

In Singapore ,we are not allowed to have any food or drinks on the public transport .
For Japanese people , eating bento on the train is good fun , so we did enjoy our lunch.

Isabella Lucy Birdas

[After leaving Shinjo (新庄）this morning, we crossed over a steep ridge into a singular basin of great beauty, with a semicircle of pyramidal hills, rendered more striking by being covered to their summits with pyramidal cryptomeria, and apparently blocking all northward progress. At their feet lies Kaneyama in a romantic situation, and, though I arrived as early as noon, I am staying for a day or two, for my room at the Transport Office is cheerful and pleasant, the agent is most polite, a very rough region lies before me　・・・・・・]
　　　　　　　　　　　　　　ISABELLA　L．BIRD “UNBEATEN　TRACKS　IN　JAPAN”