First thing in the morning, we checked out of the hotel and went to the train station. From Matsue 松江 to Yura 由良 took 2 hours by train. Yura was the birth place of the author of famous manga series, Detective Conan. The author name was Gosho Aoyama 青山剛昌. Yura is a small town, when we got off the train at the Yura station, we were surprised that only group of us got out, and there was even no coin locker. Our shoulders were tired with our big backpack on our back. After that, the train station master told us that the taxi company next to the station offered bags keeping service. So, we kept our bags inside a taxi company. I forgot what was the price, but one of my travelmates haggling with the taxi guy and finally he gave us discount!
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| Conan statue outside library |
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| the lamp post with Conan character |
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| Conan bridge |
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| the drain cover with Conan characters! |
After that, we started to walk to the Gosho Aoyama Museum. I thought that maybe Aoyama was the only famous personality of Yura town because the town seems to be centered around the characters from the author's manga. They even built a bridge and named it Conan bridge. Even the front door of the town library had a Conan statue. Along the way, there was a stall that sold watermelons and it was cheap, around 1000 yen per watermelon. However, the sellers did not provide cutting service and we depended on public transport, carrying a big round watermelon around was a big no-no, no matter how sweet the watermelon was. So, we had to let go. Sigh!
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| the prof car from the Conan detective |
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| different language version of the manga |
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| green one was the entry level certificate; pink one was the entrance ticket |
We walked and walked, finally we reached the museum. The actual name of the museum is Gosho Aoyama Manga Factory. I like the manga he wrote. So, walking inside the museum was fun. However, for a non-fan, it would be a chore. There are replica of the author work station, interviews, some different versions of the manga (the manga was translated into a lot of languages). There were questionnaires and separated into different level. After finished the questionnaires, one could get a card indicating that you have finished it. Although I do like the manga, I did not think that I would be able to do the difficult one, so I just took the entry level one, it was easy and the answer could be found from the exhibition. After that, we went to the souvenir shop, there was a memorial coin service. One can engrave name and date on the Conan coin. I made one too! This was the only thing I bought from that shop. One of my friends bought a Conan puzzle, some bought card holder, etc.
Then, we rushed to the train station to take the 12.33pm train to Tottori 鳥取. Before that, we managed to snap another Conan statue photo near the train station. It was a close call. We ran and almost missed the train. Like I said earlier, this was not a happening place, so the train was like one round per hour. So lucky! After we reached Tottori, we went to find a restaurant to eat, the restaurant menu included duck noodle, at first I wanted to try it, however, it finished, so I skipped lunch since I was not too hungry. After lunch, we went to the bus station to ask for the loop bus to bring us to sand dune. Since we needed to go to Okayama 岡山 that night, we asked about the bus from Tottori to Okayama too. The express train cost almost 4500 yen and took 3 hours while the normal train took 4 hours and cost around 2500 yen. The normal train was out of question due to time constraint. The bus ticket cost 3000 yen and it took 2.5 hours to reach Okayama. Plus, for bus ticket, there were discounts for 2 (二枚切符) or 4 tickets (四枚切符). So, after discount and averaging, it cost us around 2800 yen.
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| Tottori Sand dune |
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| Tottori sand dune |
The bus fare per trip was 300 yen while the day pass was 600 yen. Although we boarded for 2 times and it would have cost us the same. We still bought the day pass because we will have the day pass card. From our friends who have been there before, their advices were to wear long pants because it would be painful when the sand was blow by the strong wind onto the legs. However, it was a wrong decision to listen to that advice. It was so hot and the sand stuck to the pants. Very uncomfortable! The Tottori sand dune was like a giant beach only. However, there were camels for hire. We stayed there for around 1.5 hours and then left to catch the bus to Okayama. Before boarding, we bought bento and ate sitting outside the station because we could not find a proper place to eat. After we reached Okayama station, a uncle told us that our hotel was very near, walking distance, so we decided not to take the tram and walked. Again wrong judgement, with a big bag, walking was difficult and tiring! When we finally reach hotel, we was like saying "god!" We checked into this Comfort Hotel. It was much better than Toyoko Inn that we stayed 2 nights earlier. It was cheaper and the breakfast was good! The choices were of much variety and they provided ample spaces for people to sit down and relax.
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| the loop bus around Tottori |
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| Tottori Day pass |
Day 2: Sakaiminato
Day 3: Tottori
Day 4: Okayama
Day 5: Tokushima (Shikoku)
Day 6: Shodoshima (Shikoku)
Day 7: Oboke & Kochi (Shikoku)
Day 8: Ehime
Day 9: Onomichi
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