Muroya no Sono Merchant Mansion and Gardens

 

This is one of the largest Edo-period merchant residences in all of Japan that still stands.

It is located in Yanai, a small river port on the south coast of Yamaguchi Prefecture.

Muroya was the trading name for the Oda Family who were one of the biggest oil traders in Western Japan.

As far as I have been able to ascertain, the primary oil traded would have been rapeseed oil, which I believe is marketed as canola oil in the west. The Japanese rarely used oil in cooking, so its main use would have been lighting.

At their peak the Oda family owned a fleet of 50 trading ships and operated over the area from Kyushu to Osaka.

The property is open to the public as a museum, and was so full of features and displays that I have split it into two large separate posts.

The property is huge, encompassing more than 2,500  square metres and with internal floorspace of more than 1,500 square metres.

The street frontage was 14 meters wide, but the property extended 119 meters ( see second photo of the post)

Such a long, narrow property was known as "sleeping palce of an eel"

It consists of 11 buildings with a total of 35 rooms.

As well as the main family residence, there is a main warehouse, an accounting house, a rice warehouse, and a tooshed.

Additionally there are stables, tenements for servants and workers, and an oil-pressing room.

Most of the rooms are filled with artifacts and displays relating to the room, and I will cover these in the next post.

There are several gardens, a large one planted in the main courtyard area, another for the main house, and several "pocket" gardens .

The property is next to the river at the eastern end of the historic trading town of Yanai.

It is a Historic Preservation District known for its white walls and goldfish lanterns.

I will cover Yanai in later posts. I like Yanai a lot and I highly recommend a visit.

I was visiting early on day 19 of my walk along the Chugoku Kannon Pilgrimage. The previous post was on my walk down the coast to Yanai from Iwakuni.

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Modern Architecture of the Fukuoka Waterfront

 

On my second visit to the city of Fukuoka, many years ago,  I spent an afternoon photographing the architecture in the waterfront area stretching from Momochi to Hakata Port.

The Momochi district where I began is built on reclaimed land so everything is new.

Lots of apartments...

I previously posted  on the Fukuoka City Museum and the Fukuoka Tower in this area....

Mostly I have chosen photographs that are somewhat abstract and geometric, rather than showcasing the buildings as a whole.

This makes photos that resemble the kind of paintings I used to make 40 to 60 years ago...

The photo above is of the TNC Broadcasting Centre next to the Fukuoka Tower. The previous photo is of the Fukuoka City Library.

Below is one of the corner entrances of an otherwise non-descript office building, the NCB Seaside Building.

I think it may now have a different colour-scheme...

The photo above is not actually architecture, rather a view of a very large public sculpture. Not far away is the unusual Twins Momochi.

Across the river these two shots are of what was called the Yahoo Dome when I was there. Now it is called the Mizuho PayPay Dome.

Next door is the Seahawk Hotel which I covered in 2 posts, one on the main hotel, and the second on the impressive atrium.

Just inland from the dome is a huge shopping mall, itself an ugly concrete box, but the movie theatre had some nice decoration.

Next I headed up towards the port area of Hakata.

I posted earlier on the Hakata Port Tower.

A nice water reflection can make any architecture look interesting... below an unusual angle and crop of the Sun Palace Hotel...

And then a short walk upriver towards my hotel, and I couldn't refuse this shot that presented itself.

The previous post in the series was on Marine Messe Fukuoka.

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Iwakuni to Obatake a Pleasant Walk Along the Seashore

 

11th November, 2014. After a good sleep in a hotel I am up before the sun and on my way down the Yamaguchi coastline on day 18 of my walk along the Chugoku Kannon Pilgrimage. Winter days are so short that I need to use all the available light. I am past the industrial areas when the sun comes up.

Usually where a river enters the sea will be a settlement....

The main Sanyo Line railway hugs the coast....

Someone getting ready to look for breakfast.....

Much of the route the road separated steepish slopes from the water....

Nice to see some sea defenses made out of stone and not concrete....

Beach used for school gym or sports class....

Every settlement has a harbour,,, usually with plentiful concrete...

A constant stream of planes heading in to land at Iwakuni. Both an American Marine base and a Japanese SDF base. American fighter jets from Iwakuni regularly buzz our village..... way below the legal altitude, something they would not do in a more populated area, they shake my house.... I guess the pilots are imagining themselves as Tom Cruise...

The Local History & Folklore Museum in the town of Yuu was intriguing.....

It was not open the day I passed by, but I believe much of their content is sea and fishing based...

Roadside attractions in Japan often veer towards the surreal and bizarre... As I approached my first thought was that it would be a restaurant and gift shop...

Sea defenses..... In general, I find the predominant Japanese attitude towards the natural world to be that it is an enemy. Something to be tamed, and controlled... like in a Japanese garden....

Not sure what plant these red berries are of.... though I have one in front of my house....

The Inland Sea is dotted with dozens and dozens of islands, many too small to have inhabitants.... in the far distance is the coast of Shikoku....

The channel between the mainland and Suo Oshima Island narrows. Stretching halfway across to Shikoku, Suo-Oshima is one of the bigger islands in the Inland Sea...

The Oshima Bridge crosses to Suo Oshima Island, a distance of about 1 kilometer. Time to start looking for a place to set out my sleeping bag.

The previous post in this series was on the previous day's walk from Miyajima to Iwakuni.