It’s raining lightly as I walk through Shurakuen Garden, but it doesn’t diminish the experience. As rain patters on my umbrella, the moss and leaves around me, I feel a sense of calm as a local guide explains the garden’s historical significance.
When Nobutomi Matsudaira and his clan came to power in 1698, succeeding the Mori family who built the grounds, the daimyo “would use this garden as a meeting place for receiving vassals from other clans. Later on, he would come here for falconry, archery and other activities.”
In Tsuyama, Okayama Prefecture, the rain somehow feels right in the gardens of Shurakuen, giving life to the grass, moss and a whimsical mushroom here and there. The garden is now just a third of its original 77,000-square-meter size, the daimyo are long gone and the modern citizenry of the west-central Chugoku region seems to be following suit. Okayama ranks a middling 20th among prefectures in terms of population; to the north, Tottori Prefecture ranks dead last.
Maybe it’s no wonder, then, that the majority of international tourists drawn to Osaka and Kyoto to the east and Hiroshima to the west overlook these domains when they visit: Okayama drew just 1% of all overseas visitors in 2023; Tottori, a mere 0.3%.
The remains of a once-sprawling estate of a feudal lord, Shurakuen Garden in Okayama Prefecture is a tranquil reserve not often found in Japan’s tourist hotspot cities.
| CASSANDRA LORD
If Japan has flyover prefectures, these might be them — but after three days of touring Okayama and Tottori in July, I learned that fewer people means a greater chance to feel closer to the land that remains.
‘Eternally yours’
As the clouds begin to part at Shurakuen, I head to another park, Green Hills Tsuyama. It boasts a completely different history from Shurakuen, having formerly been an area for livestock research that was completely reimagined into a different world. Instead of the classic, manicured landscape of Shurakuen, I’m met at the entrance by a small water feature, and up some steps, pristinely rounded grassy hills dotted by flower gardens roll out into the distance.
Hiroyuki Sunami, a gardener at Green Hills, offers an explanation of some of the flowers he has worked on. Gesturing to a purple flower against the hilly backdrop, he says, “What do you think this flower is? It looks like lavender, right? Take a leaf and smell it.”
With permission, I pluck a leaf from the plant, rub it and bring it to my nose. It has an herbal, almost sage-like scent that I can’t quite put my finger on, though it certainly doesn’t smell like lavender.
Despite its rural appeal, a mere 1.3% of foreign tourists visited Okayama and Tottori prefectures in 2023.
| CASSANDRA LORD
“It’s a type of mint — specifically, Salvia farinacea. In hana kotoba,” Sunami says, referring to the poetic use of flowers with set meanings to wordlessly convey emotions, “it symbolizes ‘eien ni anata no mono’ (eternally yours).”
Sunami tells me that this small flower garden is just one part of his team’s work looking after the 25 hectares of Green Hills. I walk a bit farther on to the lotus garden to see pre-flowering bulbs the size of my head. I pause for a moment, taking in the smell of the ground after the rainfall and the chirping of the birds emerging overhead.
‘An enthusiastic amateur’
The following day, I wake to a quaint Kinshi Line local train trundling through the green rice paddies outside my hotel window. A faint blanket of clouds makes its way across the hills, but otherwise it seems that the weather is on my side for my trip north to neighboring Tottori Prefecture.
After an hour’s drive, I arrive at the foot of the 1,709-meter Mount Daisen. While the mountain is a snow park and ski resort from December to March, it is now green season — an apt name as I ascend on the ski lift, surrounded by grass, trees and the lush, foliage-covered mountain ahead of me.
At an observation area 900 meters above sea level, I look down toward the Sea of Japan and the town of Daisen. The coast curves out dramatically toward the city of Sakaiminato and the border of Shimane Prefecture, blue-tinted peaks barely visible in the distance. The air is clear and cool up here, a welcome respite from the suffocating crowds of Tokyo I found myself in a few days prior.
As the sun climbs higher in the sky though, so do the mercury levels, and staying outside for more than 10 minutes has me blanketed in sweat. So after another drive (and a brief stop at Terrace The Daisen for a taste of local Daisen ham), I head into the cool air conditioning of the Shoji Ueda Museum of Photography in the town of Sakaiminato.
The Shoji Ueda Museum of Photography gives visitors the opportunity to take some staged photos its titular auteur was known for.
| CASSANDRA LORD
I’ll admit: Before entering the museum, I hadn’t heard of native son Shoji Ueda (1913-2000). But I feel an almost immediate connection with him as both an aspiring photographer myself and as a Briton upon reading how his father influenced his art by gifting him a British photo magazine. Apparently it was an autumn 1931 copy of Modern Photography that helped spark Ueda’s interest in overseas and modern photography.
One of the shots on display is a monochrome photo of four schoolgirls standing in a very purposeful formation, perfectly spaced from one another and creating a sense of balance in the horizontal frame. One girl looks away from the camera, shielding her eyes against the sun, two others stand posed looking in different angles and the fourth sits with a basket behind her. This is “Shojo Yontai” (“Four Girls, Four Positions”), and it’s one of Ueda’s best-known works as it sparked the advent of enshutsu shashin (staged photos) across Japan.
I head upstairs to find a curious bowler hat silhouette on a window with Mount Daisen in the background. It’s not until I walk into the next room that I understand its purpose. In the 1980s, Ueda used objects such as mirrors and hats to add a different dimension to his photos. He was playful and unafraid to experiment, eventually giving rise to a style called Ueda-chō (Ueda-tone), and a video at the museum conveys the expert auteur’s humble mantra: “Even now, I’m an enthusiastic amateur.”
Through a window, Mount Daisen peeks out from behind the clouds, and other visitors rush to take a picture head on. I try something a little different: With the mountain to the left, I wait until someone is walking just below the hat to the right for a composition where the hat grabs the eye first. It’s no Ueda, but it’s mine.
That evening, I cross the border back to Okayama, and I’m lucky enough to try an array of specialties from the Hiruzen region at a local restaurant called Suitonbo. I barrel my way through plates of sashimi, boar and raw oysters, ending with a taste of Hiruzen yakisoba noodles made with a variety of local ingredients, but what stands out is the miso and chicken, which are a change from the yakisoba norm. The miso sauce has a salty but rounded umami flavor that has me reaching for my last swig of beer. That night, I sleep soundly with a head full of nature and photography and a stomach full of Hiruzen.
Closer to the country
On my final morning in Okayama, I hop on my first electric cross bike. My ride starts at the Kengo Kuma-design Kaze no Ha pavilion. Avoiding the temptation to make a stop at Hiruzen Winery along the way, I set off toward Hiruzen Jersey Land.
In local specialty Hiruzen ‘yakisoba’ noodles, the miso sauce has a salty but rounded umami flavor.
| CASSANDRA LORD
The Hiruzen area is known for cooler temperatures thanks to its relatively high elevation and rainfall — there is a local saying: “Even if you forget your bento, don’t forget your umbrella.” It is exactly this plentiful rain and cooler climate that works best for Jersey cattle, a relatively rare breed in Japan at just around 10,000 head compared to their more numerous counterparts, the Holstein Friesian (1.34 million).
Later that day, as I sit on the shinkansen back to Tokyo with the Chugoku countryside whizzing past me, I reflect on how I often feel a sense of distance on my way to a new place. But as I watch the greenery of Okayama Prefecture pass me by now, I feel much closer to it than I thought I would at the start of my trip. Even now, I can hear the birds chirping and smell the leaves on its hillsides, the rush of water and the summer breeze.
I look forward to the next time I can feel this close to somewhere new.