:: Satsumasendai, Where We Stopped to Rest for a Whole Day
Satsumasendai(薩摩川内) wasn’t in the original travel plan. Which makes sense — it isn’t a famous tourist spot, and it isn’t a city with food or sights that belong only to this area.
I had planned this trip in two big halves.
The first half using the Hisatsu Orange Railway(肥薩おれんじ), and the second half in Kagoshima City(鹿児島市).
The first half was about taking trains around to see new scenery, and the second half was about eating good food and drinking in a place I already know well.
Satsumasendai is the city right in the middle of those two halves. It’s where the Hisatsu Orange Railway ends, and where the Kagoshima Main Line begins.
I wanted to rest for a moment after the first half of the trip ended, before moving on to the second half.
Giving my body a proper rest after three or four days of pushing it, and saving up energy for the shochu I’d be drinking in Kagoshima. That was the idea. So I booked a hotel with a hot spring bath, small as it was.
Ah, I’ve rambled on a bit here, but
what I mean is that Satsumasendai wasn’t a place I came to see something or eat something.
:: And Yet, a City You Visit for the First Time Feels Fresh.
A place or a city you’re visiting for the first time gives a traveler a vague freshness. The fact that it’s a first time is itself fresh.
Satsumasendai was like that too. I came here with no prior information at all, completely for the first time.
The Sendai Station building, the main road in front of it, the Sendai River(川内川), the arcade around Nishimukodacho(西向田町) to the south — none of it was anything special, yet it all looked different. Maybe that’s the power of a first time.
Walking alley after alley, I felt something layered up there — the quietness and ease and wear and untouchedness and emptiness particular to a provincial town. Something like that.
The Sendai River is a river that cuts across Satsumasendai from east to west on a large scale. And there’s a river called the Haruta River(春田川) that branches off from it in a small way. More of a little stream than a river.
It isn’t a big or pretty waterway. But walking along the Haruta River felt different too. How should I put it — it doesn’t flow in a straight line. As it runs between the houses, there are many places where the water bends very sharply. And the scenery changes dynamically along with it.
Satsumasendai isn’t really a city that would be a travel destination in itself. But if you happen to stop by in the middle of a trip, it’s also a place where you can feel the mood of a quiet provincial small town to the full, and rest for a beat before moving on.
In this post I’ve packed in a lot, plenty, of photos taken all around the streets of that Satsumasendai. I’m not sure whether I’ve shown you enough of the Satsumasendai I felt through this post.
