Oarai

Somewhere in my travels, I picked up a packet of postcards showing all the best local sights. I’d heard of most of them, and even been to a couple already. But there was one that no one had mentioned (and when asked, the locals couldn’t identify it) – a fantastic picture of a torii sitting out on a rock in the surf.

Some background – a “torii” is a freestanding gate. In it’s simplest form, it has a pillar on each side and two parallel lintels on top. They can be made out of almost anything (wood, metal, concrete, etc), come in various sizes (almost always taller than a person), and can be quite complex (complete with roof and flanking guardian statues). They generally stand as the “entrance” to a shrine or temple although it’s not uncommon to see one standing in the middle of apparently nowhere (like this one).

So today was an expedition to find the mysterious torii. The postcard claimed it was in Oarai (pronounced "or I"), which also happens to have (among other things) an aquarium, a “marine tower”, a large temple complex, and the beach I was originally directed to (see entry for 6/19). So I figured there was enough to do even if the postcard turned out to be a photo-shop job.

The aquarium was an afterthought since I didn’t really think it belonged in a sightseeing tour of Japanese things. But it was easily one of the best aquariums I’ve seen, with a really nice deep sea display. I don’t know if that crab really was almost my size or if the thick glass distorted it, but it was impressive. Up on the surface, the seals were unfortunately napping, but the sea otters were cheerfully demonstrating that summersaults were an international otter past time (the otters we see in Monterey do the same). They also had a really spectacular jungle gym, but there were no big people on it. And since I’m a big big person here, I regretfully passed. What I found truly sad though, was that Aquaworld had much better English signs and guides than the world heritage site Nikko.

The marine tower turned out to be a random tower sitting in the middle of the town. 330yen gets you a 60m ride up in a glass elevator and a view for however long you can stand the other tourists. It did have a view of Sun Park Beach (remember, this is another “beach not very nice”). Close up, the beach was windy, but even nicer than the other. All kinds of sea shells to collect too – just make sure their previous owners have left (there were a lot of people out collecting dinner).





I almost had to give up on the expedition’s goal when I found a map of the town with partial romanji characters. Turns out that it’s hidden behind a row of the ugliest waterfront hotels you’ve ever seen. It’s only a km or so north from the sand beach, but the beach here is all pebbles and rocks. The torii sits out on the last large rock in the surf (it actually stands 4th in a widely-spaced line of torii from the temple complex on the hill). I don’t know what its builders thought it was a gate to or from, but it’s easy to imagine stepping through it into some completely different world.