We're back from camping in Kyushu. The middle of the island where we spent most of our time reminded me a lot of home. Big skies and open landscapes, rolling cattle pasture and small farming towns. Just like Saskabush, but for one thing: a gigantic, smouldering volcano smack in the middle of the all.

Aso-san was a totally unique landscape. It made me feel like I was Neil Armstrong, "One small step for man..." Only it wasn't just one small step I had to take, but rather a million or so normal sized steps, which carried Nancy and I up the back end of Aso-san, around the side, along the ridge of another couple mountains, up the front of yet another, and finally back down. The whole mountain was pretty much devoid of anything green, and the sulphur that blew into my face almost strangled me. It was a pretty great hike, and we took a whole roll of film up there. Hopefully the pictures turn out.

After Aso-san we drove to another volcano, Fugen-dake, in Unzen. This one was a lot more normal landscape, although the volcano had most recently erupted around '98, with the lava flow reaching the suburbs of the city nearby. The hike was thorugh a beautiful and real forest, as opposed to the cedar plantations that make up most of Japan's countryside. It was a relaxing day.

The next stop was Nagasaki, which was crazy, smelly, loud, overpopulated and just about the same as every other Japanese city, with mutilated trees and wires running every which way overhead. We went to the A-bomb museum, which was good, but not like the one in Hiroshima. We also went to an island which was the only place that foreigners were allowed to live during Japan's 200 years of isolation. Most of the people who lived there were Dutch, and were trading with their colonies in Indonesia and the Japanese and back to Europe. It was pretty interesting.

Finally we were going to go see a big gorge and do another hike, but we got rained out. Our crappy tire tent wasn't one bit waterproof and the poles were made from a material with a strength about that of wet noodles, so we bailed out and had a laundry day today. It was a great vacation, and hopefully I get the urge to write in more detail about it. But for now I'm going to enjoying the movie. See you again.