kenleewrites in 日本

I’m surrounded by Japanese samurai and I’m holding a centuries old pistol. I don’t know why, but that samurai in red standing right behind me handled it to me just before the photo was taken. Spoke with a few of them and found out that most of the home-made prop armor you see are made from cardboard! Each set took about 6 months to make.

These guys appear every Sunday at Odawara Castle. You know, to add some color and entertain the tourists, people like myself. ^^.

Visited Odawara Castle recently. It wasn’t a particularly large castle, but situated on top of a hill, it had great strategic value… which usually means some stairs involved. ^^.

The Late Hojo clan spent 5 generations at Odawara Castle. Even Tokugawa Ieyasu spent some time there too. This castle was rebuilt a couple of times and might not be historically accurate. For one thing, there wasn’t an observatory deck at the top of the castle. Nevertheless, it is listed among the 100 fine castles of Japan.

Within the main castle building is an art museum. Mostly artifacts from days gone by. One floor of the museum displayed photos of the 100 fine Japanese castles. I’ve visited a few. Hiroshima Castle being one of the more recent ones I visited. Didn’t enter Hiroshima Castle though.

The weather was pretty bad that day. It didn’t stop raining. The grounds of the castle also included a mini zoo. There were some Japanese monkeys and what used to be an elephant pen. The elephant passed away awhile back. I remember it made national news in Japan. The guys here were busy arranging flowers around a miniaturized Odawara Castle.

Odawara Station. You can get there from Tokyo by hopping onto the JR Tokkaido line. About an hours down south west.

At the top of Odawara Castle, you can also see the ocean.

I like Japanese history, particularly during the Warring States period (戦国時代 Sengoku Jidai). Incidentally, if you’re a gamer, there are quite a number of games based on this period too.

The Siege of Odawara by Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 1590 was an important event in history. The Late Hojo clan was among the most powerful clans during that period. Their defeat ended 100 years of Hojo rule. Furthermore, Hideyoshi awarded the castle and the surrounding Kanto provinces to Ieyasu Tokugawa (in exchange for the other provinces that he controlled). This in turn was a key event that would eventually lead to him controlling Japan under the Tokugawa Shogunate.

History is an interesting turn of events isn’t it? ^^.

Related posts... maybe:

1. Okinawa Shurijo Castle Park
2. Around Sendai Castle (仙台城)
3. Walking past Rinnoji Temple (輪王寺)
4. Toshogu Shrine (東照宮) part 2/2
5. Towards Yugawara: On the road and Mt Fuji

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Tags: odawara

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