Japan, Day 1 (September 3): Kobe

Today we joined our expedition group, toured sights near Kobe, and boarded our ship – the National Geographic Resolution. Read on!

After connecting with our National Geographic expedition group in our hotel in Kobe, we spent the morning touring two local sights. The first, Himeji Castle, is “the finest surviving example of prototypical Japanese castle architecture, comprising a network of 83 rooms with advanced defensive systems from the feudal period” [Wikipedia].  First built in 1333, it has been rebuilt several times over seven centuries; the current structure dates from 1609 [Wikipedia].  Like other Japanese castles from that period, it was surrounded by three moats and has numerous walls and other lines of defense.  A timber-frame wooden structure with six stories and a basement, it appears from the outside to have five tiers … each of which has numerous slits and portals to allow archers and snipers to shoot any approaching attackers.

Next door, Koko-En is a modern garden in classical Japanese style, built in 1992 just outside the inner moat of Himeji Castle.  We strolled for an hour along the carefully groomed paths and ponds, with occasional glimpses of the castle through the trees, some tinged with red as the seasons begin to change.

We stopped for a catered lunch at Nadagiku sake factory.  Although sake was available during lunch, and there were some interpretive displays demonstrating the manufacture of sake, the highlight was the hot-pot style lunch in which each person had a small pan filled with broth, raw meat, and vegetables, atop a flame… allowing us to cook our own hot meal to eat alongside a variety of cold side dishes.

We then arrived at our ship, the National Geographic Resolution.  This beautiful cruise ship was specifically designed for Lindblad and National Geographic expeditions in the Arctic and Antarctic.  It spends the year circumnavigating the globe, north and south, visiting the Antarctic during its summer and the Arctic in its respective summer months – but offering other opportunities in Asia and South America during the fall/spring shoulder seasons. It is only two years old, the slightly younger identical twin of the National Geographic Endurance on which dad and I sailed to South Georgia in March 2023; you can read (and see!) more about the ship in my blog post from that voyage.

See more photos in today’s gallery.

We sailed overnight from Kobe to Uno, through Japan’s inland sea.

This post is part of a series about our Japan trip; the series starts here.