When we woke on the third day of our voyage we were in the port city of Takamatsu, on the northern shore of Japan’s inland sea. We visited a bonsai farm, an outdoor architectural museum, and Ritsurin Garden, a large, elaborate Japanese garden. Read on!
In the morning we took a brief bus ride to a bonsai farm, in the middle of a residential neighborhood. This fifth-generation farm was as tiny as the bonsai trees they grow; maybe one or two acres, with the family’s small house at the center. With our expedition guide translating, the farmer’s wife gave us a brief tour and explained the art and practice of bonsai. Interestingly, any type of tree may be used for bonsai, but pines are the most common.
One small plot held rows of small pine trees, no taller than half a meter, but 30 years old. (One taller tree, perhaps three meters tall, is 200 years old!) Around the corner was a walled garden containing tiny potted bonsai trees, resting on waist-high counter tops for convenient access. Nakanishi, the farmer, emerged; he is the 5th generation of his family to tend this farm. Through the translator, he explained the features of a small potted tree that is 200 years old. A member of our group asked the price, out of curiosity; 10 million Yen ($70,000)! What’s more, to import such a tree into the US requires a two-year quarantine in a US Customs facility. Even if you can get a bonsai tree to your home, it requires expert care. So some of his customers purchase a tree and leave it in his garden for perpetual care. (Why? Apparently some treat it as an investment; others exhibit their tree in bonsai competitions.)
We then witnessed a rare treat, as he demonstrated how he trims a bonsai tree. (As you can imagine, they host numerous tour groups, and these tiny trees cannot be trimmed for every group!)
After a quick trip to the ship for lunch we were off again to visit Shikoku-mura, an outdoor museum of old folk houses and farm buildings. Each had been collected from somewhere in Shikoko prefecture, relocated, and restored here on site. We had an opportunity to explore antique homes of simple farmers and wealthy merchants; a rice-grinding mill; a soy-sauce factory; a paper-making factory; and to scramble across a suspension bridge made of vines.
From there, a bus took us to visit Ritsurin Garden, a large, elaborate Japanese garden. There, many of the full-size trees have been carefully trimmed like bonsai; indeed, I paused to watch a group of men on tall ladders trimming pine trees. The paths of the garden wander among tea houses, koi ponds, small streams, and even waterfalls. At one point, National Geographic Photographer Macduff Everton suggested a particularly nice viewpoint that allowed capture of photographs from a high point, across a pond and a bridge, with a tea house at rear. One of the women in our group was wearing a red dress and carrying an umbrella, which made for a particularly nice subject in the photo!
After our return to the ship, and just before we set sail, a group of local citizens who preserve the formal practice of firing antique “Matchlock guns” arrived, in full costume, to demonstrate their coordinated actions to load, prime, and fire these guns. We thus sailed to an eight-gun salute! (video)
After dinner on board we made an overnight transit through the inland sea to a position offshore of Miyajima island.
Be sure to check out the gallery for more photos!
This post is part of a series about our Japan trip; the series starts here.
David Kotz 
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