Genryu Fishing of Japan #45

Takakuwa-san (Fishing trip with Mr. Shinichi Takakuwa)

The rain, that had begun to fall when we entered into the mountains, eased off. It was 6:30 in the morning, we lifted up our backpacks on our backs and started walking up through the small stream called “Aka-gawa (Red river). "Because I'm very old now, I can't walk so fast. Go ahead and wait in the right place." Takakuwa-san said to us and he went to the end of the group. We were on the route to Obuka-zawa climing over the mountain ridge of Hachimantai mountains spread over the north of Akita and Iwate prefecture.

Hachimantai is a national park with rolling mountains. There are variety shape of peaks of volcanic origin on a plateaus at an altitude of about 1500m, and there are countless swamps and wetlands between them. We went on a fishing trip to the headwaters of Onuka-sawa flowing westward on the Akita side of Hachimantai for 3 days. This trip was special because we had a special guest Takakuwa-san in the group. 

Takakuwa-san is a very famous genryu fisher and stream trekker. 

I first met Takakuwa-san about 5 years ago. When I went to Haide-gawa (Haide River) with my fishing friend Tsuru-chan, we happened to meet with Takakuwa-san's party at the tenba (camp site) by the stream on the first day. Haide-gawa, which has a huge slab cliffs called Gangarashibana at the most upstream, is a popular genryu not only for anglers but also for enthusiastic sawanobori (stream climbing) people. On the first day of entering the valley, I and Tsuru-chan enjoyed fishing a few miles upstream from Temba and returned to Temba in the evening, we saw unexpected bonfire smoke from the tributary stream by the tenba. As we climbed to the tenba, we found a party of 3 people on the other side of stream. When we went to say hello and talk about our schedule for the next, I got to know it was Takakuwa-san and two young women. We did simple self-introduction and told that we always enjoyed reading articles written by Takakuwa-san. Takakuwa-san and his colleagues were visiting Haide-gawa to write an article of Gangarashibana for a mountain climbing magazine. Then, for the next day, we decided to go to Gangarashibana together so as not to disturb Mr. Takakuwa's coverage. 

Since Takakuwa-san and I had common friends like Sebata-san and several other headwater fishing acquaintances, I sometimes met Takakuwa-san at a year-end party and other occasions. We promised to go on a genryu fishing trip together someday, but I was not given a chance. Five years later, this opportunity has finally come. When I talked to my genryu friends about this trip, 4 members gathered at once because we could go with that famous Takakuwa-san. It was Tsuru-chan, Hama-chan, Yagi-san and Ubi-chan who have just returned to Japan. Unfortunately, Tsuru-chan had to cancel the trip at work just before the trip, so it was a trip with a total of five members including Takakuwa-san.

Takakuwa-san is a celebrity in the headwater fishing world alongside with Sebata-san. In my favorite magazine, "Keiryu", there is an article by Takakuwa-san every issue. He also has authored more than 10 books and has appeared on television programs sometimes. However, Takakuwa-san’s style in the genryu world is a little different from Mr. Sebata or Dr. Ishigaki. Takakuwa-san's approach to the genryu world was not fishing, but mountain climbing. Takakuwa-san was one of the leading persons in establishing a unique Japanese sport called “Sawa-nobori(stream climbing)”.

Originally, Takakuwa-san was one of young mountaineers who aimed for the highest peaks in the world, like Everest. Takakuwa-san said that he gradually began to realize that the appeal of the mountains was not only to reach the summits, but also in the forests and valleys at the foot of the mountains and the history and culture of the people who live there. Needless to say, Takakuwa-san likes fishing. However, fishing itself was not always the primary purpose of Takakuwa-san's mountain trips. His trips were from adventures such as perfecting the many impregnable genryu trips and climbing the waterfall that was said to be impossible, to the trips walking through the fading mountain trails with more than 1000 years of history and recorded the history and the culture of mountain dwellers. Before long, Takakuwa-san became known as a mountaineer who did not aim for the summit.

I was particularly impressed by Takakuwa-san's travel writings and essays in the several books that documented the history and culture of those mountain dwellers and intended to preserve them for posterity. I think Takakuwa-san is an excellent folklore scholar as well as an angler and a mountaineer.

When we were planning this mountain trip, I told Takakuwa-san that we planned to go over the shortest route to the headwaters of Ofuka-sawa and fish only the core part of the stream. However, Mr. Takakuwa said, "No, it is not beautiful by simple round trip, we should make a kind of circle trip in Hachimantai. On the first day we will walk through the ridgeline to the downstream part of Oukasawa and descend down Kantozawa and go to Ofuka-sawa. On the 2nd day, slowly fish the best area of the mainstream and go to Tenba at Mitsumata(confluence of three streams) upstream, put the load from Tenba and fish the headwater part. Last day, we will climb through the Kedo-sawa from Mitsumata to the ridgeline.” So Takakuwa-san suggested a circle trip route which we can enjoy both Hachimantai's ridgeline walk and fishing in Onukasawa.

Akaka-gawa was a stream where acidic water was flowing and the riverbed was dyed in red. After a couple of tributaries, the water quickly diminished, it became a very walkable stepped stream. We arrived on the ridgeline trail for about an hour. The rain had stopped completely. After walking for 1 minute on the mountain trail, there was an evacuation hut of Ofuka Sanso. It was a well-maintained evacuation hut, and the inside looked it was just renovated. Ubi, an Italian, was constantly impressed with its cleanliness.

Takakuwa-san told us that after this fishing trip he would work in a mountain hut for two weeks as a hut guard in the Iide Mountains. Mt. Iide, located on the border between Fukushima and Yamagata prefectures, is a mountain of religion for a long time and is still very popular with mountaineers. Everyone thought that if Takakuwa-san is doing a hut guard, we definitely visit him to the hut next year. There seems to be a stream where you can fish iwana if you go down the northern slope from the hut. I also thought it would be a luxurious mountain trip to fish char at the headwaters of Iide during the day and listen to Takakuwa-san at the mountain hut at night. 

We ate light breakfast in front of the evacuation hut and when we started walking through the ridgeline, the clouds started to cut from the south, and the sun appeared from behind the clouds. Before long, the blue sky began to spread, and by the time we arrived at the top of Mt. Ofuka, the scenery of the Hachimantai mountains gently spread under the wonderful blue sky. In the southeast direction, we could see Mt. Iwate, which was particularly high. It was so beautiful exposed in the morning sun.

We enjoyed a three-hour walk along the ridgeline while enjoying the nature of Hachimantai, with mountain scenery, abundant forests, flower fields along mountain trails and dotted ponds. Around noon, we arrived at the swamp area near the source of Kanto-zawa(Kanto stream). "That side." Takkakuwa-san said. As soon as we descended from the point where he pointed, we immediately came out to the source stream. After walking about 10 minutes, the amount of water increased steadily and it became a fine stream. We went down the stream for about 30 minutes and had lunch on a large monolith by the stream. After lunch, at a confluence with a large tributary, Takakuwa-san told Ubi-chan to try fishing. Immediately, Ubi-chan fished a few iwana, but the size was still small. We kept on walking down Kanto-zawa. It took an hour to reach the confluence with mainstream Obuka-sawa from there. I was lack of sleep and exhausted, but it was a great walk. 

The riverside at the confluence was very wide on the mainstream side, and we soon set a tarp at the safest place by mountain side. Hama-chan and Ubi-chan started fishing, but the iwana seemed to be small again. We bathed in the pool in front of Tenba and started preparing for dinner. We made a bonfire, and the dinner was started with toasting with beer. Beer was so good because it was a hot day. We cooked some appetizers and grilled meats, and the main was Ubi-chan's risotto. Since it is the first night, everyone started with a brief introduction of ourselves first and heard Takakuwa-san’s mountain stories. However, we all lay down early under the tarp due to extreme lack of sleep and tired walking on the first day. 

The next day was blessed with good weather from morning. "Let me take a picture of a good fishing today." Takakuwa-san pushed our back, and we left Tenba. We were told that we would arrive at Tenba at Mitsumata before noon. Mitsumata is the core of Obuka-sawa genryu area, and just downstream of Mitsumata there is a big waterfall, a landmark of Obuka-sawa, known as the Niagara Falls.

I did not fish at all the previous day, so I fished first this day. I could catch iwana of about 25cm in a riffle above Tenba immediately. Then the iwana had great reactions and chased the kebari and bent our fishing rods. The average size was about 28cm, but in about two hours to Niagara Falls, we enjoyed fishing in Obuka-sawa enough. 

Climbing over the Niagara Falls, a long slippery riverbed continued for about 300m, but we quickly arrived at Mitsumata. I heard that Tenba was on the left bank in Kedo-sawa, so when I went to reconnaissance, there was a large enough Tenba on the bank just upstream of the confluence on the left bank that looked comfortable. We immediately set up a tarp and made up Tenba. "We slept enough last night and we have physical strength today, so whatever we do, the work is quick." Yagi-san said and laughed. After Tenba was made, Yagi-san boiled soba for everybody. We spread large leaves on the rocks beside the stream, served soba on it and ate all at once. It was delicious. 

We split into two groups from noon and fished upstream from Mitsumata. Hama-chan and Ubi-chan entered Kita-zawa(North stream), and Takakuwa-san, Yagi-san and I entered Higashi-zawa(East stream). Iwana's response was excellent in the afternoon too. As Takakuwa-san had taken enough pictures in the morning, he finally started fishing in the afternoon. Takakuwa-san told us that he was doing bait fishing in the past, but he has been focusing on Tenkara fishing since 10 years ago. Yagi-san and Takakuwa-san caught good size Iwana one after another. 

We climbed over a few waterfalls, and we were happy to have fished well enough. So we returned to Temba. We had enough time even after arriving at tenba on this day. We lit a bonfire on the riverside of Kedo-sawa and toasted with beer early on. Hama-chan made iwana sashimi and kobujime(kelp rolled sashimi). After that, we all made Yagi-san's specialty iwana gyoza(Fried iwana dumpling). Cooking was good fun. Takakuwa-san seemed to have iwana gyoza first time and seemed enjoying them. This evening, Takakuwa-san told us many stories about the mountains and the books.

I told Takakuwa-san that two of Takakuwa-san's books were very impressive. The first book is "Mountain Work, Mountain Life", which I described a little earlier, but it is the book carefully describes the history and culture of the mountain people. It is the record of life that has been supporting and inheriting the lives of mountain villagers for hundreds of years. The stories about fisherman, wild vegetable picker, Kiji-shi(Wooden craftsmen) etc. The stories about the culture of the ancient mountain people of Japan that is almost disappearing in this modern age. Takakuwa-san said, "Because if someone does not write it, those things will be forgotten."

Another favorite book is "Kodo Junrei (Pilgrimage of ancient road)". This book is very familiar to genryu fishermen like us. The book is about the roads or foot paths in the mountains. For example, the ancient roads that have been used for more than a thousand years in eastern Japan and all over the Tohoku region, and old trails that mountain people made, or fishermen’s and mountain plants pickers hidden foot paths, some of work roads that has been cut open in the mountains. Takakuwa-san travelled those rods and trails on foot for this book. It is a book that records such a mountain trip. I occasionally wrote about such old mountain trails and zenmai paths in this blog, and the book includes detailed records of those fading mountain roads. Even if it is called a road, it is not a main road that has been promoted to a road where cars run, such as a national road or a prefectural road, but a so-called back road. Sometimes those roads have been made on the steep mountains or cliffs. Those were the places like the natural fortress that seemed impossible to go through. I really think some roads that Takakuwa-san describes in this book are truly miracle. 

Takakuwa-san has turned 70 this year. "I'm old now," Takakuwa-san said, laughing. I sincerely wonder if somebody who is younger than us inherits the rest of these Takakuwa-san’s records. As the night went on, we slipped into the sleeping bags one after another. It was a calm summer night, with no wind, the moon light spilling out of the gaps between the trees.

On the last day, we chose the most straightforward route through Kedo-sawa to the mountain trail on the ridge. It was a relatively easy route until the end of the stream, but we made a mistake in choosing walking direction in the last bush and struggled, but finally we managed to go on the mountain trail. The superb views of Hachimantai had been spreaded like 360 degrees. It was the splended landscapes, and we could forget all difficulties we had. The cool breeze was pleasant. We went around the Hachimantai ridgeline and the genryu of Obuka-sawa and reached back the head of Aka-gawa again.

I really wanted to come back to fishing with Takakuwa-san and the friends. I asked to Takakuwa-san, "Where shall we go next year?"

"Yeah, let's go somewhere again," Takakuwa-san laughed.

Genryu Fishing of Japan #41

Snow Bridge in mid July

by Keiichi Okushi

This year, rainy season ended much earlier than usual year. In our main genryu fishing field Tohoku, generally the rainy season ends around middle to end of July, but it ended by the end of June this year. As soon as July came, the summer had come. The sun was shining and glittering strongly every day. I do not like the rainy and humid climate of the rainy season, but when the rainy season had ended so soon, I was concerned about the shortage of water. Not to mention growth of agricultural crops, I was also worried that the genryu in the summer would not be drought.

In mid-July, on the three consecutive holidays including the marine day, I went to Arakawa flowing on the south side of the Asahi mountain range with 2 friends, Go-chan and Ubi-chan. Arakawa genryu area is a beautiful mountain stream that runs through white granite river-bank, and the stream is surrounded by mountains of 1,500 meters to 1,800 meters and untouched forests of beech. For me Arakawa is a stream that I have fished many times already, but it is the first genryu in Asahi Mountains for Go-chan and Ubi-chan. Tenba (Camp site) is only 2 hours walk from the car parking, and we can use the climbing trail up to the tenba.

In this fishing trip, we planned to stay at this tenba for 2 nights and aimed to go to the upstream waterfall called “Magari-daki” that I have never been before. A little while ago when I visited Sebata-san at Bansho in Tadami, as I talked about this fishing trip, Sebata-san said, "There must be still snowy bridges remaining in mid-July and it might be impossible to go to Magari-daki." However, we did not have much snow this year, so I thought that it would be fine in the middle of July as expected.



When we arrived at car parking lots by Arakawa, as the weather forecast was very good for the three consecutive holidays, there were 5 or 6 cars were parked in the parking lots at the gate of the climbing pass already. Early in the morning, when nobody had gotten up yet, we started walking up the mountain path. Arakawa's climbing path continued upstream along the river, so there was no hard climb. We walked breathlessly in the deep forest where stunning beech trees are scattered. We crossed three suspended bridges that gradually became poorer, and when the sun appeared over the mountains, we arrived in Temba.

Around the time the Tarp and the Blue Sheet were set up in the tenba, 2 anglers were coming down to the stream. We exchanged greetings. They said "We will stay for one night, so we would like to go to the tenba of about an hour and fish around there." I said “OK, then we will fish lower part today.” “We will take care walking not to spook fish” they said and walked to up stream.

We had a break for a while and prepared for fishing. Go-chan said he would like to fish near tenba and have a little nap today. I could understand him because we only slept for 2 or 3 hours a night before. Ubi-chan and I decide to fish up to Masudome-no-taki (Trout Stop Water Fall) which is about 1km up-stream from the temba. Arakawa in this section is surrounded by un-touched deep forest of big old beech trees, and stream flows slowly with a large amount of water.

I thought fishing might be a tough condition because it was already July and many fishers walked and fished around this area, but contrary to expectations, the fish showed good reactions to our kebari. There were nice sized iwana of 24-27 cm vent our rods at every good point. Apparently the two leading fishers seemed to have walked so as not to rough the fishing points. Ubi-chan and I enjoyed fine fishing up to Masu-dome water fall. We had lunch under the water fall and walked back to the tenba.

When we arrived at the tenba another 2 guys lookd ike fishers were resting by the tenba. I said hello to them, then one guy told me “You are Okushi-san, aren’t you?”. He was a genryu fisher that I once met in the keiryu and talked for a while. They were wanting to stay at this tenba, so we welcomed them to set a tarp by our place. Luckily there was enough space for one more tarp. I said, “Let’s drink together tonight.” “Yes, of course.” they answered with smile.

"Photo by Uberto Calligarich"

We started bonfire around 5:00 and prepared for dinner. That evening, Go-chan cooked lamb-chop steaks with salt, pepper and rosemary. We called 2 guys and had beer together. Lamb-chop steaks were so good. We also cooked more foods and enjoyed talking until about 9:00 pm. When noticing, the starry sky, that was promising good weather of next day, was spreading in the night sky.

Next morning, we woke up at 6:30 am. When we were having breakfast, 2 young guys looked like Sawanobori (Stream trekking) were coming over. They told that they were on a day hike sawanobori and do some fishing too. We said we would probably catch up sometimes later, and we saw off them. There were many people because of 3 consecutive holidays. Well, thought that day's fishing was difficult, but I thought it was OK if we could see Magari-daki, and we left Tenba after 8:00 am.

"Photo by Uberto Calligarich"

The morning mist hung over the river where the sun light was not reached yet. We aimed up-stream and walked in this fantastic scenery. It only took us 30 minutes to Masu-dome waterfall where we finished fishing yesterday. Masudome waterfall is only about 8m but it had a large amount of water and there was a huge pool under the waterfall. There was also another 8m waterfall right after Masudome waterfall. I told Go-chan and Ubi-chan how to climb over the waterfalls, and I traversed right side of the pool and climbed Masudome waterfall and waded across the rapid stream and climbed the next waterfall. Go-chan and Ubi-chan climbed the waterfalls safely. We really enjoyed this waterfall climbing.

Gorge finished just upstream of the waterfall and the vast Hirokawara (Wide and flat shallows) spread before our eyes, and over there the spectacular scenery of the Asahi mountain peaks were spreaded under the shining sun and the blue sky. There were no clouds to obstruct this majestic scenery shone on the summer sun. Ubi-chan and Go-chan both were taking photos. This was the landscape I wanted to show them. I said, “Real Arakawa genryu is starting from here.” Since we have a predecessor, we took walk forward for a while.

Two fishers we met yesterday came down as we walked a little. Talking, yesterday they took a tenba near there and fished up-stream. “Fishing was good.” They smiled fairly. Talking with them, I learned that they are the same locals as me. We talked for a while and said good-bye. Around 9:00 am, we reached the confluence of Nabekura-sawa where a huge snow bridge lied down even in mid-June. The snow bridge had disappeared without a trace, but the mainstream was deep pool for about 30m that we can not wade or traverse, Ubi-chan and I decided to climb over the 40m high right-side riverbank, but surprisingly Go-chan swam and broke through the pool.

We started fishing from the up-stream of this big pool. We fished some iwana but size was not satisfied, we knew it was because there were still 2 sawanobori guys up-stream. We walked again and then we found 2 guys about 100m up-stream. We soon caught up with them. It was around 10:30. They said they were just finishing fishing and go down the stream as they had to go home by the evening. Finally, there was nobody up-stream of us in Arakawa genryu. Now, as soon as I thought that Arakawa fishing was going to be real high right, the river suddenly became little muddy. I think it was the sign that a snow bridge broke down somewhere up-stream. "In July, there must be snow bridges left." I remembered Mr. Sebata-san’s words.

As we fished and walked for about 30 minutes, the turbidity disappeared. After passing a large tributary called Ohobi-zawa, the flow of mainstream became rapid, and the contrast of white granite of river banks and green forest, pale blue sky showed us a beautiful scenery of Arakawa genryu. Iwana to catch got bigger, and they bent our fishing rod comfortably.

"Photo by Uberto Calligarich"

After few minutes, we faced Ex-Sakanadome Waterfall. It was only 2m high water fall, but there was no clue, I climbed the right bank acrobatically and put out the rope for Ubi-chan. As we walked for a while, the valley became the deep gorge and the compressed flow became deeper and stronger. When we turned one blind corner of the valley, there was a huge snow bridge caught upon 30 meters high valley hill. It looked like breaking and falling down any time soon. That was too huge and too unstable snow bridge. The current under it was very deep and rapid. We had to give up wading up the stream there. However, it was quite an inspiring sight.

"Photo by Uberto Calligarich"

We had lunch at down-stream of that place and slowly went down the stream. The sun in summer was as strong as ever, the temperature went up but the walking in a pure flow was very pleasant. In the pool by Nabekura-zawa, high school students boys and girls sawanobori (stream climbing) group was practicing swiming supported by instructors by a rope. They said they were wading up Oh-Obisawa from now on and stay overnight in the mountain and coming down the climbing path tomorrow. We waved hands and said, "Take care and enjoy!". Everyone turned about and waved hands with a smile.

This time, we could not reach the target waterfall. Moreover, it was only 200 meters from the waterfall. It was disappointing, but fishing was very good and we really enjoyed breathtaking sceneries. Also, we met more fishermen and sawanobori climbers than usual during this trip, and everyone was very nice. On the last day, we met the local elementary school students who were led by the teachers. They were on a beginner river hike tour and everyone looked enjoying the walk very much. They all said hello to us with smiles. It reminded me the smiles of the high school students who were waving hands at that pool Nabekura-zawa a day before. I was thinking that Japanese young people were still not that bad.

"Photo by Uberto Calligarich"