After Kanazawa, the five of us (Me, Sammy, Ellen, Michael and our car, Rumi) headed to Fukui prefecture. Like Toyama, I got a really good vibe from Fukui almost immediately and knew I would want to come back for an extended trip in the future. (If you didn’t know we went to Toyama, nor the good vibes I’m talking about, you can read about that by navigating back 2 blog posts using the arrows at the bottom.)
The mountains that surrounded us, along with the openness and greenness of everything around us in Fukui made me feel comforted and free. Look out for a blog post in the next year or so with a Fukui update, because I’m sure it won’t be long before we’re back!
We went to the Dinosaur museum first because, as anyone who lives in Japan and particularly for those with small children will know, that is what Fukui is famous for! The museum is built on the excavation site, which is still being used to this day. 80% of all dinosaur fossils found in Japan come from Fukui and six completely new species were discovered there and named after the area. These include: Fukuisaurus, Fukuiraptor, Fukuititan, Fukuivenator, Fukuipteryx and Koshisaurus katsuyama. Katsuyama is a city in Fukui prefecture, hence why the latter is named after it, and the others are very clear where the names originate. It goes without saying that for anyone who loves dinosaurs like me, Sammy and Michael do, (Ellen likes them, but I would definitely say more of the excitement came from my brother-in-law,) Fukui is a magical place! Honestly, all four of us had a blast walking around the museum and seeing so many fossils and completely reconstructed dinosaurs. It was so fun to be able to see the actual scale of dinosaurs we’ve always known and loved, as well as to learn about species that we never knew existed. (To name but one, the giant turtle/Archelon which we got a picture of next to Sammy for scale – note how big it’s skull is in comparison to Sammy’s head!)
The building of the museum itself was also really interesting. It was like a dinosaur egg in shape, and, as you rode the escalator down into the main exhibition hall, it really felt like you were taking a portal into a Jurassic Park science lab or something. I tried to get a picture of it, but honestly the experience is worth a thousand photos.
I wish we could have stayed at the museum for days, seeing every nook of the excavation site as well, but we had to get to Fukui city and drop the car back at the rental service on time. So, after we said one last goodbye to the dinosaurs, we headed back into the mountains again.
Fukui city was quaint, with roads that didn’t seem scary even to a nervous driver such as myself. I enjoyed the scattered references to dinosaurs around every corner and it felt very homely to me. I can’t wait to go back soon. We did some souvenir shopping whilst we were there, discovering the beauty that is Habutae Mochi (silky mochi) and buying many many versions of it for me and Sammy to snack on during our trip as well as a nicely wrapped version for one of Sammy’s dearest, mochi-loving friends and colleagues back in Kanto. From Fukui, we headed to Okayama, where the next leg of our adventure, and another of the great 3, awaited us. More details on that will come in tomorrows blog post. For now, I hope you like these photos and that you’re enjoying the updates. (Once again, sorry there are so many at once, gotta strike the iron while it’s hot so to speak and run with the updates while I have the time and energy to do so!)
