When talking about Japan, the first thing come to my mind is “someday I will travel to there.” Yes, Japan is a great tourist country, Mount Fuji, cherry blossom, temple and shrine, Shibuya, and many places are full of charm and very attractive to tourists. In this blog, I will briefly discuss one or two interesting tourist places associated with geographical knowledge.

 

An introduction of Japan tourism resources

Japan’s tourism resources are mainly in two aspects. One is the beautiful physical sceneries of the islands, rivers and mountains, waterfalls and deep valleys, and hot springs, etc.. For example, Mount Fuji, Matsushima, and Miyajima. These natural sceneries have very good and special features and are in good states for tourism. Second, the rich and colorful historical and cultural heritage, especially in Nara, Kyoto, and Kamakura. Japan not only retains its national tradition but also actively absorbing the foreign culture, committed to modernization. Tokyo is one of the largest and most modern cities in the world. In addition to Tokyo, Osaka, Japan’s famous tourist city with historical and cultural characteristics. Yokohama is known as the “world kitchen.” Kobe is a city combine eastern and western cultures that is called “the Japanese spiritual hometown.”

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Mount Fuji 富士山

Mount Fuji is the highest peak of Japan, and it is one of Japan’s crucial national symbol. Mount Fuji is one of the world’s largest active volcanoes across Shizuoka and Yamanashi, which closes to the Pacific coast, about 80 km southwest of Tokyo. Even though Mount Fuji is an active volcano, it is currently in the dormant condition, but geologists still put it in the active volcanoes list. Since the year of 781, a total of 18 eruptions were recorded, the last eruption in the year of 1707 which was in the Edo period. This last eruption had a lot of words and pictures records. August 2002 (Heisei 14 years), the Japanese Land and Geography Institute re-measured the height of Mount Fuji, which was 3775.63 meters high.

Mount Fuji is more than 60 million years old volcano, and the past was the island of the Izu peninsula,  which is due to the tectonic activity of the Eurasian plate and the Pacific plate. The intense collision of Izu peninsula and Honshu island uplifted the mountains and made a basic formation of Mount Fuji. The Foothills of Mount Fuji is about 125km long; the bottom diameter is about 40 ~ 50km. Crater surface diameter is about 500 meters, and 250 meters deep.

Mount Fuji is a typical stratovolcano. It has the standard cone-shape with unique and beautiful contours. Although Mount Fuji is in a dormant state, there is still the jet phenomenon. The base of Mount Fuji is a Tertiary stratum. At the beginning of the Quaternary, volcanic lava broke through the Tertiary strata, erupted and accumulated during that period. After several eruptions, volcanic eruption layer kept accumulating, and finally became a cone-shaped volcano, Mount Fuji. Volcanic activities also bring a wealth of geothermal resources to Japan. All kinds of hot springs are all over the country. Hot spring travel is one of the most popular recreational activities in Japan. It is said that Japan has more than two thousand hot springs, Japanese-style hotels have their hot springs. In Japanese, if people need to say hiragana “fu(ふ),” they usually would say “the ‘fu’ of Fuji San (ふじさん).

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Kyoto 京都

Kyoto is located in the Kansai area which is the center of the Japanese archipelago. Kyoto was built in the year of 794 as the capital of Japan, that has been a thousand years of history. Kyoto is the home of the Japanese spirit, Japanese textiles, ceramics, lacquerware, dyeing fabrics and other traditional crafts. Meanwhile, it has the Japanese Sado and Japanese Ikebana. Kyoto as the cradle of Japanese culture, art, Buddhism, and Shinto sanctuary, also known as “true Japan.” There are hundreds of famous shrines and temples, with more than two percent of Japan’s cultural heritage resources. Beautiful natural sceneries and a long history of building and architecture, attracting countless tourists come to sightseeing. Kyoto is a museum of ancient architecture of Japan. In 1994, the ancient capital of the historical buildings of Kyoto as a cultural heritage by the UNESCO World Heritage Committee included in the “World Heritage List.”

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References

Horinaga 4th (1707) Eruption, Available                                from: http://sk01.ed.shizuoka.ac.jp/koyama/public_html/Fuji/fujid/1707.html

Japan Guide of Kyoto, Available from: https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2158.html

Japan Guide of Mount Fuji, Available from: https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2172.html

Kyoto Prefecture Web Site, Available from: http://www.pref.kyoto.jp/error404.html

Kyoto Wikipedia, Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyoto#Geography

Mount Fuji Wikipedia, Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Fuji#Geography

P.P. Karan (2005) Japan in the 21^st Century: Environment, Economy and Society, Lexington, The University Press of Kentucky.