A Free Shuttle from Yasugi
From Matsue, it’s a short JR ride to Yasugi, where a free shuttle bus takes you out to the Adachi Museum of Art, in the countryside at the foot of the mountains.
The Garden
It’s an art museum, with Japanese paintings, but nobody really comes for those. They come for the garden. It’s been voted the best Japanese garden in Japan by the Journal of Japanese Gardening every single year since 2003. And it’s not even close once you see it.
You don’t walk in it. You look at it from inside the museum, through huge windows and from terraces, as if it were a painting. White gravel raked like water, clipped azaleas and pines like soft green balls, a waterfall, and the real mountains behind, which are part of the design. The gardeners keep it perfect every single day.
There’s a stone outside that says it: “Garden No. 1 in Japan”.
Then the shuttle back to Yasugi and the train to Matsue.
Shabu-shabu
Dinner in Matsue was shabu-shabu, with a split pot of two broths, a pile of vegetables, and thin slices of beef and pork. It was the lightest dinner in days, which our stomachs badly needed.
Tomorrow: south again to Hiroshima, and the island that’s full of rabbits: Okunoshima.
Information About the Adachi Museum of Art
A museum of Japanese painting with a huge garden around it, ranked the best garden in Japan by a US gardening journal every year since 2003. A free shuttle bus runs from JR Yasugi Station, 25 minutes from Matsue.