This Monument Needs No Introduction. I Just Want To Show The Names Of French Scientists And Engineers

Arrived here a year ago today: Nagoya station. I did little more than settle in at the guest house and wander back to the station for food before getting a good night's rest.

At each end of the station concourse, there's a distinctive clock - one called the Silver Clock, and the other the Gold Clock, which make good meeting points.

At basement level, there's a good row of restaurants, and I settled on one that serves miso katsu, pork cutlet fried with a hatchô miso sauce. It turns out I'd hit the jackpot, because that's a local dish, and because I loved it! I went back for more another evening with fellow guests, and once again when I made a stop-over at Nagoya on the way from Western Japan to Tokyo. I'm definitely eating there again if I get the chance!

Hohentwiel fortress

We've seen the stunning volcanic surroundings of Hohentwiel, and managed the climb - now we're at the gates of the fortress. Or the... tunnels of the fortress?

The entrance tunnels are a recent addition to the fortress, in the sense that the 18th century is more recent than the 10th, when the castle was first mentioned. For around 900 years, Hohentwiel Castle stood, seemingly and effectively invincible, receiving updates in line with the battle tactics of the times, as this entrance tunnel leading to a forward bastion, shows.

Now we are at the actual gates, exceptionally wide open to allow traffic in to set up or take away festival equipment. I thought they were setting up, but I can't find a trace of what was due early August. The largest festival the castle hosts is late July, so maybe they were taking away... but wait a minute. This place hosts festivals. It's huge.

Hohentwiel Castle is on two levels. So let's assume you and your army have made the climb, survived the open trench in the middle of the tunnels, got through the gates - and your objective is still up there. A 15% incline and the upper fortress drawbridge and gates are yet to be passed.

Perhaps unsurprisingly at this stage, one understands how the castle went undefeated. Owned by Swabian then Württemberg dukes, it stood in the crossfire of French and Austrian troops during the Thirty-Years' War between 1618 and 1648 - and survived five sieges.

It was another major conflict, nearly two centuries later, that would claim the Hohentwiel. And even then, it wasn't taken over in battle. The territories Napoleon conquered included Württemberg, and the French Emperor ordered that the castle be decommissioned and ruined in 1803.

Undefended and stripped of meaningful material, the castle was open to the public, who quickly took a liking to the astounding views of the Hegau area and the Bodensee (Lake Constance) in the distance. It became a tourist destination as early as the 1840s. And, as mentioned before, today it hosts festivals.

Hohentwiel Castle is a fantastic visit. It is an enormous complex, with a lot of structure left. The history and stunning views make the effort to get there well worthwhile. I recommend hiking from Singen city centre if you can for the fuller sense of reward!

To keep or not to keep? The case of the Kyoto Imperial Palace

Completing the set of former Imperial palaces that I've visited, the question regarding Kyoto was a different one, when, after the Meiji Revolution, the throne of Japan was moved to Tokyo, ending Kyoto's 1000-year tenure as Imperial capital. The answer came swiftly: keep it. After all, it had only been rebuilt in 1855, fires having destroyed the palace multiple times in the Edo period alone.

The Shishinden throne hall, with its courtyard and traditional tachibana orange and sakura cherry trees either side of its grand staircase, was used for the coronations of Emperors Taishô and Shôwa (Hirohito) in 1915 and 1928, but since the accession of Emperor Akihito in 1989, coronations have been held at the active Imperial Palace in Tokyo.

Today, the palace is preserved and can be visited for free, albeit on a fixed tour route. Only the exterior of the buildings can be accessed, still allowing good views of the Shishinden and the gardens to the East of the palace.

E10 Shinkansen coming soon!

NHK WORLD

JR East to launch new bullet trains, cargo-only cars | NHK WORLD-JAPAN News

East Japan Railway, or JR East, says it will launch new bullet trains with improved anti-earthquake features and other services in fiscal 20

The Japanese railway companies don't make prototypes for the lols. JR East's ALFA-X project will come to fruition with the E10, due to start testing in 2027 and enter commercial service in 2030.

Also of note in the announcement, is that JR East will run freight-only high speed trains, using retiring E3 Series trains (these are currently being replaced by new E8s). I remember that during the pandemic, the empty Shinkansens were used to transport fresh fish. As far as I can tell, this would be the first regular high-speed freight service since the French Post Office's TGVs which retired in 2015.

Back to the Arzviller-Henridorff lock ladder

I took my own advice and returned to Arzviller to walk the full section of closed canal. It turns out the upper part is less overgrown and more active than the lower end. I'd only gone from the bottom lock, n°17, up to lock n°14 (under the railway bridge) at the time.

Starting from the top, the house at lock n°2 is a crêperie restaurant, while lock n°4 is a gîte complete with a private fishing pier. I counted four lock houses with some form of art going (n°2, 10, 13 and 15). The other lock houses are more or less well-maintained residences. There are no houses standing at locks n°14 and 17.

The Vallée des Éclusiers, or Lock-keepers' Valley, is well worth the wander. The quickest is either to drive there or cycle from Lutzelbourg station. But more on the logistics tomorrow - for now, let's enjoy lock n°9, probably the most dramatic on the route.

I had to do Eckwersheim village justice on the way to the canal and the memorial shown yesterday, and took the time to walk through it. As it is part of the Strasbourg Metropolitan Area, buses go there, and it's a rather nice ride through several villages, nearly all of which end in 'heim. And all these villages, within easy reach of the city, have at least a few streets with charming, timber-framed buildings, some richly decorated, with flowers and ornaments like the one above. An Alsatian village in rose season is quite the treat.

This building is evidently a restaurant, with the menus chalked up on the gate! I was there on a Monday morning but no menu on display - maybe it was too early, or maybe they weren't going to open because it was a national holiday - kind of. Pentecost in France got weird after 2003 and I don't fully understand it. Let's enjoy that door some more instead.

And it wouldn't be a lovely day in Alsace without storks!

Kaub

A few kilometres down the Rhine from Bacharach and on the other side, is the small town of Kaub. Its main attraction is the Pfalzgrafenstein, a remarkable, vaguely boat-shaped "castle" in the middle of the river. I use the term "castle" a bit loosely, as it wasn't a feudal lord's residence, rather a customs office on the river, with Gutenfels in the background providing a wider watch. A tollgate, basically. Sidenote, if you find other photos of this place, you'll notice how low the Rhine is right now...

While Burg Gutenfels in the hills has been converted into a hotel, not unlike Burg Stahleck discussed last time, the Pfalzgrafenstein has been preserved, and is open as a museum on some days of the week, with a small ferry allowing visitors to get there. Beside that, a car ferry runs all day between the two banks of the Rhine, so I could easily cross to quickly walk around Kaub.

Like a lot of riverside towns and villages in the area, Kaub is a charming place with many old buildings. It provides a picturesque backdrop to all the traffic going by, boats and trains, and the Rechte Rheinstrecke, the railway line between Wiesbaden and Koblenz on the right-hand side of the Rhine, was seeing more trains than usual, as the section between Mainz and Bingen on the Linke Rheinstrecke was closed. Long-distance trains, like this international EuroCity service bound for Zürich, were (and at time of writing probably still are) diverted via Kaub.

As any jagged coastline should, Shionomisaki has a lighthouse. Many were built across Japan during the modernisation of the Meiji era, and Kushimoto town has two.

After passing through the shrine in this picture, a trail continues to the left to a cape out of frame. People from the nearby port of Koza would go out there to watch for the arrival of pods of whales when their migration was due, and return home to basically say that hunting season had begun.

As such, Shionomisaki has always had a bit of a lookout role. And, according to the Akari no Moribito story, this guy below will be looking out for us against the forces of darkness in the future! The project has aimed to give all of Japan's main lighthouses a character, complete with a voice actor! I don't understand much, but on the surface, I think it's neat.

381 series: the last of the JNR-era electric express trains

We mentioned the upcoming withdrawal of the Doctor Yellow Shinkansen track inspection trains, but there is another retirement I've wanted to talk about as it's just happened, and it's a train I had the chance to ride last summer.

Launched in 1973, the 381 series was the Japanese National Railways (JNR) first tilting electric express train, designed to speed up the Shinano limited express services on the winding mountainous route between Nagoya and Nagano. The tilting compensates for G-forces inside the carriages, allowing the train to take curves up to 25 km/h faster without creating passenger discomfort. As such, it is already a significant piece of railway history, with JR Tokai preserving one lead car at its SC Maglev Railway Park museum in Nagoya.

Over the next 50 years, the 381s would be moved around whenever they were superseded on specific routes, but soldier on nonetheless. Their last services would be JR West's Yakumo limited express between Okayama and Izumo, another route with lots of hills and curves. Now, it is replaced by brand new 273 series sets, based on JR West's current express train design, still with tilt.

The 381 series lived through the entire L-tokkyû period, in which many limited express services were marketed with an L symbol signifying higher levels of convenience. This logo was phased out in the 2000s and 2010s largely due to all JR limited expresses running to L-tokkyû standards, and as far as I can tell, the 381s are likely the last trains to wear the L badge, as well as the classic JNR express chevron seen above, on a regular basis.

さようなら381系

Another short one today, just a couple of Christmas decorations from Strasbourg. The "tree of cathedrals" was, as far as I can remember, new for last year in front of the station, and is back again this year. I definitely should talk at length about the cathedral at some point... Not to worry, normal nerdy and rambling service will soon be resumed.