Japanese pears are round in appearance and have a crisp, refreshing taste. They are light green in colour with soft, moist flesh that naturally melts in the mouth.
The Tottori Inaba and Hyogo Tajima regions are rich in seafood such as snow crab, white squid, and Iwagaki oyster, and a variety of seafood dishes are available. Among them is the “oyagani-don,” a bowl of rice topped with a rich combination of crab meat, miso, and eggs from the crab’s stomach (sotoko) and inside the crab’s shell (uchiko). It is a well-known specialty available only during the crab fishing season.
Along the road near the Tottori Sand Dunes, there are many pear orchards, hence the name “Fukube Pear-Picking Road.” Visitors can experience pear-picking of various varieties, including Tottori’s signature 20th Century Pear, with its beautiful greenish-yellow skin, sweetness, and refreshing acidity, as well as new varieties created recently. Pear varieties vary depending on the orchard, so please inquire at each orchard.
At Fukube Sand Dunes, located in the southeastern part of Tottori Sand Dunes, rakkyo (Chinese onion) is cultivated on a vast farmland as large as 26 Tokyo Domes. Around late October, rakkyo flowers bloom, creating a carpet of red and purple like a lavender field all over the sand dunes they grew on. The vivid contrast of the colors of the dunes, the sea, and the rakkyo flowers makes the entire area a beautiful dight, and is known as a spectacular spot for photographs.
Tottori is known for its white squid fishing, and the lights of squid fishing boats, called “isaribi,” are a famous spectacle in the summer.
The Sand Museum, which opened on November 18, 2006, on the edge of the Tottori Sand Dunes, is the world’s first museum that specializes in exhibiting sculptures made of sand. The museum’s theme changes every year based on the core concept of “traveling around the world with sand,” and the exhibits, which are made entirely of sand and water, are broken down and returned to their original sand form after the exhibition period is over. We hope you will enjoy the charm of these sand sculptures, which are beautiful only because they do not last forever.
Yuasa Town catches fresh seafood such as horse mackerel, mackerel, and is proud of having the largest catch of shirasu (whitebait) in the whole country. There are many restaurants in town offering up whitebait dishes, and the shirasu-don, made of whitebait served in a bowl of white rice, with the finest soy sauce added on top, is a famous dish. In particular, what is rare is anything using fresh, raw whitebait, which fills your mouth with the aromas of the sea and has a beautiful taste you cannot experience anywhere else. It is a local delicacy.
Kinzanji miso is one of Wakayama Prefecture’s local foods. It is said it begun when a high priest in Yura called Kakushin (Hoto Kokushi) learned how to make kaisanji miso when training in Song era China, and brought this back to Japan, and is the forefather of soy sauce and miso. The naturally fermented side dish miso is made from soybeans, barley, and rice, and is soaked with eggplant, melon, shiso, ginger, and other ingredients. Served at the dinner table with white rice, cold porridge, or cucumbers etc., it is a familiar dish in homes in Yuasa Town.
In Yuasa’s important preservation district for groups of traditional buildings (historic district,) there are many old private residences dating from the late Edo period to the early Meiji period, and Yuasa Town is promoting projects which use these old, empty homes in Yuasa. You can experience staying in an old private residence at “Senzanan” etc. and other private accommodation facilities. Please experience this good old-fashioned hospitality which has been passed down to the present day.
Wakayama Prefecture is one of the leading citrus kingdoms in Japan. Among them, those produced in the Tamura district of Yuasa Town, Arita County are called “Tamura Mikan” and are known as the highest quality oranges. The slopes of the mountain in this district are full of “Tamura Mikan” covering Yuasa Bay. The contrast between the blue of Yuasa Bay and the green and yellow of the oranges is a beautiful sight worth seeing.
