This past Saturday I went to Hita City in Oita to see their hina matsuri (aka girl’s day aka doll festival) dolls. it was pretty sweet! there is a nice old part of town (a little touristy but meh) where all of the cute shops have their dolls displayed as well as private residences/museums that have displays as well. some are free, some are 200~400yen. the nicest, most famous one, Kusano Honkei (Kusano family manion) was 550yen but totally worth it. they have over 150 dolls, a number of them are around 300 years old.
also in Hita is the Kyushu factory of Sapporo beer. didn’t go to that one but there is a factory tour!
this was a very pleasant day trip and if you have some time in the next couple weeks why no check it out? i believe the dolls have been out since last week and should continue being displayed until mid-march (hina matsuri is march 3rd).
how to get there:
from fukuoka:
i took the bus from the tenjin bus center. there was a special ticket for the hina matsuri that was 3,200yen (round trip ticket) plus a voucher for free rides on the community buses and a few discounts at places around town (the bus goes to the dolls district, the beer factory, bus center, eki, etc). the buses to/from tenjin run every half hour (or more frequently). it’s a 1 hour 20 minute drive
from saga:
buses to hita leave from tenjin, kurume, or 六ツ門(mutumon?)
so, get yourself there and go :D hita shouldn’t take sooo long so you could definitely work in some lunch/dinner in tenjin before/after you go
once in hita i rented a bike at the tourism center near the eki. they were 200yen for the first hour and 100 yen/hour after that. i guess we didn’t really need the bikes but it was nice riding around the traditional streets. we found a few cool places off the beaten path
links!:
http://www.city.hita.oita.jp/
Hita City website (japanese)
http://iris.hita.net/~city/ht/hina.htm
weird high school computer class version (engrish)
http://www.japan-hopper.com/2007/03/02_09958.php
travel site with pictures (english)
p.s.–
if you get there around lunch time (like i did), you may stumble across a hamburger shop by the station called “OJ” or something. eat at your own risk. the staff was rude, the hamburgers were really just thin hamburg steaks on buns, and they won’t let you order something off the take-out menu if you plan on eating it in the place (???).
