Letters from Kagoshima
A slow bus ride through Kagoshima. A quiet garden once walked by lords. Stone paths, soft moss, and the volcano always there, just across the bay.
In December 2023, after the surreal dinosaur park, we boarded a bus into Kagoshima—its streets settled, the volcanic island of Sakurajima always visible across the bay.
We stepped off at Sengan‑en (仙巌園), the former summer villa and strolling garden of the Shimazu clan (島津氏), who ruled the Satsuma Domain from the late 12th century until the abolition of feudal domains in 1871. Created in 1658 by Shimazu Mitsuhisa, the garden folds the bay and the ever‑smoking Sakurajima into its design—soothing water, bamboo, stone lanterns, and the distant rumble of a living volcano.
Nearby, the remains of Kagoshima Castle—the clan’s main stronghold through the Edo period—offer quiet testimony to centuries of samurai rule. We wandered the paths among shrines and ponds, the calm of the landscape barely disturbed by ash drifting across the sky.
All photos in this post were taken with my Nikon F3 on Ilford HP5.
