You might be thinking, “Amy! You don’t drive a car in Japan! How did you get up to Date City?”

Well,  I took a train.

I personally find the whole train system in Japan confusing. The main train company is Japan Railway. That’s the Biggie. But there’s also private small train companies.

When we lived in Chiba Prefecture, the private train line we used was Keisei.

And if you arrive in Narita Airport, you may see that there is JR and Keisei and you may be confused as to which one you want use. My advice is to play Rock, Scissors, Paper.

Rock-JR

Scissors-Keisei

Paper-Sit in the nearby Starbucks for an hour and take photos of your Japanese Frappucino.

Here in Fukushima City, the biggie is still JR, but we also have a private train company that operates a line that goes from Fukushima City up into Miyagi Prefecture, and back again. This train is what I used to go up to Date City (in Fukushima Prefecture,) so I could visit the park and the Kameoka House.

It’s the Abukuma Kyuko Train Line. You can board it on the east side (NOT THE WEST SIDE, OH GOSH NO, NOT THERE!) of Fukushima JR train station. It’s hidden away, much like Hogwarts hidden in some train station in London, I forget which one, pardon me, I’m a Muggle, I don’t really know how these things work.

Above is the Abukuma Kyuko train line. The yellow side is Fukushima Prefecture. The green side is Miyagi Prefecture. It’s actually going north but just like the novel by Ken Liu that I am currently reading, north is to the east. But hey, Japan is just like a book, so it all works.

And this is where I got off. By the way, this is REAL JAPAN. No English!

Signs in English are Wimp Signs.

Abukuma Kyuko Train Line is Off The Beaten Track and does not tolerate wimps. Although it tolerated me just fine. Scratching my head on this one.