The gentler pace of Kyushu

Think Japan and travel and you immediately concur images of bullet trains, snarled traffic and densely populated pedestrian thoroughfares. This most populace of countries, despite its wealth of breathtaking scenery, does not necessarily spring to mind as a driving destination and yet, for a holiday in the alternate lane, shake off the stereotypes, get yourself behind the wheel of a car and motor gently into the countryside for a particularly rewarding experience. 

On Kyushu, you may leave the urban excitement behind, but Japan’s clashes and quirkiness remain – timeworn temples and ear-splitting pachinko parlours, venerable inns flanked by vending machines, samurai castles and serene Buddhas, outsized scenery and downsized living.

You’ll find all that and more in Kyushu, Japan’s southernmost main island – a calming destination for the first-time driver in Japan, with small cities, quiet country roads, fine sights otherwise difficult to access on public transport and glorious landscapes topped by smoking volcanoes and splattered with emerald rice terraces and garish sunflower fields.

Kyushu is a low-key destination and driving in Japan nowhere near as daunting as you might think. Driving is on the left, speed limits are low and traffic is usually light. 

Directional signs are translated into English, while most other signs use familiar international symbols. The Japanese are patient drivers. They have to be – urban backstreets and country roads are narrow and pedestrians often have right of way.

Fukuoka is the place to launch a driving tour of northern Kyushu. Although the island’s largest city, Fukuoka’s vibe is laidback and the population a modest 1.5 million. You can ease into Japan with light sightseeing – such as Japan’s oldest Zen temple and pleasant parks – before hitting the city’s renowned yatai or street-food stands, which are buzzing places to meet the locals and tuck into steaming bowls of ramen, pots of cockles, skewered charcoal chicken and tankards of beer (when you’re not driving).

As you head into the suburbs, stop at thousand-year-old Dazaifu Tenmangu, a Shinto shrine where youthful students pray for success in exams. Adjacent Kyushu National Museum has an outstanding array of artefacts that trace pan-Asian influences on Japanese culture and religion.

The tangled highways of Fukuoka pose only a passing driving challenge, but once beyond them, Kyushu is uncomplicated. Your main challenge is getting used to stop lines that are further back from traffic lights than expected. 

Japanese addresses are notoriously obscure, so make sure you have a sat nav, best programmed using telephone numbers rather than addresses.

Seventy kilometres south of Fukuoka is Yanagawa, a sleepy town crosshatched with sixteenth-century canals. Its castle is ruined but shrines, temples and old warehouses remain wrapped in defensive walls. Traditional family businesses produce nori (seaweed paper for wrapping sushi), soy sauce and the local speciality, grilled eel. Swap car for punt and have yourself poled under willow trees and past samurai-era houses for a very pleasant afternoon.

Kyushu’s cities feel small and old-fashioned. You won’t find the neon lights and you won’t the wild nightlife and the urban vibe of Japan’s mega-cities here. But you will be rewarded with the atmosphere of everyday Japan – clanking trams, clacking chopsticks, the shouted welcome of shop owners. A good example is Nagasaki, another hundred kilometres down the road.

Nagasaki is forever associated with the Second World War, as a harrowing visit to the Atomic Bomb Museum attests. Yet this is one of Japan’s most scenic, agreeable and interesting small trading cities. Portuguese and Dutch remnants sit on the harbour and a lively Chinatown writhes with dragons and steam from woks.

On the leafy hills above, a nineteenth-century European quarter is dotted with culture-clash villas and gardens with views across Nagasaki’s silvery harbour.

At Unzen-Amakusa National Park east of Nagasaki, Kyushu’s turbulent landscapes appear in layers of ash, gently steaming lava fields and fizzing hot springs. Ride the car ferry across the bay to save a long detour and you’ll find yourself in Kunamoto, a pleasant city of art museums and traditional Japanese gardens that claims Japan’s most complete samurai stronghold. Kunamoto Castle’s five-kilometre walls and huge towers are spectacularly illuminated at night, while eight hundred cherry trees blossom in its grounds in springtime.

As you drive inland, Mt Aso presents a staggering sight – the original crater of this volcano is 128 kilometres around and now cups several towns and fertile farmland. A highly scenic road takes you to Kurokawa in an hour – the Hobbit-like spa town of well-preserved wooden buildings nestled in a forested valley surrounded by Aso-Kuju National Park. This is just the place to hike, immerse your weary limbs in hot springs, and stay at a mossy ryokan or traditional inn.

Drive on to Yufuin, a modest tourist town on gently steaming Kinrin-ko Lake and from here the road winds upwards past Mt Tsurami and down to Beppu on Kyushu’s northeast coast. Here, startlingly coloured mineral pools of boiling water steam right between apartment blocks, lending the scene an almost cinematic air.

Beppu is retro and scruffy but, as Japan’s biggest hot-spring resort, vastly entertaining. Steam your own vegetable-and-beef lunch at rickety restaurants by the edge of burping fumaroles, and have yourself (plus a snack egg) buried up to the neck in hot black sand on the beach by old ladies with shovels.

In the evenings, a bawdy domestic tourist crowd wends through Beppu’s back streets, which are crammed with cupboard-sized restaurants, bars and karaoke lounges. Chances are you’ll make some new friends in these cosy confines. Just be aware that karaoke translates as ‘empty orchestra’, and you’ll be expected to fill in the missing parts. Never mind if you’re off-key. This is Japan after all, and like the odd wrong turn or mistake made behind the wheel, everyone will be too polite to tell you so.