A drive to Kunimigaoka Hill An early-morning drive in November to a hilltop above the basin

In autumn, my friend and I travel around Kyushu in our 2 cars. At Ariake Port, we put her yellow car on the same ferry as mine, so wherever we go, her car leads the way. After spending 1 night in Takachiho, we set out before dawn on this early-November morning. I’d heard that the sea of clouds is most likely on clear, cold, windless mornings from late September to early December, so I checked the forecast the night before and got up early.

I followed the taillights of my friend’s yellow car along the still-dark road. We parked the 2 cars side by side in the car park right in front of the lookout, then climbed the sloped path to the viewing point. We were here to watch the basin wake up, so the morning began a little more quietly than one of our usual drives.

I slipped on my cream-colored coat and stepped out to the viewpoint. Clouds stretched across the basin. I held the front of my coat closed with both hands and looked out. Each breath came out white, so I could tell it was a cold morning. As I shifted my gaze from the trees nearby to the mountains in the distance, the clouds looked a little different from each angle.

After the sun rose over the mountains, its light reached the tops of the clouds. My friend and I paused our conversation to watch the change. Looking closely, I spotted a little of the town through a gap in the clouds. “Morning’s starting down there too,” I told her.

As the sun climbed higher, the clouds began to drift. The rooftops that had been hidden beneath them started peeking through the gaps. I’d heard the Gokase River ran through the Takachiho Basin to the east, so my friend and I pointed through the clouds, trying to work out where it was. I couldn’t help letting out a little gasp whenever another gap opened.

Legend has it that Takeiwatatsu-no-Mikoto surveyed the land from Kunimigaoka Hill. Looking out across the broad basin, I found myself thinking about the people who once stood here and gazed into the distance. Before we left, I went to see the stone statues of the gods from the Kunimi legend. In the morning light, as I looked up at them, it felt as though they were watching over the same basin I’d just been admiring. My friend asked me to take a photo of her with the statues, so I took one.

The folk song “Seicho Karihoshi Kiriuta” is also said to have originated here. My friend hummed a little of the melody, and hearing it up on the hill made it feel like a song that belonged to this place.

When I looked back from beside the statues, I could see the Aso Five Peaks to the west and the Sobo Mountains to the north. I’d been looking east at the clouds, but when I turned around, a completely different mountain skyline opened up. The foothills to the north were still in shadow. I couldn’t believe how many mountain ranges I could see from a single hilltop.

By the time we walked down the sloped path and got back to the car park, it was full daylight. My friend started her yellow car and waved to me from the window. “Let’s get breakfast in town.” Having breakfast in the very town I’d been searching for between the clouds felt like a perfect way to start the day. I hurried back into my red car.