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melancholy landscapes, waterfalls and wildlife sanctuaries hidden - follow a path inspired by the Noh theater Kii peninsula and the island of Sado in Japan resistant, the favorite in the land of the long distance path of the 2011 Awards

Noh is the classical theater of Japan, a medieval living tradition, which has had many illustrious followers modern Yeats and Brecht to Britten and Kurosawa. This is the kind of thing should learn more, and certainly, if the word "medieval" and "tradition" does not inspire horrible premonition. I finally overcame my resistance to it, while working for the Scottish Opera in Glasgow, where my curiosity about the Japanese theater was awakened by a piece of Zen-inspired, in its stead.

Britten turns out that Yeats knew better. I was ashamed of my former skepticism and moved by the poetry of the works and their strong sense of place, decided to go to Japan to see them on stage. My favorite game, Matsukaze, evoking its surroundings, Suma beach pictures of autumn Moody -. The whistling of the wind above the shore, a reflection of the silver moon in the dark rock pools, the cries of cranes from the reeds at sunset

is even more intoxicating

the sense that the place is full of spirits, including Matsukaze, aspiring to his lost lover. Matsuko is also the word for the sound of wind in the pines. Noh is full of encounters with travelers - the monks, pilgrims, exiles - and these spirits. Across Japan, people have put up posters, and even shrines to mark the locations of these meetings. Some roads are now in charge, or on the streets of the city normal, but they have a magical attraction on the drive.

Suma beach always seemed happy. But my journey began noh inspiration elsewhere - in the Kii Peninsula, southern wild, mountainous region of Kyoto. It is the site of pilgrimage in medieval Japan, it seemed a good place to start to follow the footsteps of the marchers solitary figure in many works. I was fascinated mostly by their religious beliefs. A mixture of Buddhism and Shintoism native behind noh sensitivity to the natural world.

A bus ride through the spine of the peninsula dropped my rough deep into their world. The peaks were much higher than in Scotland, but incredibly strong and relentless, forests remains the conservation of bears, monkeys and wild boars. Deserted villages clinging to the larger gullies. Looking into its depths, I felt a twinge of fear in which travelers once they have made these mountains.

In medieval times, the Buddhas mingled freely with the nature spirits - the gods of rocks, rivers and trees - and the country has become a sort of

mandala an object of mystical contemplation. Travelling in this sacred landscape could raise the impermanence of things and open your soul to nature. And of all places, none was more serious charge of Kumano shrines remote, near the south coast of Kii.

'll spend two nights in Yunomine, found in the latter part of the ancient pilgrimage route to Kumano. The sun had set when the village was in sight, a zig-zag flashing lights in the darkness below. Mi

ryokan

(traditional hotel), the Azumaya (tinyurl.com / Yunomine, + 81 7 3542 0012), proved to be comfortable and rustic, but do not cut Infectious quiet pleasures and sophisticated. Each meal was a feast in my room in three or four courses for the good mood in a kimono at home. Place a large plate on the tatami-mat that would establish an exquisite composition of eight or more gems, like the dishes on the table of the knee - grilled fish and pickled fish, pickled plums, algae and plants, jellies, food baby cream, soups and stews and fish roe sashimi, rice and tofu in various forms, and

shabu-shabu

- steaks cooked meat in the boiling broth at the table ". / Aa>

served with breakfast was a

Onsen Tamago

, a boiled egg in the waters of hot springs across the road. This hot spring Yunotani the river which crosses the city, is the most humble of this World Heritage Site by Unesco can not imagine a small wooden hut that houses a heated swimming pool that people have used since 1800, who is the oldest known spa onsen in Japan.

walked the last miles of the temple through the forest, leaving the mountain above the largest of the three Kumano Hongu. It is a beautiful complex of bark roof of wooden buildings. But the most sacred site itself - an island at the confluence of two rivers in a basin where the hilly landscape seems open and breathing heavily. Looking at it, do the same. I felt the same beside the great waterfall of Nachi, the kami - or divine spirit - the second sanctuary. Therefore, standing in this old cypress forest in the cool evening in October, I made what I would do next to any old British cascade, even if none is so powerful: I was watching and listening , leaving my thoughts dissolve a little in their incessant thunder. Then, reflecting on the simple wooden arch that was like a picture with us - a Torii the kind you find in every shrine in Japan - I was wondering if Perhaps old inventor had meant nothing more for her to sanctify, to approve, precisely the kind of momentum that had just delivered. My next was a personal journey - a journey through the peninsula and west of the beach where Matsukaze Suma, a humble saltmaker fell in love with the exiled court Yukihiro and was subsequently abandoned. Located in a quiet residential area of ??Kobe, a piece of a lovely town surrounded along the Pacific coast following the high hills, forests. His presence looms in the shadows behind the roofs Sum of coincidence brought the wild coast and melancholy at the head of Matsukaze -. The hills, the sea, the autumn moon and saw herons and jumping fish On a side street, I came across a shrine to Matsukaze. Unlike Yukihiro, a historical figure, which was created by playwright Zeami engineering, Noh Supreme - however, it appears that the greatest legend or the sheer force of his poetry has given life to their spirit here. With its sanctuary is the trunk of old trees, pines bent by the wind once confused his ghost with his god-like lover. With ankles in the surf and poetry Zeami in mind, I looked west from the crowd Somme inner islands of the sea and wondered if there was a wild beach them, where a single traveler can hear Matsukaze

, the murmur of wind in the pines. I continued to watch the rugged northern island of Sado in the Shogun exiled Zeami in his old age. In his quietly miraculous story of his journey, Kintosho, develops the theme of Japan