YAMAGATA INDEX

In Yamagata try Yamagata Grand Hotel, 1-742 Honcho, Yamagata, tel. (0236) 41 -2611, five minutes by taxi from the eki, from Y8000. Or for more reasonable accommodations try the following business hotels: Hotel Arcadia,5-12-17 Nanokamachi, Yamagata, tel. ( 0236) 23-7300, 40 rooms, from Y5000, six-minute drive from Yamagata Eki Station; or Hotel Sakaiya, 1 -1410 Kasumicho, Yamagata, tel. (0236) 32-2311, 51 rooms from Y6000, two minute walk from Yamagata Eki.

Yamagata YH, Kurosawa, Yamagata, tel. (0236) 88-3201, located 25 minutes by bus toward Zao Onsen, offers youth-hostel accommodations and onsen facilities.

Zao-ryusan-so, a people's lodge, at Zao Onsen-machi, Yamagata, (0236) 94-9457 located near Zao Onsen, provides a room, two meals, and onsen facilities for about Y6000.

Yamagata is a hub of transportation. Recently in service, the Yamagata Shinkansen whisks you to Tokyo, 360 km distant, via Fukushima in just two hours and 30 minutes. The JR Ou Honsen Main Line connects the city to Fukushima, Akita, and Omagari, where connections can be made to Lake Tazawa-ko and vicinity. The Senzan-sen Line runs directly to Sendai in just 70 minutes, and the Yonesaka-sen Line connects the city with Niigata via Sakamachi, which is serviced by the coastal Uetsu Honsen Main Line.

Daily flights by ANA connect Yamagata Airport with Tokyo in just under one hour, while JAS connects the city with Osaka in 75 minutes. A shuttle bus runs from the airport to the city center in 40 minutes.

Night buses connect the city with Tokyo via the Tohoku Expressway in about eight hours.

A tourist information office, open daily 1000-1800, is located just outside of Yamagata Eki. They can help with most travel needs, but for more precise information and to bridge communication gaps between the Japanese and you, call the English Travel Line at (0236) 31 7865.

A small city, gateway to the Dewa Mountains and located about halfway between Niigata and Akita, Tsuruoka began as an administrative castle town of the ruling Sakai clan. It now has the split personality of many of Japan's provincial towns: the area aroun d the eki is modern bustling, and boring, while the back lanes are lined with century-old businesses still housed in vintage buildings. Tsuruoka sits in the center of Yamagata's fertile Shonai Heiya plain, famous for its production of sasanishiki, rice purported to be the tastiest in Japan. Upon approaching the city you'll see innumerable rice fields, particularly picturesque during the autumn harvest when the sheaves have been bound together into golden bundles.

The "silk road" winding its way from the Middle East to Imperial China carried among its precious commodities the tiny seeds of the golden yellow safflower. Chinese trading junks, braving the Japan Sea more than 1,600 years ago, introduced benibana to Japan. Almost immediately, the nobility was enraptured with the red dye that could be coaxed from the petals. By the 11th century. the silk of the most splendid kimonos of the Imperial court was dyed in shades of beni ranging from soft pink to crimson red. Be cause of the internal peace brought about by the Tokugawa Shogunate. the demand for esthetically pleasing silk rose even more. Yamagata became the center of benibana cultivation, especially along the fertile banks of the Mogamaigawa River. Here the petals were pounded and formed into cakes to be transshipped along with the splendid beni dyed Yonezawa silk created by local weavers and considered the best in the land. Even today, the wide ranging crimson shades of beni are still greatly admired. In long-standing tradition, Japanese brides wear lipstick approximating the beni's rich, deep color.

The Suefuko Ryokan, tel. (0235) 22-8395, is about 10 minutes on foot from the eki Most clientele are working men who come for a comfortable place to stay with good meals and don't worry much about the ambiance. To arrive, leave the eki and make an immediate left, and walk past the parking garage where you make a right and a quick left. Tale inn is a few meters down the lane on the right, just past a croquet field.

The closest youth hostel is Tsuruoka YH, 11 Miya-no-mae, tel. (0235) 73-3205, located three stops south of Tsuruska at Sanze. The youth hostel, which is sometimes closed without notice during the off-season, is located 15 minutes on foot from Sanze Ski.

Note: For an excellent cultural experience, lodge at any one of a dozen or so shukubo located at Toge, at the foot of nearby Mount Haguro-san. Reservations can be made at the tourist information office mentioned below, or at any JTB or travel agency. Expect to spend about Y6000 including two sansai ryori, special vegetarian meals prepared with wild mountain vegetables.

There is excellent one-stop shopping at Tsuruoka Eki. Plenty of nooks and crannies are filled with inexpensive eateries and tiny shops selling everything from telephones to jeans. A supermarket inside sells bento lunches, perfect for a trip to the mountai ns, and fruit stalls sell local produce.

Leaning on a gnarled staff upon a granite boulder, the yamabushi, dressed in flowing pantaloons and wide-sleeved checkered smock, blows his plaintive conch to herald the dawn and summon the familiar mountain spirits. This sect was founded in the 7th centu ry when Prince Hoshi accepted the tenets laid down by the great mystic En-no Gyoja. These mystical mountain priests (now women, too) of the Shugendo Shu sect, a combination of Shinto and Buddhism, pay homage to the kami enshrined atop Mounts Haguro-san, Gassan, and Yudono-san, collectively known as Dewa Sanzan, "Three Mountains of Dewa," the ancient name for western Tohoku. Even in old Japan, the yamabushi were both revered and feared because of their supernatural powers. They were called when conventional remedies failed, often to drive away demons, usually renegade fox gods from an Inari shrine. The yamabushi gather at the mountain shrines in June and again in January, at which time they work their magic and somehow bring old Japan to life once again.

Sakata, located at the mouth of the Mogamigawa River, is the second-largest city in Yamagata, with a population of 100,000. Because of its premier location, the city flourished as a distribution center. The area's abundant rice crop was its primary commodity and was controlled by the Honma Family, rich merchants who were the economic and political power in the city. Sakata is the perfect gateway to Mount Chokaisan just to the north, the Mogami-gawa Gorge to the east, and Tobishima island just offshore.

Umineko, black-winged gulls protected as Natural Monuments, migrate from Hokkaido in October and roost until June on Eboshi Guntoa Lilliputian archipelago of one-pine islands a few meters off the coast of Tobi-shima. In June and July, the Tobi-shima kanzo, a lily indigenous to the island, blooms just as the gulls head northward.

A warm current flows past Tobi-shima helping to keep the climate on this relatively northern island moderate, even in winter. Rain and snowfall are light, with drought occasionally a problem. Although home to only 600 people and measuring a mere three square km, Tobi- shima is divided into three sections, each demarcated by it own port and preferred jinja. From the ferry terminal to Tekiana Caves, a distance of about 600 meters, is Katsuura, the island's most built-up area, with Ogami Jinja the center of worship; from the caves to the high school, another 600 meters or so, is Nakamura, with its Komonoini Jinja; and finally there is Hoki, on the northeast coast, with Hachiman Jinja, perhaps the most interesting on the island. Arasaki, the west coast, wild and pocked withcaves, is uninhabited.

Village life on Tobi-shima is laced with a heavy dose of industriousness, and most of the action takes place on the small streets in front of villagers' homes, somewhat like a cottage industry turned inside out. From early morning till late evening you will see women drying ika and mame on long bamboo racks, fishermen tending their nets along the jetty, and a constant stream of boats heading into or out of the harbor.