Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado and Remains of Hara Castle

Scenic road chapters

Waypoint introductions and full write-ups

1. 1. Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado

   Hirado is an island off the northwest coast of Kyushu, connected to the mainland by a bright red suspension bridge, and for a brief moment in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was one of Japan's windows on the world. Portuguese traders arrived in 1550, followed by Jesuit missionaries, and later the Dutch and English East India Companies set up trading posts here. When Christianity was banned in the early seventeenth century and foreign trade was moved to Nagasaki, the Christians of Hirado went underground. Kasuga, a farming village on the western side of the island, is one of the places where these Hidden Christians, the Kakure Kirishitan, maintained their faith in secret for more than two centuries, outwardly following Buddhism and Shinto while worshipping Christian images disguised as Buddhist statues and reciting prayers in a garbled mix of Latin, Portuguese and Japanese. The village and the sacred mountain of Yasumandake above it are part of the UNESCO listing of the Hidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Region.

   Read the complete Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado is where the day begins. Next is Ono Village in Sotome.

2. 2. Ono Village in Sotome

   For more than two centuries Christianity was banned in Japan, and in the villages along the Sotome coast north of Nagasaki, communities practised their faith in secret, disguising prayers as Buddhist chants and hiding images of the Virgin as the bodhisattva Kannon. These were the Hidden Christians, the Kakure Kirishitan, and their villages, including Ono, are part of the World Heritage listing of Hidden Christian Sites in the Nagasaki Region, inscribed in 2018. At Ono the small Ono church, built by the French missionary Marc Marie de Rotz in the late nineteenth century after the ban was lifted, has thick walls built in a local technique of stones bound with mortar, known as de Rotz walls.

   Read the complete Ono Village in Sotome write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Ono Village in Sotome comes up about 100 km into the recorded legs. Next is Remains of Hara Castle.

3. 3. Remains of Hara Castle

   On a headland overlooking the Ariake Sea, at the southern tip of the Shimabara Peninsula in Nagasaki prefecture, the grassy ruins of Hara Castle mark the scene of one of the darkest episodes in Japanese history. In the winter of 1637 to 1638, thousands of peasants, many of them Christians, rose up against heavy taxation and religious persecution, and took refuge in the abandoned castle under the leadership of a charismatic teenager, Amakusa Shirō. The shogunate besieged the castle for months with a huge army, and when it finally fell, almost all the defenders, including women and children, were killed.

   Read the complete Remains of Hara Castle write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   about 194 km into the recorded legs you reach Remains of Hara Castle. Next is back through Ono Village in Sotome.

4. 4. back through Ono Village in Sotome

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Ono Village in Sotome write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   back through Ono Village in Sotome, late in the day. Next is Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado.

5. 5. Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado

   Return visit. Read the place description above.

   Read the complete Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado write-up.

   Recorded stop-planning note

   May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.

   Planning note

   Back at Kasuga Village and Sacred Places in Hirado. That is the ride.