The Lonely Mikasa Park Fountain Performance

Located right next to the U.S. Navy base is Mikasa Park.

The main attraction there is the Memorial Battleship Mikasa, which has been turned into a wonderful museum ..... Here the museum's an English language PAMPHLET.

Go deeper into the park, and there are greenery areas, a music stage, places to sit & relax, watch the ocean, etc. --- all-in-all, a well maintained, clean, and peaceful park.  (And it is free.)

Then, there is the fountain, which does musical performances (every one-and-half hours, starting at 11:00) ..... It is place where one can feel a sense of pathos, or lonely magic, an existential moment perhaps --- especially at times like weekday afternoons, when there is pretty much no one in the park, and the fountain performs for nobody...

     













From April to October, the fountain performs at night, with lights ..... beauty in emptiness

   











Someone recorded a performance HERE.

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UPDATE -- 5/19/2023

The musical fountain, one of the symbols of Mikasa Park (Inooka-cho 82) and loved by local citizens, will end its operation around this summer.  Along with the wall fountain (waterfall monument), which has already been suspended due to equipment failure, the water landscape facilities will close due to aging.  The city has announced plans to significantly renew the park, and the musical fountain will be excluded from the plan. The city is considering a way to utilize the shapes of the pond and the wall fountain.

The musical fountain pond was created in April 1987, when Mikasa Park was redeveloped as part of the city government's 80th-anniversary project.  It is the main facility that expresses the park's theme of 'water, light, and sound.' At designated times, water sprays energetically in all directions accompanied by music.  The water columns can reach up to 10 meters high, and the colorful lights illuminate them in a fantastic display, delighting visitors.

Currently, it operates five times a day from 11 a.m., every one-and-a-half hours, until 5 p.m., though the performance with integrated lights can no longer be seen.

The music is selected monthly, featuring hit songs and standard pieces.  In the past, the song 'Town Feeling the Wind ~Yokosuka,' created for the city's 100th anniversary and sung by Kiyotaka Sugiyama, was also played.

入鉄炮出女 IRI-TEPPO DE-ONNA

I previously briefly wrote about the Uraga Magistrate's Office ( 浦賀奉行所 )  HERE.

Starting in 1720, the Magistate's Office complex served as a check point for ships and vessels going into and coming out of Edo Bay (now Tokyo Bay) ..... It was located along Yokosuka's southeastern coast, as shown in this model:

   

　

A similar facility to check on land-based travelers & traffic along the Tokaido Road was built up at Hakone.  It later was closed and fell to ruin, but was excavated and rebuilt as a museum in 2007:

A couple of things, in particular, the checkpoint officials looked for when they did their interviews and inspections were: (1) guns and (2) women ..... so, this came to be called IRI-TEPPO DE-ONNA "guns going in, women coming out"...

Keeping guns from being smuggled into Edo was obviously to maintain public order and control & crime prevention, etc. --- all important to the ruling Tokugawa (Shogunate) government.

As for departing women, the Shogunate had a system where the regional Samurai Lords (Daimyo), who could be pretty independent & powerful, were required to send their wives or other important family members to live in Edo, as hostages ..... so, naturally, there were instances of wives or daughters who tired to get out of Edo to reunite with their husbands or families, etc. --- hence the strict checks at Uraga and Hakone.

Kappa!

Located behind Hashirimizu Shrine ..... in the oldest spot ..... carved into the rock slope....

The Secret Beach

Along the coast, just south of Yokosuka's Uraga Bay is Tomyosaki  燈明埼  (Tomyo Cape)

It is the site of a light house, which was built in 1648 ..... The reason being that after the Tokugawa Shogun moved Japan's capital city (and the Emperor) from Kyoto to Edo (now Tokyo), the amount of shipping traffic into Edo Bay (i.e., Tokyo Bay) increased significantly....

So, a light house (called Tomyo-Do) was built on the Cape, since it was a great location near the Uraga Suido shipping channel .... and for 220 years afterwards, it helped to guide various vessels & boats safely in & out of Tokyo Bay.

The lighthouse was closed & replaced in 1872, and thereafter fell apart ..... but in 1988, Yokosuka City rebuilt it using the same stone foundation.  This is what it looks like:

         















Another thing is that the nearby rocks and beach are undeveloped, and are a rare example of natural coast line still left in Yokosuka ...... for some reason, Google Map lists the area as "Glass Beach" ..... perhaps because of sea glass and shells which can be collected there ...... in any case, it certainly is off the beaten track, and Tomyosaki Kaigan therefore qualifies as a "secret beach" in Yokosuka

     

National Defense Academy

Located on a plateau called "Obaradai", which overlooks Yokosuka City and Tokyo Bay, is the National Defense Academy (NDA).  It is also a place from which Mount Fuji can be seen.

NDA belongs to the Japanese Ministry of Defense and mainly serves to educate cadets who will serve as officers in the ground, air, and maritime units of Japan's Self Defense Forces (JSDF).

What makes NDA unique, compared to the U.S., is that it is a "Joint" school, which, in effect, combines Annapolis (USN), West Point (USA), and Colorado Springs (USAF).

In 1950 when the National Police Reserve was organized, then Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida wanted to create a national school that could educate, motivate, and train career officers for Japan’s Self-Defense Forces.  On August 1, 1952, the National Safety Academy was established under the provisions of the National Safety Agency Establishment Law, and Prime Minister Yoshida appointed Dr. Tomoo Maki, a professor of law at Keio University, to be its first president.  The National Safety Academy opened on April 1, 1953, in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, and admitted its first class of 400 cadets, of whom 300 were for the Ground Safety Force and 100 for the Maritime Safety Force.  On July 1, 1954, with enactment of the National Defense Agency Establishment Law, the name of the academy was changed from the National Safety Academy to the National Defense Academy.

Here is NDA's Website

    

An interesting event, which occurs in the Fall when NDA holds a Field Day which is open to the public, is called "Bo-Taoshi"  棒倒し ..... one group of cadets defends a tall pole, while another group tries to pull it down (and has only a few minutes to do so) ..... apart from hitting with closed fists & biting, etc., pretty much anything is permitted...  (FYI --- There are several videos of this exciting event on YouTube)