Things to do in Autumn

Autumn is a season for leisure in Japan. Autumn has been known as the best season for reading, eating, and playing lots of sports. People start to enjoy leisure activities with the nice weather.

Japanese cultures in Autumn

①Otsukimi

”Otsukimi” is a traditional culture that Japanese people enjoy the full moon night with some offerings such as rice cake and rice plants. On the "Izayoi day" which is the night when the full moon comes out during the mid fall, people had enjoyed looking up the beautiful moon and cerebrated the harvest. 

②Momiji-gari

Momiji-gari means seeing the autumn leaves. This is one of the symbols that represent Japanese autumn season. People now also go to see the autumn leaves to feel the nice season. The leaves starts to be turning to red in Japan from later in October to later in November depending on areas and later in November  would be the best to see the full red leaves. There are many spots that have beautiful autumn leaves around Kobe. Among that, Kyoto is well known place for the autumn leaves all over Japan. In Kobe as well, you could see the beautiful mountain scenery with the red and yellow leaves. 

Rokko Arima Rope Way

From the lift which connects Rokko area with Arima Onsen Hot Spring, you could feel Japanese autumn surrounded by red mountain covered with colorful leaves. For details about Rokko mountain, please have a look at this page. 

Kobe Municipal Arboretum

In northern part of Kobe, there is a botanical park which has 3,000 trees of autumn leaves. Every year, they have an event specialized for autumn leaves. Through the event, you could enjoy different types of autumn leaves in different occasion from music concert to light up events. 

Suma Rikyuu Koen Park

If you want to see the autumn leaves trees more closer, Suma Rikyuu Koen Park is the best for you. There are 600 kinds of autumn leaves in the park. You could see them in the garden there and also they have a tunnel created with autumn leave trees that can only be seen in this season. Light up autumn leaves are worth to see. Not only the autumn leaves in the mountains, autumn leaves trees are also pretty and attractive to all adults. Suma Rikyuu Koen Park has the special events every year in this season. This year, the events are held from 16th on November to 1st on December, 9:00-19:00. For more details, please visit the website. 
https://www.kobe-park.or.jp.e.abn.hp.transer.com/rikyu/hanadayori/

Japanese Autumn Foods

 There is a word "syokuyoku no aki" in Japanese which literally means "Autumn Appetite". It is believed that their appetite increases because of the bountiful amounts of good food during this season. 

①Shin-mai

"Shin-mai" literally means newly harvested rice. Shin-mai is known as the rice harvested after November. People started their harvest from November, which relates to the name. This is different from other rices in that it has soft and much sweeter tastes in rice. 

②Pacific Saury 

Pacific Saury (さんま, sanma) is a kind of fish Japanese people like to eat in autumn because it is very fatty and tasty in this season. People typically broil whole sauries with just salt, squirt a little lemon or yuzu (an Asian citrus fruit), and pour on a bit of soy sauce before enjoying this fatty fish. Broiled sauries are usually served with grated radish. Besides broiling, you can also enjoy raw sauries (sashimi) if you can get fresh ones.

③Sweet Potatoes

It can be said that roasted sweet potatoes (さつまいも, satsuma-imo) remind Japanese people of autumn. Street vendors pulling carts and selling roasted potatoes are a staple of autumn in Japan. Also Japanese people like confections made of sweet potatoes such as Yokan, cake, and candied sweet potatoes (daigaku-imo).

④Perssimｍon

Persimmon (柿, kaki) is a fruit Japanese people enjoy eating mainly in autumn. There are two kinds of persimmons: one is sweet, and the other is sour, which is usually used to make dried persimmons. The sweet one can be eaten fresh and can also used as an ingredient for making desserts like jelly, Yokan, and more.

⑤Chest nuts

Chest nut (栗 ,kuri) is a popular type of nut in Japan. It is known that Japanese people started eating it more than 5,000 years ago as their staple diet. You can enjoy its rich, sweet taste just by boiling it with salt or soy sauce and cooking wine. Furthermore, chestnuts are commonly used to make chest nut rice. The sweet taste mixed with rice is the best matching.