World Traveling Military Family

Mt. Osorezan means 'Fear Mountain' and is considered the Entrance/Gateway to Hell, or where the dead pause on the way to the underworld, something that I was not aware of at the time of our visit.  It is located in the Shimokita peninsula and is about 2 hours from Misawa.  It is a volcano which cause the area to smell like sulfur and there are areas where steam comes out of the water.  The pamphlet said there were boiling mud pits and we were excited to see them because we had seen some in Iceland.  Unfortunately they appeared to be all dried up.  The sulfur smell did remind us of Iceland though.  This is once again a place where the Japanese come to worship and make offerings to dead children, and it was once again a place I found a bit creepy.  There is a small river there, the Sanzu River, which is what the Japanese consider the equivalent of the river Styx and the dead must cross the bridge to escape.  There is also a nice looking lake with a nice beach but that is fouled by streaks of sulfur and the sulfuric acidity of the water.  Now that we've been there and seen it, it's not a place that I'd want to return and visit.

This is what you have to enter to get into the area

Statues out in the parking lot

After you walk through the entrance you get a view of this temple

Scary looking statue figure

View of the walking paths 

Statue

Looking back down on the entrance area from the top of one of the walking paths

Picture of all the volcanic rocks you have to walk through

Sulfuric stream going under a small bridge

View down to the lake area 

View of the lake from the beach

Scenic view

View from top of a walking path near the lake down to the parking lot area

See the steam coming out of the rocks?