February 10, 2011

FLIGHT OVER MT. ASO

Approching Mt. Aso
Mt. Aso 阿蘇山中岳火口
Mt. Aso 阿蘇山中岳火口
During the Chinese New Year, we spent few days for a North Kyushu trip in Japan. We took a train to Aso from Beppu to visit the famous volcano, the Mount Aso (阿蘇山). Usually visitors will take cable car up to Mt. Aso to experience this live volcano, but on the day we visited, the cable car did not operate due to heavy smoke. Jane also coughed badly....

We were quite disappointed and walked toward Volcano Museum. When we were enjoying the nice view and sunshine, we found a helicopter landing not far away from us. We realized it was for Mt. Aso scenic flight. So we decided to have a different experience about Mt. Aso.

Though it was not the first helicopter flight for us, we still felt exciting about it. When we were flying around Mt. Aso, we really enjoyed the whole picture of Mt. Aso which we could only see from post cards. The image was super stunning.

Before the flight, we though JPY5,000 per person for a 5 min flight was kind expensive. But after seeing the beautiful Mt. Aso, we could say it was worthy to do it.