A Real-Life Enchanted Forest

This article prompted me to book a hiking holiday to Yakushima. Its' one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. Thank you.

This article prompted me to book a hiking holiday to Yakushima. Its' one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. Thank you.

Simply beautiful. Thank you.

Also see the book The Oldest Living Things in the World, by Rachel Sussman with essays by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Carl Zimmer, published in 2014 by the University of Chicago Press. http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/O/bo16364599.html

The Hoh Rainforest in Olympic National Park is incredible as well and it is definitely more accessible. You can park at the trailhead and commence being amazed right off the bat. The trail is relatively flat for over ten miles and if you don't mind crossing some interesting natural bridges (fallen logs) you are in for a treat.

When I reached the last paragraph, then the last sentence, then the last words of this mesmerizing article -- I found my jaw had literally dropped and my mouth was open, this trance-like state persisting for a good ten minutes. I am no stranger to Japan's amazing sugi trees and Shinto gods, and so, am exceptionally grateful to Ms. Yanagihara for conveying the sublimity of her experiences with choices of wording that elevated the mind and spirit of this reader, and I rather suspect of many thousands of others'.

Dear Hanya, Your article about the forests of Yakushima hit a cord deep in my soul. Forests and their associated rivers were always places I could go to escape the noise and clutter of modern life. I guess that is why, I have chosen to live as close to them as I can. Many of my most cherished places, I can no longer get to physically. Now I must travel there through my memories. I remember every twist and turn of the walks. I remember every turn of the river, every pool and riffle. It is good for my brain. Besides, the fishing was spectacular. RAW

A lovely article. It is articles like these - and the lush photography that brings them so alive - that make me read the NYT. Humans only become fully themselves when they come into an intimate connection with nature. Reject this as we may, we are an indivisible part of nature. But we have become alienated from it, blind to our dependence on healthy eco-systems to remain fully healthy ourselves, eating devitalised food, drinking water that is often tainted by pollutants and poisons that originate from human activities, and breathing air that is no longer kept clean and health-giving by a vibrant nature. I had the great privilege to be born and spend my early childhood in Borneo at a time when its primeval jungle and forests had not yet been despoiled by intensive logging and being fired so palm oil plantations could be established. Humans need to cease being parasites on the planet and become worthwhile contributors to that life of which we are only a very small but very destructive part.

Baltic primal forest in NE Europe has a similar role and grew a nature spirituality among those who have lived nearby. PNW Native American cultures also grew alongside missy primal forest which still exists in bits and pieces. I’ve often wondered about the vast areas of northern Canada we hear very little about. Are there any people there or is it completely and primally wild still? Lovely article. Would love more writing on these topics. Miyazaki does indeed hook us directly into these mysterious forces of nature. Makes sense his using animation, how else could it be translated into a visual narrative?

Thank you for this beautifully-written article. I live in the Hudson River Valley -- our primal trees were shipped to Europe for timber during colonial times, burned in local factories, chopped down to make room for farms. We lost our heritage. I was particularly fascinated by your insight that something primeval remains beneath the surface for the Japanese. Connection with, I think, an inward primeval in all of us while surrounded by recent-growth forests -- something to think about.

This sort of defines surreal. Beautiful but a bit scary too.

Please NYT, run more articles like this. Really miss your Gardening section. In this tumultuous time, we NEED to see the beauty of nature to give us some respite from all the discord being thrown into our faces multiple times a day, every day.

America's "Enchanted Forest". A bristlecone is not considered "Ancient" until it is four-thousand years old: https://www.flickr.com/photos/bregalis/

There aren't a lot of virgin forests left in Japan. What forests you see are mostly planted trees, essentially tree farms, much to the displeasure of those who have cedar allergies. If you aren't ambitious enough to get to Yakushima, you can visit Shirakami-Sanchi from Tokyo on train. I've been to Shirakami and it's wonderful to experience primal beauty. Japan is beautiful, but a lot of it is man-made or at least been constrained by concrete. Alternatively, if you're in Washington State or visiting, you can experience the cooler but just as lush and mossy temperate rainforest of Olympic National Park. It does resemble the green photographed here.

What a great piece of writing. And, yes, Miyazaki!

There are rarely birds in dense forests anywhere simply because they lack the food sources they need, insects and earthworms. Flowers and forest creatures as a consequence are also rare given the nature of the everlasting shade that makes each tree compete with the other for the sunlight that falls upon and leaks through the canopy. What the attached images also show are the stumps of ancient trees chopped down long ago, some of them sprouting younger trunks from living roots, surely another parable to be told by Miyazaki and his successors.

Thanks for the amazing article. I visited Yakushima a few years ago in preparation for my forthcoming book on Miyazaki (Miyazakiworld, Yale University Press). Yanagihara brilliantly expresses the subtle way in which Miyazaki took the surreal beauty of Yakushima and made an even more surreally beautiful movie (Princess Mononoke) out of it. If you are interested in other sites that inspired Miyazaki, I would recommend the Matsuyama hot springs town (Spirited Away), the fishing village of Tomonoura (Ponyo) and the mountain resort of Karuizawa (The Wind Rises). Not all are easy to get to but they are all worth a visit!

I visited Yakushima four years ago as part of my own Miyazaki tour. The edges of the island where the mountain streams rush to the sea are a torrent of whitewater and house-sized boulders. The insects, which I found to be quite loud in Tokyo, were deafening at night--like no other sound I had heard before. The hike through Shiratani was, at times, nearly vertical with barely a path to follow (we just followed all the other hikers ahead of us) the twisty roots and branches of the sugi were our only handholds. In the August humidity in density of the forest, with moss sprouting moss and covering nearly every surface, the air itself seemed green. Our destination was the so-called "Mononoke moss forest" (a name that had to be changed due to the displeasure of Studio Ghibli). Never had I seen such a surreal and gorgeous landscape (prefigured for us by Kazuo Oga's backgrounds in the film). It was sublime in an oddly intimate way. Thank you for this wonderfully rendered (and informative) reminder of that visit. I hunger to return.

Thank you! I sent this on to my Mizaki-loving, Japan-loving sons. They may actually go see the forest someday. As for me, I saw the Princess Mononoke rainforest, complete with a torii gate and little dolls representing the dead scattered among the rocks, at a Zen monastery in Washington state.

Beautifully written. I felt like I was there in person but also like I was in a dream. The descriptions were wonderful.