The trip to Mt.Aso....?

Can anyone recommend the most spectacular way to travel to Mt.Aso, Takachiho and Fukuin?. We're thinking of going Nagasaki-Kumamoto-Kagoshima and then find a good way up to Mt.Aso region and then back to Kitakyushu.

We are planning a trip in that area too - in October. We'd really like someone who knows the area to give us a plan for 2-3 days there.
Have also been wondering if one direction is better than the other ie is it best to start from Beppu or from Kumamoto. Any advice? Also any good recommendations for beautiful places to stay in these mountain areas that are not so expensive (like around 10,000yen for two - or even less)?

Can anyone recommend the most spectacular way to travel to Mt.Aso, Takachiho and Fukuin?

I'll have to assume you're driving.

Starting in Kagoshima City, take the ferry over to Sakurajima and driv up to the tembodai for views of the volcano and back across the bay to Kagoshima City.

Continue around Route 224 on the southern coast stopping at the Sabo Center (earthflow/landslide) on the left side of the highway. Stop at some overlooks along the way until you get tot the route 25 turnoff for Kurokami where there's the buried torii.

Go back to 224 and continue east to where it runs into 220 north. You can stop at Tarumizu Miti-no-eki for a free hot spring foot bath.

Go north around the bay until you get to Kokubu City and take the route 10 turnoff to the right to find the Jomon-no-mori archaeological site. They have a good museum for Y300 and an inexpensive restaurant. If you're lucky, someone will show you around the labs where all the archaelogical work is being done.

Head back toward Kokubu City and turn north on route 60 for Kirishima. You can check out the shrine and tourist town below. Find route 480 for Takachiho Plateau. You can park at the museum if you want and it's a short walk to the original site of Kirishima-jingu. Only the foundations and a torii remain. It was moved lower on the mountain to get out of the way of the volcano, Takachicho-no-mine. Continue on 104 (480 becomes 104) toward Hayashida and other onsens, a big tourist area. Just past Maruo Falls, a pretty falls featured in "You Only Live Twice," you turn right (north) at the intersection to head up to Ebino Kogen. There are several crater lakes and a few smoking vents around this huge hotel complex. There is also a free foot onsen outside one restaurant. If it's not busy, parking is free behind the restaurant.

You can descend into the Sendai River Valley on either the road to Kobayashi, which has some really nice Kosumosu (Cosmos - Fall Cherry) fields, or down route 30 to the city of Ebino.

If you want narrow roads and mountain scenery, you can head north on 221 to Hitoyoshi or else take the long tunnel on the highway.

In Hitoyoshi, you can take a boat down the Kumagawa for the day or just check out the walls of an incomplete castle.

Take 445 north from Hitoyoshi through the Kawabe River valley. There are narrow fields and steep walled valleys all the way to Itsuki, a town removed to the hillside from the valley below when plans for a dam were still in action. If you follow 445 north, you'll be getting into some of the most remote areas of Japan, and the roads are not for the faint-hearted, not because of their narrowness, but because it's always fun meeting a dump truck on a one-laned road and having to back around curves into you find a semi-wide spot.

Off of 445 you can check out Sendantodoro Falls and Heike-no-Sato in Momigi. The descent along 445 from Nihonsugi to Route 218 is one of the steeper switchback roads in the area. With a full minivan, I've had to stop to let the brakes cool even though I was in the lowest gear.

Turn right (east) on 218, a major E-W road. You can stop at Reitai Bridge, a huge stone bridge no longer in use, and in Yabe Town, Tsujun Bridge, an aquaduct that has become the symbol of Kumamoto Prefecture. 218 also takes you all the way to Takachiyo-cho, with its small gorge and shrines with kagura.

Just after Yabe Town, there's another Miti-no-eki at Seiwa-son, called Seiwa-bunraku-mura. They give puppet shows at 1 PM and there's a small attached museum out back.

Eventually, turn north on 265 for Takamori. This will bring you into the Aso caldera from the south with good views of the 5 peaks.

From Aso, take the Yamanami Highway to Beppu, and from there you follow 210 back to northern Kyushu, or if you're tired of mountain roads by this time, the highway is a fast return to the north.

An option after Kirishima is to go to Saito City to see the Kofun (burial mounds). However, the drive up the coast along route 10 isn't that interesting as it's pretty flat, and even when it gets into the mountains, they aren't that high. You would pass Usuki, which has recently found stone Buddhas, and come into Oita City from the south.

Hopes this gives you some ideas.

Thanks for the great answer but I'm afraid we're not driving, and from some of the road descriptions I'm rather glad! Sorry to mislead you, Anaguma.
What we are really looking for is the best way across from Kumamoto to Oita using busses and/or trains, and great places to stay enroute.
Not hiking or Onsen fanatics but they are part of this area anyway. We were thinking Kumamoto, Aso, Takachiho,Yufuin and then ferry to Shikoku - over seven days or so.
Hope someone can help.

To get to Takachiho from Kumamoto, you have to take a bus. I believe Uji just referenced that bus number somewhere. You'll need to walk or take public transport around Takachiho. If you want to see the Ama-no-Iwato Shrines and cave, you'll have to take a bus there also.

From Takachiho, you can take a bus to Takamori in the Aso Caldera. There are a lot of onsen resorts spread around so depending where you want to stay, you'll need to continue by bus to where your accomodations are. You'll need to take a bus up to the crater of Mt. Aso unless you want to hike it.

I would then take the bus up the Yamanami Highway, getting off at the turnoff for Kurokawa Onsen. If you want to stop at a nice onsen, this is one place. Yufuin is also nice for onsens but a bit more expensive. It can be reached by continuing along the Yamanami.

A short bus ride from Yufuin, would take you to Beppu, where you could catch the ferry for Matsuyama on Shikoku.

..is there some kind of alternative that uses a train ?
I'm wondering if the bus ride could cause carsickness for my wife. Is it very winding by road?

You could take trains to the base of Mt. Aso, but then you would have to take a bus up anyway.

There is no train from Kumamoto to Takachiho unless you go all the way to Nobeoka on the east coast first, then take a private train up to Takachiho.

From the north side of Aso, the JR Hohi line runs to Oita City, where you would transfer for Beppu and Yufuin.

The private train on the south side of Aso ends at Takamori.

Kurokawa and the Yamanami Highway area don't have any trains.

If you start in Kita-Kyushu, at the northern tip, the train lines run SW to Fukuoka where they branch into a westward Nagasaki and Sasebo lines; and south into the Kagoshima line which runs through Kumamoto and down to Kagoshima; and the last line from Kita-Kyushu runs E to Beppu and down the coast to Miyazaki eventually also going over to Kagoshima.

There are only 3 E-W lines, one connecting Omuta and Beppu; one connecting Kumamoto and Oita; and one connecting Yatsushiro with Miyazaki. A few private and smaller lines branch off of these, especially around the populated northern Kyushu area.

This link has a schematic map of the lines.

http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2361_05.html

Thank you so much!
One more thing; is there a bus pass (like the JR Pass) we can use for this to save money? We plan to arrive in Fukuoka (ferry from Osaka) and go Nagasaki-Kumamoto-Aso-Takachiho-Yufuin over 10 days and then ferry back to Matsuyama and Miyajima .

I'm sorry I don't have answers for Connie Chiwa, as I have similar question(s).

I'm also thinking of going to Mt Aso during Autumn. There are 2 possible approaches - either from Kumamoto to Mt Aso (day trip) to Beppu, or the other way round (i.e. Beppu-Aso-Kumamoto). There are bus options as well as train options. It is of course possible to do bus first then train (and vice versa), which makes up several possible permutations.

Which portion of the Yamanami Highway is worth doing by bus, the Beppu-Aso portion or Kumamoto-Aso portion? I'm thinking of doing a bus-train combo because the entire bus trip may be too tiring.

8 days in Kysshu gave this response at the bottom on how they combined a 3-day JR Pass with a 3 day Nishitetsu Bus Pass:

http://www.japan-guide.com/forum/quereadisplay.html?0+51401

Uji-san gave the address for the Nishitetsu bus web site:

http://jik.nnr.co.jp/cgi-bin/Tschedule/menu.exe?pwd=gb/menu....

The Yamanami Highway only runs from the NE corner of the Aso caldera to Yufuin, near Beppu. The highway from Aso to Kumamoto, Route 57, is fairly commercialized where it isn't going through farm fields. From Tateno, where there's a sometimes running waterfalls, when the water isn't being diverted to the fields, down to Kumamoto starts out nice but as soon as you reach Otsu, it is pretty much a city road.

Check out the JNTO pdf file. Page 4 has a map of the Aso area plus other info.

http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/location/rtg/pdf/pg-704.pdf

...Anna , that's very helpfull