The stoat and the rabbit
Mar. 20th, 2019 09:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cycleboy1957In the town of Yusui is a spring. It gurgles out ~60,000 m3/day, which sounds immense, but is of the order of 1m3/second. Nothing to be sniffed at, of course, and the locals use it as their drinking water supply. Amazingly, the source is open to the public to walk around and you can see the sand swirling around the points where the water exits the rock. Considering it's next to a railway station, it is a very relaxing place.
A short distance to the east is Kurinodake and a trail that took us up a very long staircase and then to a high lookout that gave us superb views all the way south to the volcano Sakurajima and an aerial view of a geo-thermal power plant. Sadly (for me), we didn't go past the power plant as, even if we had been allowed to look, it was getting too late.
On the drive back I was suddenly aware of a whirling ball of fur in the road ahead (not unlike the Loony Tunes Taz - Tazmanian Devil) it suddenly stopped to reveal a stoat-like animal with a death grip on the back of a rabbit. I'd stopped by this point and the engine automatically cuts out, but I was aware that the car following us had now caught up and had been forced to stop. So, I eased off the brake and the engine automatically fired into life, which caused the stoat to release its grip and shoot off up the road. Amazingly, the rabbit seemed not critically injured and ran straight towards us. I thought it was taking refuge under the car, but it ran past the car down the road, putting as great a distance between it and the stoat as possible, it seems. Sadly, this all happened too fast to get any pictures.
Pulling up outside our little apartment, I discovered a neighbour had parked in our usual spot. So, I drove around the back and parked up. As I got out, I heard the sickening sound of metal scraping on stone. I'd caught the door on a step. I immediately instructed Junko to get back into the car, to tilt my door up from the step, and gingerly closed it again. I then got out on the passenger side.
When we picked up our hire car it turned out to be virtually new and, after a week of trouble-free driving, it was disheartening to say the least that this happened on the last evening. A cursory glance with a torch does not show anything amiss, though I'll check again in daylight. Even so, it's unlikely they will check on the underside edge of the door. Of course, I could be scrupulously honest...
https://www.facebook.com/mark.kuramotoheadey/media_set?set=a.10212842181067420&type=3&uploaded=8
A short distance to the east is Kurinodake and a trail that took us up a very long staircase and then to a high lookout that gave us superb views all the way south to the volcano Sakurajima and an aerial view of a geo-thermal power plant. Sadly (for me), we didn't go past the power plant as, even if we had been allowed to look, it was getting too late.
On the drive back I was suddenly aware of a whirling ball of fur in the road ahead (not unlike the Loony Tunes Taz - Tazmanian Devil) it suddenly stopped to reveal a stoat-like animal with a death grip on the back of a rabbit. I'd stopped by this point and the engine automatically cuts out, but I was aware that the car following us had now caught up and had been forced to stop. So, I eased off the brake and the engine automatically fired into life, which caused the stoat to release its grip and shoot off up the road. Amazingly, the rabbit seemed not critically injured and ran straight towards us. I thought it was taking refuge under the car, but it ran past the car down the road, putting as great a distance between it and the stoat as possible, it seems. Sadly, this all happened too fast to get any pictures.
Pulling up outside our little apartment, I discovered a neighbour had parked in our usual spot. So, I drove around the back and parked up. As I got out, I heard the sickening sound of metal scraping on stone. I'd caught the door on a step. I immediately instructed Junko to get back into the car, to tilt my door up from the step, and gingerly closed it again. I then got out on the passenger side.
When we picked up our hire car it turned out to be virtually new and, after a week of trouble-free driving, it was disheartening to say the least that this happened on the last evening. A cursory glance with a torch does not show anything amiss, though I'll check again in daylight. Even so, it's unlikely they will check on the underside edge of the door. Of course, I could be scrupulously honest...
https://www.facebook.com/mark.kuramotoheadey/media_set?set=a.10212842181067420&type=3&uploaded=8
