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Some 80km east of Hagi, in the neighbouring prefecture of Shimane-ken, is the older and even more picturesque castle town of TSUWANO . Nestling in the shadow of the 908-metre-high extinct volcano, Aono-yama , around which mists swirl moodily each autumn, this is yet another small town that touts itself as a "Little Kyoto" and, for once, there really is an air of courtly affluence along the tourist-jammed streets. Tonomachi , the well-preserved central area of samurai houses, with their distinctive cross-hatched black-and-white plaster walls, is famous for its narrow canals teeming with carp and flowerbeds bursting with purple and white irises each June. Overlooking the town from the west are the ruins of the castle built in 1295 by Lord Yoshimi Yoriyuki as protection against potential Mongol invaders. The Yoshimi clan followed their allies, the Mori, to Hagi after they both fought on the losing side in the Battle of Sekigahara in 1600. Sakazaki Naomori was installed in Tsuwano by the Tokugawa clan but, even though he later proved his loyalty by rescuing the Princess Senhime from the siege of Osaka castle, he was refused her hand in marriage. The castle was dismantled at the start of the Meiji era, then an earthquake in June 1997 made what was left of it unsafe to visit. At the foot of the hill on which the castle stood is the bright-red shrine complex of Taikodani Inari-jinja , approached through a zigzag tunnel of a thousand vermilion torii . Closer to Tsuwano Station is the serene Zen Buddhist temple Kakuzan-Yomei-ji and the tranquil Maria Seido , a chapel in a mountain glade, dedicated to the martyrdom of Japanese Christians. Also worth a look are the small Katsushika Hokusai Museum , with its collection of works by the master printmaker and artist Hokusai, and the Musee de Morijuku , displaying twentieth-century art in an old farm building with some unusual features.
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