"My yearning for Matsushima grows day by day,
for I know someone may be waiting for me there."
~ Basho

Memorialized by the renowned Japanese poet and haiku innovator Matsuo Basho (1644-1694), a visit to Matsushima Bay, located in the Tohoku region, about a one hour drive north of Sendai (Shiogama being the closest town of any size), is a wonderful gem. Filled with small islands amazingly eroded to reveal arches or imitate ducks, and topped with what looked like hordes of banzai trees, the bay also is host to what is purportedly the 2nd largest fish market in Asia. Seaweed and oyster farms dot the bay. And at it's northern terminus waits the town of Matsushima, lovely 17th century (shinto) shrines and (buddhist) temples, abandoned cliff dwellings, elegant hotels and tourist souvenir shops.