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16:13, 21 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Fukushima Castle (I first came here in the morning before sitting the JLPT exam. ...So the day wasn't a total waste!)
08:31, 19 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (Thanks, Raymond. Would love to join you and Eric in an assault there. My impression of the northern outer ruins of the castle was that they were built at an earlier stage in the castle's history? And perhaps not refortified in the Momoyama period.)
21:52, 18 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (Good on you for posting an updated and near-comprehensive review of Omi-Hachiman Castle based on your second visit to this yamajiro. >ART wrote: It might be said that a fourth part of the castle consists of some rudimentary earthworks defences along the ridge to the north of the castle, including a horikiri (trench) and some flattened areas. I totally agree with your assessment here as there are clear earthwork remnants. Not many castle fans go to or notice this part of Omi-Hachiman Castle....)
03:49, 16 March 2023 24.182.232.254 talk posted a new comment on Gifu Castle (oops I meant to say what it was made out of and is it still standing or open to public.)
03:46, 16 March 2023 24.182.232.254 talk posted a new comment on Gifu Castle (needs a little stuff on the fashion of Japan)
08:35, 14 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (I'll add it to the list for this fall! Hoping for some nice Koyo too :))
07:07, 14 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Edo Castle (yeah, I love the design here. Shimizu Gate is my favorite hidden gem in Edo Castle. The places with walls strategically have no walls to fire from other locations and not provide something for attackers to hide behind. They may also fall into the moat ! :))
06:21, 14 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (Part 2, Kyokan (Lord's Residence Area) I came down from the mountaintop castle ruins via the ruins of Kitanoshōjō, and moved onto the kyokan area of Ōmi-Hachimanjō from the town rather than retrace my steps, though it is possible to go down to the kyokan via the castle's demaru. The kyokan, the site of the residence of Toyotomi Hidetsugu, one of the Sengoku period's more tragic figures, is now ruins, but what impressive ruins they are! The site is disguised as a mere local park, but it is in...)
06:18, 14 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (Right then! ART's updated travelogue for this site: My second visit to Ōmi-Hachimanjō was much more rewarding than my first whay back in 2016. My exploration of the site was near exhaustive, practical limitations considered. Ōmi-Hachimanjō is vast when one appreciates that it is essentially a castle in three parts. The first part is the yamajiro (mountaintop castle), which is the centre of the castle. The second part is so neglected by most visitors to the town so as to be almost a secret,...)
06:15, 14 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (Haha, I was fairly green six years ago, but I'm glad you visited that temple. I remember being quite struck by it. For me it was a realisation moment: temples have some pretty sweet ishigaki too. Of course, the castle is older and more extensive. I also visited the Hidetsugu residence site on my more recent visit to Hachiman. I'll update my comments as promised now.)
06:01, 14 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Nagahara Castle (No, thank you!)
23:02, 13 March 2023 Eric talk contribs deleted comment #1707 on Edo Castle
23:02, 13 March 2023 Eric talk contribs deleted comment #1708 on Edo Castle
21:03, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (@Eric. It might be time for the JCastle website owner to revisit this yamajiro ruin and update it with newer and more extensive photos of this highly enjoyable mountaintop castle ruin with extensive stone walls.)
20:59, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Hachiman Castle (I know Omi-Hachiman Castle’s stone walls around the Honmaru have been marred by some modern pipes and one section of the Honmaru walls is reinforced with concrete. That is certainly unsightly but so are modern pipes running down the sides of some ishigaki at many other castles such as Hikone Castle, Himeji Castle, Nagoya Castle, and Osaka Castle. There are many more baileys at Omi-Hachiman Castle which have unmarred stone walls such as the Western Bailey, Northern Bailey, and the Demaru Baile...)
20:49, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Ohtsu Castle (I went to the site of Otsu Castle’s main bailey back in 2011, and there was nothing there. Even walking around 150 metres in all directions, I found no traces of any extant ruins. Every trace of this lakeside castle seemed to have been subsumed by modern Otsu. I had not included this castle site on my tally of castle visited for many years because I did not come across any ruins during my first visit. However, last summer on my way to Miidera to check out some relocated buildings from Fushimi...)
20:43, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Ibako Castle (I have ridden past these rice fields on a bicycle after visiting Iba Castle Ruin, and there is absolutely no trace of Ibako Castle at all. If a castle fan has oodles of free time to kill in the Notogawa area, and you have already visited Sasou Castle, Iba Castle, and Iba Palace, all sites with some extant ruins, try going a bit further north to JR Kawase Station (two train stops away) and then head to Yamazakiyama Castle, an Oda Nobunaga castle built at around the same time as Azuchi Castle....)
20:37, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Mikawa Yamanaka Castle (It’s good to see this castle profile up on JCastle. Thanks for putting this up. Now I can see what I have missed by opting to go to Ganryakuji Castle instead. I had only enough time and daylight to visit one of them after visiting some other castles on the same day, so I chose Ganryukuji Castle because Yamanaka Castle had looked more overgrown based on photos that I saw back in 2015. Ganryukuji Castle is located on the same Meiden railway line as Yamanaka Castle, just a few train stations awa...)
20:34, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Wakayama Castle (@Eric. You can literally spend a whole day at this castle if you go back for a slow revisit. There are kokuins all over the place. If you do go for a revisit, make sure you drop by the Wakayama Prefectural Museum. There is a detailed model of Tedori Castle inside this museum. I have also posted a comment about this on the Tedori Castle profile.)
20:28, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Tedori Castle (There is a very detailed model of what this castle looks like during the Sengoku Period in the Wakayama Prefectural Museum.)
20:27, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Kameyama Castle (Kii) (Visiting this yamajiro is the icing on the cake after going to Tedori Castle. As Tedori Castle takes a lot of time to get to unless you happen to live in Wakayama, it’s always nice to get in an extra castle ruin on the same day for the effort expended in getting to this part of Wakayama Prefecture. There are some clear earthwork remnants at this castle ruin as shown by the photos that Eric has put up. As mentioned in the profile, there are only four of the baileys at the top of the mountain w...)
20:15, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Shimashi Ozato Castle (This Ryukyuan gusuku ruin way exceeded my expectations. I had expected just some collapsed stone walls, but the amount of stone wall remnants remaining is quite impressive as is the size of this Ryukyuan fortress. My wife and spent nearly 90 minutes on site exploring its stone wall ruins and multiple shrines located in and around the castle, but I reckon we could have done with another 30 minutes as there were a lot of ruins to see and photograph.)
18:23, 12 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Nagahara Castle (ART, I have uploaded five photos showing the interior of Nagahara Goten ruin. Thanks for letting me add photos to your profile.)
04:11, 12 March 2023 177.185.248.248 talk posted a new comment on Matsushiro Castle (Nice review and precious tips!)
06:28, 8 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Murai Koya Castle (I revisited here. There may some scant remains after all. Will update shortly.)
10:40, 7 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Ashigara Castle (Okay! Friends, lol. The treasure hunt sounds fun^^)
10:31, 7 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Kitanosho Castle (In replying to Eric: Yes, I had noticed you shifting to province names recently! I'll switch to putting domain or other names in brackets where appropriate. I've gone through and done that for Shiga already. I'll standardise my other profiles across the website at some point (except for Shinano and Kai because that's too much - for now). I'll avoid obscure district names if possible. As I mentioned to you, there are districts with the same names throughout several provinces, and there is al...)
21:24, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Ashigara Castle (Maybe I should go back to my photo archives and renew this profile. I know I have a lot more photos too but in 2010 I needed to be much more rigorous with how many photos to add for server space! (no, not quite the dark ages, Friends was already long over....). We actually went here on one of those early days GPS phone "find the treasure" games that was some popular thing back then. There was some hidden trinket in a plastic box hidden in the roots of a tree in one of the baileys!)
21:22, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs deleted comment #2339 on Ashigara Castle
21:22, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Ashigara Castle (Yes, maybe I should renew this profile. I have a lot more photos too but in 2010 I needed to be much more rigorous with how many photos to add for server space! (no, not quite the dark ages, Friends was already long over....))
21:20, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Ashigara Castle (That's the main reason I went too! Unfortunately..... you see the results above.)
21:15, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Tedori Castle (Wakayama is just not often on my radar so I'm glad I could add this site on a great recommendation. This was a great little site so it was nice to find an accessible and enjoyable mountaintop castle in Wakayama for a day trip. Nearby Kameyama Castle (Kii) makes a nice one to visit too once you know the history of these 2 sites. Though it is not often obvious from the profiles I like to combine historically relevant or interesting sites into one trip. It just so happens that in this case t...)
21:12, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Kozutsumi Castle (OK, you've both convinced me. I'll put it on the list for fall 2023. I'll research and document everything with dozens of pictures for future travelers ! :))
21:06, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Himeji Castle (I totally missed the key/lock mechanism and the writing on the pillars. Argh! Despite the castle being very crowded on a Saturday the special exhibit area hard hardly any people in it. Maybe because the entrance was around the side and you might not notice it if you were just face forward to storm the keep.)
21:01, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Kitanosho Castle (I'm honestly at a loss for what to do with all the similarly named castles too. I'm not too hung up on precise naming conventions for prefectures/domain names, I just prefer them in parens ( ) after the name so it is easier to identify in an alphabetical list. Whether it's a domain or prefecture is up to you. I preferred prefecture originally because my thinking is that most "normal" foreign born castle go'ers who are likely to use this site won't know the domain names, but domain is growing...)
20:46, 6 March 2023 Eric talk contribs posted a new comment on Wakayama Castle (6hrs! Kokuin! Oh my. I think I need to revisit this one....)
09:27, 6 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Kitanosho Castle (Well, I have my own reasons for choosing where to go, but I'm anyway happy to leave the other, more better known sites to you and Eric ^ ^)
09:21, 6 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Nagahara Castle (I have no plans to revisit anytime soon.)
22:36, 5 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Nagahara Castle (ART, if you are going to re-visit Nagahara Goten this year, you should upload your photos from your upcoming second visit as this your castle profile. However, if you aren’t planning to re-visit Nagahara Goten, I can upload a few of my photos of the interior of this site.)
21:55, 5 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Wakayama Castle (I visited this castle again last month after previously visiting it in 2012. In past visits to Wakayama Castle, I had insufficiently researched and under-appreciated this castle. Wakayama Castle can be deceptively simple as many visitors tended to visit only parts of the castles and be impressed by some of its high stone walls but underwhelmed by the reconstructed concrete castle keep (despite its decent museum and collection of samurai armour.) Furinkazan mentioned in his comment below about...)
21:47, 5 March 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Kitanosho Castle (@ART. No worries about the feedback. I think the massive amount of work that you have done on JCastle has helped raised the interest in Japanese castles by bringing to Japanese castle fans’ attention some of the little-known castle ruins in Shiga and other prefectures. You certainly deserve kudos for that. However, for your Shiga castle profiles I have noticed you tended to go for some very minor sites with very little or no ruins before having visited and written about the more “major” castl...)
11:10, 3 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Wada Yakata (Kanzaki) (Kanzaki here refers to the historic district to distinguish this site from the Wada joukan in Kouka.)
11:09, 3 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Aoki Castle (Sakata) (Sakata here refers to the historic district to distinguish it from Aoki Caste in Koka / Koga.)
10:55, 3 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Iwakura Castle (I've removed 'Yasu' from the profile name. There are other castles called 'Iwakura' knocking around, but this one is decent enough. It might also be called 'Omi Iwakura Castle' to distinguish in future.)
10:51, 3 March 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Edo Castle (Thanks! I want to highlight this profile along with the kokuin gallery on the FB group at some point.)
12:39, 28 February 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Kitanosho Castle (Naming conventions vary greatly across jcastle.info. There are no clear rules, and many inconsistencies. Different users also employ different conventions, it seems (I thought that added to the site’s character, haha). The webmaster has used both province and district names. Sometimes province names come first, particularly if the site is often referred to as such in Japanese (the ‘Matsuyama’ castles, for example, or ‘Aizu Wakamatsu Castle’). Sometimes the province is given in brackets after...)
10:30, 28 February 2023 ART talk contribs posted a new comment on Nagahara Castle (It looked like there might some work going on, or that the site was being used for something like a lumber yard within, and there were some workies around, so, given the barriers, I did not go into the interior. But thank you for clarifying that the site is open to the public. Feel free, by all means, to add to the gallery for this profile.)
22:51, 26 February 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Himeji Castle (My wife and I went to Himeji Castle recently to check out the Hishimon (Water Chestnut Gate), a gatehouse which apparently is open to the public for the first time ever and only for a limited time (until 12th March 2023.) We had a chat with one of the volunteer guides in the gatehouse, who pointed out some writing in black on some the ceiling beams to us. They were written by carpenters during the restoration done in the Showa Period, which was completed in 1964. There were other features tha...)
22:48, 26 February 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Omi Kitanosho Castle (Good on you for changing the name to Omi-Kitanosho Castle from Gamo-Kitanosho Castle. It makes a lot more sense utilizing the old provincial name for Shiga Prefecture instead of a local district name, given its location next to Omi-Hachiman Castle. I can see your logic in adding a prefix with the old district name to catalogue castle sites on JCastle, but some of those names are no longer in use or hardly known by people who live outside those districts. Also, I reckon you wouldn’t have this...)
22:45, 26 February 2023 RaymondW talk contribs posted a new comment on Kozutsumi Castle (So, this highly enjoyable but little-known gem of a yamajiro has finally been discovered by another JCastle fan. I’ve been telling the website owner, Eric, for years how amazing this mountaintop castle is. Well, it looks like you with / without him finally made it to this impressive castle ruin in Shiga. In the notes about the castle that you have described accurately how the main bailey is tucked a bit down mountain, surrounded by higher and protective baileys, unlike the usual design for a...)

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