In 1998 a man called Tim Schafer and his development team at Lucasarts created the last great adventure game, called Grim Fandango. I haven’t enough time to sing its praises: but suffice to say Grim is not only one of the finest games ever created, it is, in some ways, truly art.

Anyway, without going into too much detail about the story, at the start of Act IV our man Manny Calavera is journeying through the Mexican Land of the Dead with his love interest, the beautiful deceased nun Mercedes; a rotund, bright orange spirit of the land and car mechanic dressed in blue overalls called Glottis; and a group of ex-slaves previously rescued from the coral mines run by his evil ex-colleague.

They reach The End Of The World, an Aztecean pyramid in the middle of vast plains of snow, where dead souls board the train to eternal paradise. Beneath the station, a small garage houses the engineer spirits who service the cable car. Inside the garage is a small kitchen area. On the counter is a mug rack. If you examine the mug rack Manny says, in a suitably dramatic voice, the immortal line:

“It’s the Mug Rack at the End of the World.”

And for some reason, that line has stuck with me. It symbolises my love of all things at the End of the World: the far, distant places, where civilization makes a last, desperate attempt with a mug rack or a small souvenir stall before handing over to the vast, unfathomable forces of nature. I’m almost at the End of Japan, down here in Kagoshima.  I’ve nearly reached the lonely point where the entire country ends.

So, ever one for early starts, I wandered down to the train station and got a ticket to Kagoshima. The route is not straightforward. First you get the excitingly tilty limited express back towards Fukuoka/Hakata, getting off at a place called Tosu (which appeared to lack signs of any kind, so I had to use my gut instinct to know which station to get off at), catching the connecting express from Tosu to Shin-Yatsushiro, and then taking the (pointlessly short at the moment, but lots of tunnels) Kyushu Shinkansen to Kagoshima-Chuo. (The Kyushu Shinkansen trains are very nice, decorated in this art deco-y style that reminds one of 1930s ocean liners.)

Anyway, at Kagoshima-Chuo I went out to look around, exchanging nods with a fellow backpacker on the escalator. Both out here, at the end of the world. I caught a train to Kagoshima Station, where the Nakatono Ryokan was apparently clearly signposted in English. Except it wasn’t. Some wandering around later, I discovered it was next to a tram stop a few stops down the line, so I got a tram. I found the ryokan around a corner and went in and rang the bell and… nothing.

Thirty minutes later of reading the newspaper, still nothing. Eventually, however, someone appeared and got someone else who got me checked in, which was nice. Oh, the relief of finally dumping your bags in your room never gets old.

So, with nothing else to do, I wandered down to catch the ferry to Sakurajima, the (former) volcanic island which in a 1912(?) eruption connected itself to the mainland. Like Naples, Kagoshima lives in the shadow of Sakurajima, and if there’s a major eruption Kagoshima will just go poof and vanish.

Anyway, it’s very scenic, shrouded in fog. I wandered down to the lava fields where volcanic rock has spewed out and formed new land. If you remember your A-level biology, you’ll see striking examples of pioneer communities forming … strata… and … secondary … trees. But it’s very primeval, and fascinating to see what plants manage to establish themselves.

So now I’m back here, and there’s a spider in my room. Ulp.