THE further east we went, the more amazing the scenery outside became. While spring was in the air down in the lowlands, winter still reigned supreme on the peaks. Eerily lifelike scarecrows in the fields, and farmers driving quaint tractors, planting rice. Shoden, Omagari Station. Atsumi Onsen, and Kisakata. is where the northbound Black Current and southbound Oyashio Current collide.". Plankton is plentiful offshore last week I learnt that the Tone River seperates Ibaraki Prefecture from Chiba Prefecture, and empties into the sea at a place called Choshi. If you ever fly into Narita Airport from the Pacific Ocean side and look north, you can see Choshi as a point at the end of the long black beach. That long black beach is called 99 Ri Beach ("ri" being a Chinese mile)... I am not sure if it is really 99 Chinese miles long, but it is cool name nonetheless. And a famous place for surfing! ..