Waiting at Akabuchi Station

Akabuchi is on the Tazawako Line in Iwate Prefecture. The local trains that stop here are few and far between.

I arrived on the 16:15 from Omagari to have a walk around the area, and then take the 18:15 train onwards to Morioka.

Arriving back at the station at around 17:45, I intended to take a few shots of the station and get a few shots of the Akita Shinkansen trains that pass through this station without stopping.

The platform was in need of a bit of weeding, was one of my first thoughts.

Shortly after, an alert from the speaker on the platform told me that a train was about to pass through. Great, I thought, I could get a picture of the lovely red shinkansen passing through on its way towards Akita.

But the train unusually came to a stop at the station, so I could take my time getting a few shots.

The shinkansen didn't move for 20 minutes. Looking online, I could see that there was a delay due to a "collision with a bear."

Then at around 18:05, the late running Tokyo-bound shinkansen pulled into the station and came to a stop, with the Akita-bound train pulling out a few minutes later.

I then took the opportunity to take a few pictures of the newly arrived Shinkansen as the light was fading.

Then I heard a door slam. Moments later, the driver appeared on the tracks to do a visual inspection under the front of the train, presumably looking for traces of squashed bear...

It left about ten minutes later, leaving me waiting a further 30 minutes waiting for my delayed local train, all the time thinking about bears in the area...

An interesting wait.