The already cloudy sky darkens perceptibly as our car descends into Takachiho Gorge. This area of extreme scenic beauty — carved out of the earth by lava flow from Kyushu's volatile Mount Aso and further eroded by local rivers such as the Gokase — is already fairly hidden, in an untrampled corner of northern Miyazaki Prefecture. Yet the lower we go in elevation, the more it seems as if the rest of the world has disappeared completely. I feel like we're trapped in a geological time capsule, locked between ancient rock walls.