帰りの電車は12時01分発だったのですが、旅館の車で送っていただけるのは11時までとのことで、11時に送っていただいて、駅の近くにあるコンビニでサンドイッチなどを買い、駅前のお土産屋さんをちょっと見たりして時間まで待ちました。旅館の中では日本の方も結構見かけたのですが、行きも帰りも電車の中はほとんどが韓国からの方達のようでした。ちょっとググってみたら、由布院と別府は福岡からのアクセスの良さから、アジアからの観光客がとても多いようで、以前から多かったようですが特にコロナの後、増えたみたいです。そこには13%くらいと書かれていましたが、わたしたちはむしろ日本人がそれくらいではないかという印象でした。

帰りのゆふいんの森号は、あまりレトロではない内装でした。

Our train to come back to Fukuoka departed at 12:01. The ryokan gives guests a lift to the station but only until 11:00am, so we took the lift, got to the station early. We went to a convenience store near the station to buy some sandwiches and drinks for lunch, then looked in a souvenir shop and waited for the train. We thought most of the visitors were from Asia, specially Korea, in Yufuin although we did see many more Japanese in the Ryokan. I did a little googling and found out that there are a large number of visitors from Asia, specially from Korea, to Yufuin and Beppu because the access from Fukuoka is so good. There had been many before but it increased after the pandemic. It said about 13% are from Asia but we felt it was much larger percentage and a very small percentage of Japanese.

The train “Yufuin-no-Mori” we took back from Yufuin didn’t look so retro as the one we took on the way out.