Kiyotaki

Hillside district in Moji with views down to the Kanmon Strait, its name meaning pure waterfalls, a reference to the springs where sailors once filled water casks before departing. Around the turn of the twentieth century it was Moji's entertainment center, a neighborhood of geisha houses and high-class restaurants with a notably racy reputation. The celebrated prewar restaurant Sankiro still operates here, though on a quieter scale. As Moji's commercial importance declined, the geisha left and the pleasure quarter quieted into a residential area. Today small galleries, cafes, and boutiques line its stone-walled lanes. Kiyotaki Park, designed in 1916 by Japan's first forestry professor Honda Seiroku, sits further up the hillside.