What is it with Japanese and really early mornings? We were awoken by the “time to wake up” song for the village at about 6.00. The night itself was fairly sleepless – the mattress was hard and the pillow was just a sandbag! I managed to doze for a little bit, and then got up, and we had breakfast. This was your typical Japanese breakfast, but with something I hadn’t tried before – tamago kake gohan. Basically crack a raw egg, mix in some soy sauce, and pour over rice. Really nice!

We checked out and walked around the village. It was beautiful – just 12 “authentic” buildings. From a 10 minute stroll up the mountain we got some fantastic views. Then it was back in to town to make paper. We went to the paper making mill factory and the guy walked us through the process. First of all we made a sheet, then were able to decorate it, before the guy made a top sheet (very thin) to go on top. This was then dried and voila! We had paper!

We went back to our hut to collect our bags. Not long later our taxi arrived to take us to the oldest of these huts – > 300 years old. It was about a 20 minute drive away. We paid to get in, and they had just started a show so we sat down and enjoyed the majority of it, before having a walk around the hut. It was 3 stories and had lots of old equipment on display. We had some “medicinal” tea and then strolled across the bridge and up the hill to the jail cell.

We wandered around for a little bit before our bus came, which took us to another old village. This was similar to the one we stayed at last night, but even smaller. We had ~1 hour before the next bus, and were getting hungry, so we walked through the village and had some noodles for lunch. On the way back through the village we stopped for some photos, and then bought a soft serve ice cream for the walk up the hill to the highway. We waited about 5 minutes for our bus to arrive.

It was then about an hour bus trip back to Takaoka, and we had 90 minutes to kill. So we walked up to Kanaya-machi – an old style part of town. It was ~20 minutes at a brisk pace. We were able to leave our bags in a locker at the train station (500 yen) which made it easier, but it was still quite hot, so I enjoyed a cold drink of water for the walk. Once we were there we walked down the street, which had a market on for the day! So there were stalls on both sides of the street with the usual trinkets. We bought some food and made our way back to the train station. We got side tracked at a couple of shops so by the end we were running short of time for our train! A quick toilet stop, grab our bags from the locker, buy our train tickets, and we had about 2 minutes to spare.

It was about a 30 minute train trip to Himi, heading North up the peninsula a bit. The water was to our right and looked so different compared to the mountains we had been walking through the last couple of days. At the train station we had a transfer to our hotel. It took about 15 minutes past the fish market and the sake brewery we were expecting to go to (which was the reason we came to this town – unfortunately they decided not to have tours, but only told Kaoru last week). We were taken up to our room on the top (5th) floor, and looked out East over the bay. It was a beautiful view! So I bought a beer and a drink for Kaoru and we enjoyed that looking out over the water and discussing our plans for the rest of the day.

Feeling quite sore, we decided to start by going downstairs to the free massage chairs. This was just what we needed after the walking with our heavy backpacks! Luxury! Then we sat in the lounge and had a cup of tea, looking out over the bay again.

At 6.20 it was time for a bath before dinner.  There was a beautiful view over the ocean from the 3rd story bathroom, but the water was just way too hot.  And trying to shave using the disposable razor provided just drew lots of blood.  Still, it was nice to relax, even if just for a short time.  However when you’re on the clock, it’s hard to really appreciate where you are.

We made it to dinner about 7.00.  We were quite relaxed and warm, and ready to start our “mini” sized meal.  We had no idea what we were in store for…

I ordered a sake tasting platter – 3 different sake’s (100ml glasses) for 1,500 yen.  One of them was from the brewery we were hoping to go to tomorrow.  It was particularly nice – I don’t know what stood out about it though.  I think it had a bit of a fizziness to it – not necessarily the right word to describe it, but that’s the only thing I could put it down to.  But the food….oh my god.  It just kept coming, and coming, and coming.  And every dish was as good as the last.  You can imagine what the seafood would be like in a fishing village.  The sashima was great, even for Japanese standards.  We had shabu shabu squid, that swelled up while being cooked (for no more than 60 seconds).  The seaweed changed from a dull brown to a glowing green as it heated.  I can’t even remember most of what we had as I just kept getting fuller and fuller, but couldn’t stop eating.

*finally* they brought out the rice, and I knew we had reached the end.  I left half of this, but I was wrong – there was still dessert to come!  Luckily that went down easily – some jelly with a dob of creme on top.

It was an effort just to stand up after this meal.  Finally we made it back to our room, and were delighted that they had come in and cleared our table, to make our beds up.  We sat out on balcony for a while and planned what we were going to do tomorrow given a few changes in our schedule…enjoying the night view of the bay.

*Somebody* had a great idea to watch the sunrise this morning. So a wake-up call confirming the tour was on happened about 3.55. Scared the crap out of me! We knew it was going to be cold, but we were also quite hot in the room – so we put a few layers on, and then our top few layers in a backpack, and made our way to reception.

There would have been ~100 people doing the tour. We caught the electric bus back to the previous stop from yesterday, and it was starting to get cooler. I was expecting them to have the heaters on to keep everybody warm, which would have been stupid because of the amount of clothes we were all wearing, and we didn’t want to have to take them off. Luckily they took the logical approach and had it fairly cool so we could be rugged up. Nonetheless my driza-bone and gloves didn’t go on until we were walking outside at the lookout.

It was quite light outside already; but the sky was clearly red in one direction. We took a few photos, and weren’t shivering, which was good as we had brought quite a lot of clothes on this trip and wanted to justify them all coming! Eventually the sun started to rise above the mountain. It was a magical sunrise – words can’t describe the mountains, half covered in snow, as the sun broke through.

After about 15 minutes we caught a bus back to the hotel – it was now about 5.30, and we thought we’d go outside to see the sunrise from where we were staying! You could see the sun reflecting on the peaks of the mountains opposite but it hadn’t risen enough for us to see it yet. We gave up on this one and went back inside.

After a cup of shitake mushroom and pepper tea (which tasted more like soup), we waited until 6.45 when breakfast started. We had a bit of everything – it was a full buffet so we had our choice of lots of food, and we indulged in all we could!

After breakfast we were both feeling pretty tired, so decided to get a little bit of sleep. After an hour or so, we woke up, showered, packed our bags and checked out. It was just before 10.00, and our tour was scheduled to leave at 11.45, so we went for a walk around the “lake”, which was supposed to be about a 1 hour stroll. Because the sun was up we knew it would be warmer, so we left our bags at reception, and just had T-shirt and jumper on (Kaoru had a couple extra layers). Again, we were treated to sensational mountain views as we walked up and down the snow. We saw a couple of raichou birds – an almost extinct species that are very old. Apparently it was very lucky for us to see them.

Near the end of our walk we went to a “cultural building”. Because we had seen these birds we had to fill it in a register, and were given stickers. However the building was just too hot. I was already down to just my T-shirt with my jumper around my waist but I would have still been hot in shorts! So we made our way back to the hotel and went to the 5th floor lounge to wait out the next 40 minutes or so, with a hot chocolate.

It was finally time to go, so we found our tour guide from yesterday, and we boarded our bus. This drove us through the snow wall, and the winding roads, for about an hour. Then we boarded a cable car further down the mountain, and said goodbye to our tour group. They were going back to Tokyo directly, but we had other plans. So in 8 minutes we boarded a train, bound for Toyama Station.

This was quite an interesting trip. Kaoru kept making jokes comparing the stations to Yarraville station, because they were unmanned. However they were old shelters really (albeit with larger waiting areas).

At Toyama we caught a train to Takaoka station. There we had a snack and a drink, before catching a 4.00 World Heritage Bus to Gokayama. This was about a 1 hour trip. After being on low ground for a while, we were expecting to have a warm night. But no, the last 20 minutes of driving were steadily going up-hill, and soon enough we were driving through scattered snow again. The bus driver pulled over and told us where to get off the bus, and we walked about 20 minutes in to town.

Wow. What an amazing town! I can see why it’s world heritage listed. Very old style houses, with grass roofs, all with a perfect 60 degree angle for maximum strength given the weight of snow they must sustain. From the cartoon map Kaoru had printed out, we managed to find our building without too much trouble (there are 12 buildings in the village – so yeah, it was never going to be *that* hard!).

After being taken to our Tatami room and putting our bags down, we went to the “family room” and had some green tea and filled in a registration form. We met another guest who was Japanese, but currently living and working in Hungary – he was just back travelling through Japan for a bit. Then another couple came out of their room, from USA. They had arrived yesterday and had enjoyed a restful day today.

Before dinner we were told we were getting a room upgrade! Another couple who were supposed to come had cancelled. So our new room was about twice the size! Score!!!!

Dinner was, as always, a fantastic feast. Our host told us stories, mostly of which he probably tells every night. The couple from the USA said that the previous night, the other guests were a couple of Frenchmen and a Chinese, so communication was very limited. They were wrapped at having a translator tonight explaining all the details!

After dinner we watched a short movie about the history of the village. The American couple told us how they had ~7 hours travel time tomorrow to get to Kyoto, so Kaoru, the other Japanese boy and the owner talked about all the various options they had, and I think in the end, a better option was found. Then after a hot bath, it was time for an early night. I could feel the bottom of my legs were very swollen – not sure if this was due to the walking, the altitude or the weather. I’m sure I’ll sleep well tonight! About 9.00 we could hear music playing – it was like the “it’s time for bed” song for the village.

I woke up fairly early this morning (okay, after Kaoru and her parents but it’s pretty hard to beat them!).  I got dressed, finalised packing and wend downstairs for a quick breakfast, and we were out the door by 7.40.  Kaoru had decided that we would have trouble getting on crowded trains with our backpacks, and that we would be better off getting a taxi to Tokyo station; so we started walking to Nishikasai station, and found a taxi pretty quickly.

It cost just over 3,000 yen, and we had a good run – very little traffic.  Which was surprising.  We got to the station with 7 minutes to spare.  We found our tour director (not Kaoru this time!!!) and found we were the youngest in the group.  This is something getting rarer and rarer for me these days, so it’s quite nice for a change!  At 8.30 we walked in our group to a quiet area, and were given a briefing, before catching a 9.04 Shinkansen.  While waiting for our train to arrive, we saw a double decker Shinkansen, which I had never seen before.

We got off the train about 10:45, where we changed for a bus.  It was still quite warm, which was a surprise, as we were definately getting up in the hills.  A lot of the trip here was through tunnels.  The bus took about 2 hours, and the last hour we had a beautiful view of snow capped mountains, and there was snow on the side of the road.  Eventually we reached the end of the line.

About 15 minutes later we caught an electric (trolley) bus to our next stop, where we got a cable car, ropeway, and another trolley bus, and *finally* made it to Tateyama Hotel about 3.00.  We had about 15 – 30 minutes at each stop to look around – this included crossing a dam, and several observation towers.

After a briefing (which I didn’t catch a word of), we were given our room key and finally took a load off.  But time-was-a-passing….so we went outside for a bit of a walk around the area in the snow and took some photos.  At 5.00 we met up with everybody else from the hotel, as the ‘day trippers’ had all left, and were able to walk through the snow wall by ourselves.  This was amazing!  It was ~19 foot high in places – vertical.  The sun was out and I was in a T-shirt, with lots of warm gear in my backpack just in case.

We had about a 45 minute round trip through the snow wall.  Then it was time for dinner.  We were taken in to the restaurant and enjoyed a fine meal of….well, you know Japanese food!  Lots of tasty things!  The newest for me was the Firefly Squid – whole.  Very interesting taste.

After dinner we had a bath to warm up, and then decided to go outside and check out the stars – there was a group viewing but we decided to go by ourselves as I wouldn’t have understood them anyway!  The snow covered mountains lite up by the half full moon were beautiful, but it was very bright – we even had shadows as we walked!  So the stars weren’t as impressive as we were hoping, but the view made up for it.  This was also a test of whether we had brought enough warm clothes.  Tomorrow morning would be even colder so we needed to find out how we were going.  I think we’ll be OK.

A drink up on the 5th floor lounge wrapped up the evening.  We were both very tired – while we hadn’t done a lot (other than sitting and changing modes of transportation), it had been a long day.

I didn’t wake up until about 9.00. So a well needed sleep. I was feeling a bit better but still a little groggy. I went downstairs and had a Japanese style breakfast of fish and rice and then went back to bed.

It was able 2.00 next time i woke up and after a shower to clear the cobwebs i was ready to take on the world. I had hiyashi chuka noodles which is a summer specialty as they are served cold. Mio and Arisa joined us for a walk around their neighborhood which we had never done before. Then Kaoru and i packed our bags and Mio took us to the train station.

We went to Togo shrine where we got married just over 12 months ago. We were given ofuda when we were married – some cards with a happy prayer on them. We needed to return these and a priest will burn them.

We then walked to Meiji Shrine, where we always go as it was the first place Kaoru took me the day we met. After a prayer we made our way back to the station and went to Nishikasai,  and found an okonomiyaki restaurant for dinner. They had some very different waysof serving than i was used to-same concept but just looked different.

Then it was back home for a couple of beers, a nice bath and then pack bags for our trip.

Flying in style. I’m coming to Japan on jetstar business class this time. Kaoru came a week ago and now I’m coming to start my holiday.

The plane took off on time from melbourne…pushed back about 1150pm Friday night. The usual routine-i left my car at Brett’s and he drove me to the airport.

Immigration was empty and my bag came off very quickly. So i found Kaoru waiting for me at 927 and we bought tickets and rushed to catch a 935 bus to Kasai and then walked to Kaoru’s parents house in Nishikasai. We had some tea and then went for lunch-soba restaurant.

I was feeling a bit sick. Burning the candle at both ends while Kaoru was away had given me a bit of a cold. So after lunch and browsing through a few hundred of Kaoru’s old photographs i had a little nap. Then we packed an overnight bag and left for Mio’s house about 4.00.

It took a couple of trains…but how good was it to be using a system that works again! The second train was very crowded but somehow we managed to get more people on. Mio picked us up from the station and took us to her house. Kozue and Kenichi and their kids were already there. So after some hello’s we started eating…

Mio knew how much i loved sushi so had organized a couple of large platters to be delivered. Because i was unwell it was a quieter night than normal. A couple of beers, some sake and some topaque that i brought from Australia was all i had. I excused myself early and had a bath for a good 5 minutes and then was in bed by 9.00.