Nakasendou Road

Many years ago when Tsumago was still a postal town, there was a main walking road people traveled from Kyoto to Tokyo. It is now a beautiful natural trail. There is a popular hike along this road which is 7 kilometers from one town to the next. We took a taxi to the top of the trail and walked down.  It was beautiful!

As we were walking along, we came upon a small little house in the middle of nowhere.  A Japanese man came out and asked us to come in. 

Inside the home, a small fire was burning.

We sat down with him at his table.  He offered us water, cucumbers and candy.  Matthew leaned over to me and said nervously, "Isn't this a lot like Hansel and Gretel?"  I agreed, but felt safe because this man was actually a volunteer from the historical society and he comes to help visitors know what it would feel like to be hiking along the trail and have a place to rest for a moment and refresh.  He keeps track each day in a book of where all the visitors that come are from.  He took out a map and we showed him our hometown.  It was nice to have a drink and a break on a hot hike.  (And I assured the kids that in any other circumstance it is not okay to go into a strange man's home for candy.)

The scenery is really beautiful as it winds around streams and under very old trees.

We did not see any other travelers along the way.  It was rather serene.

Some of the trees are very interesting - they grow very tall, but not straight.  I wondered how they are strong enough with such a curvy trunk.

They have these bear bells along the way.  You are supposed to ring them to let the bears know you are around.  Of course this made me a little nervous, but the kids looked forward to ringing the bells very loudly.  Here, Lauren is making fun of me taking a picture of the bear bell. 

Again, these signs don't really help us.  We just hope they don't say "stay off this trail."

We came upon a beautiful set of waterfalls.  They are featured in Jon's favorite Japanese historical novel Musashi.

Andrew loved playing in the water and trying to walk across the rocks.

Lauren loved the peaceful solitude.

Ali helped Andrew in his quest to walk across the rocks all the way to the waterfall.

Three hours later we arrived at the town.  It was fun to walk past the homes with small vegetable gardens with people working in them.

The view down onto a little town.

I like this door.  It said "do not enter" and looked like it led to nowhere.  I was very tempted to enter.

As we arrived on the main street of town, we saw shop owners spreading water onto the stone walkway in front of their shops.  It makes it look very pretty.  Here a little girl was helping her grandfather spread water.  She was very much enjoying herself.

Love this mailbox.

We ended up at our inn and were excited to be in air conditioning!

Along the main street, there were many little shops selling souvenirs.  This is one selling japanese umbrellas and traditional sandals.

Jon has stories from his mission of riding his bike at night and falling in the ditches surrounding the streets.  We understood what he was talking about when we saw the ditches.  Every street has ditches where the water flows between the street and their homes.  Some are quite deep and wide.

japanese past

Two trains and a taxi ride later, we arrived in the charming town of Tsumago. During the Edo Period, Tsumago was a post town people would stop in on their way from Tokyo to Kyoto. It is preserved to be almost a living museum of the time period. We stayed in a Ryokan (traditional Japanese inn) run by a very kind and hospitable couple.

Here are some pictures from our train window of the countryside.

This woman was tending her garden.

There are these rice fields all over.

Here is our cute little inn.  If you look at the top, that is where we stayed.

The garden and koi pond in front of the entrance.

We had our own little veranda which joined our two little rooms.

This is our bedroom.  We slept on futons with little rice pillows.  The tatami floors were very nice.

The have a little table where you can have tea.  When they prepare your room for sleeping, they move the table out of the way to make more room.

This is the kids' room.  The fourth futon was set up after their table was put away.

We had our tea (water) when we arrived in the room.

Our suitcases were left outside our rooms so we did not hurt the nice tatami floors.  We are quite the group walking around train stations with our suitcases!

We ate lunch at this little restaurant across from the inn.  It just had 4 small tables and two women running the restaurant.  It was delicious.  The innkeeper warned us against eating too much at lunch because he had a very large dinner for us.  It was really hard because the lunch was so good!  Our innkeeper even came over while we were eating, and I think he might have been checking on how much we were eating!

The kids were excited to get a snow cone (or snow corn)! 

Matthew loved the grilled steak and would have eaten much more if he could!

A few pictures of the beautiful town.

When you arrive at the inn, you remove your shoes and wear the slippers they provide.  You wear those slippers everywhere around except for when you remove them to go on the tatami mats and in the bathroom.

When you are in the bathroom, you wear special bathroom slippers.  You never wear these outside of the bathroom.

This is the dining room.

Saying goodbye to the inn!  Such a beautiful place.

toilets

Yes, a post on toilets. These toilets are incredible. Bathroom breaks are not a chore, they are an event. These toilets are heated. They are bidets. They even have a button with a music symbol on it. I was intrigued by that one. Listening to relaxing music while using the toilet sounded like a luxury. So, in one public bathroom I decided I was going to try that button. I sheepishly pushed it and a loud flushing noise began. I learned that the music button is actually a masking noise if you did not want the other stalls to hear what was really going on in there. Not wanting to make that kind of a statement to the other stalls, I quickly tried to turn it off. I pushed every other kind of button I could. Apparently it turns off by itself after a period of time. I am not as intrigued with the music button now.

In Sega Joypolis after a bathroom break, the boys ran out with big, excited eyes. They couldn't talk fast enough as they told me the toilets were actually video games. Unfortunately, I did not get the opportunity to see it myself - it is in the men's bathroom. However, Jon was kind enough to document the evidence. In the toilet there is a target. Depending on your aim, you get certain points for your preciseness in hitting the target. I especially like the detailed instructions on the sign explaining how to play the game.

This is the stall in the women's bathroom at Sega Joypolis.  I thought it was very nice until I saw the pictures of what the men get.

The men's bathroom arcade.

The toilet video game.

The target.

The instructions.

*update* Not all the toilets are this great after all. In the train station in the middle of the country, this is the toilet we had to use.

trains

We are on the Shinkansen on our way from Tokyo to Nagoya. This is a great way to travel. It is clean, comfortable, quiet and roomy. The chairs actually recline to a truly relaxing angle. Andrew has been looking forward to riding the "bullet train" since we told him we were going to Japan. I wish we could take this all the way back to Utah.

The Shinkansen train station.  There are so many different tracks and lines, I'm sure glad Jon is our navigator.

There are just crowds and crowds of people.  This isn't even the busy station.

Waiting for the train to come.

Is this a cool looking train or what?  It feels like you are getting on a Disneyland ride.

The kids are very patient to always let Andrew ride next to the window.