Matsumoto to Takayama

Again, sorry for the lack of updates and the lack of of pictures, but
for the tech capital of the world, Japan sure has some crummy old
computers!! Hopefully more will come soon.

Briefly, we left Tokyo many days ago and went to a town in the north
called Nikko, where we were supposed to go hiking. We didn:t because
we were so tired and it was raining all the time. We left Nikko and
went back to Tokyo to hang out for one night (we stayed at a great
youth hostel there), before moving on to Matsumoto about 100 miles
north and west of Tokyo. Matsumoto has a really exquisite old castle
there shaped and painted up like a huge crow. It was fabulous. From
Matsumoto, we came to Takayama, which is what I:ll post about today.

The road from M to T is a twisty mountain road that takes about 1hr
and 45 on a bus (and costs a hefty 30 bucks each). We met two very
nice Americans on the bus named Chris (an MD) and Nicole (who owns her
own marketing/business consulting firm). Nicole speaks Japanese
pretty well, and when the bus made a pit-stop most of the way through
the Japanese Alps, she told us the bus would wait about 40 minutes
before finishing the journey. Actually, the bus only waited a minute
or two before leaving with all of our baggage! It was really not a
big deal, as Nicole was able to communicate with the bus terminal and
make sure our bags would be safe in Takayama (which they were), and we
got to spend an extra hour or so with them in Hida. That night in
Takayama, they very generously bought us a Ramen dinner with many
bottles of sake!

Today (28.Aug.06), J and I visited the Hida Folk Village museum, which
contains many traditional Japanese housing (think: thick thatched
roofs, etc.)

**news flash, this is Justine now writing**

We wandered around the re-created village for a while, which had
somewhat of a Vasona Park (for you bay area peeps) feel to it - not
entirely original or organic. We had first planned on taking a bus
out to some of the real remaining thatched-roof housing villages that
are designated World Heritage sites in the Shirakowa-go area, but
ended up deciding it was too far and too expensive to get out there,
and that we would do better to explore the Takayama. The houses,
known as gassho-zukuri houses after the act of putting hands together
in prayer, are wooden structures with immensely thick straw roofs at a
60 degree angle that take something like 200 villagers two days to
re-build one side of the roof. Anyway we were able to see some of the
re-constructed houses here in Takayama. I have to admit one of the
better experiences we:ve had here in Takayama is the food. We tried
the local specialty of hoba miso which is mountain vegetables (and
even beef) roasted on a magnolia leaf over a little burner set on the
table. It was another flavor adventure totally new to us and well
worth it! We dont always strike food gold but so far have been pretty
lucky considering the vegetarian and language limitations. In fact
the food here has been so amazing I might have to put it up on the
list of :best experiences:　in this country.

Tonight and last night we are staying at another youth hostel, this
one connected to a buddhist temple. The cheaper rooms are segregated
male-female, so we tried that last night and each met some fellow
(Japanese) travelers in our respective dorm rooms. Tonight however we
returned to find the place over run with other travelers and decided
to shell out the extra yen for our own tatami room so we can actually
sleep.

Tomorrow we leave for Kyoto via a series of train connections on the
JR lines. It should be a long day of traveling so I am thinking we
will have to seek out :western style:　rooms since we are practically
getting bruises from sleeping on thin futons the last couple of weeks.
It hasnt been so bad but we occassionally realize that the simple
things we take for granted back home are actually pretty damn good and
we wouldnt mind having a pizza or sleeping on a bed. Or having our
own bathroom or being able to communicate freely.

Well a line is beginning to form at the dorms here so I am going to
end this posting. Hopefully it goes through OK because we are having
to post this one via our email since apparently the computer is set to
block blogspot. Again, strange to find these technological
limitations in Japan of all places....

Take care and feel free to email me because I do like to hear updates
from home!!

Justine (and Mike)