I got my luggage packed and out the door in plenty
of time for pick-up and headed downstairs for breakfast. I was careful about what I ate as I did not
want of repeat of yesterday morning. Roz
joined me and we gossiped for a while before heading back upstairs. I needed to
finish packing my rolling bag and get my hat and coat.
The weather could not have been nicer and our guide
had high hopes that we would be able to see Mount Fuji. We were supposed to see it yesterday from the
cable car, which was cancelled owing to the extremely inclement weather. As we drove out of Tokyo, we got glimpses of
the mountain. We stopped at a rest stop
and quickly grabbed our pictures. Our
guide was concerned that by the time we got to the “real” rest stop which has
the better view, clouds would descend and we would see nothing. Apparently Japanese believe that if you don’t
climb Mount Fuji, you are a fool.
However, if you climb it twice, you are a bigger fool!
The fine weather continued as we went on to
Matsumoto. The scenery was reminiscent
of driving on the New York State Thruway at least once you get north of the
city. I particularly liked the
variations in the green colors on the hills.
Once we reached Matsumoto, we walked to the
Matsumoto castle which is one of only four castles remaining from that troubled
era. The gardens are very lovely. Shoes had to be removed to enter the castle
and climbing the steps was difficult.
They are extremely steep. Walking
in stocking feet was difficult in that the floors were a bit slippery. I quickly realized that while, with effort, I
could climb the stairs, I doubted my ability to climb down 6 flights of
them! I went out and enjoyed the view of
the garden.
There is a “folk” museum on the site, which we visited
and found to be interesting. Our next
stop was for a full Lunch at a very nice hotel in Matsumoto. 
 |
| Gardens with castle in background |
We then headed over, but mostly through, the
mountains to Takayama. There was one tunnel in particular that was about two
and a half miles long, which cost about one billion dollars to build. Apparently during construction, they ran into
a hot spring which killed several workers.
I took 18 years to complete that tunnel. The completion of the tunnel
has made it possible to go from Tokyo to Takayama in a day. What used to take four hours now takes less
than twenty minutes.
Once we arrived in our hotel in Takayama, we were on
our own. Roz and I decided to meet for
dinner. I wanted to try the local noodle
specialty, which is buckwheat noddles.
Roz agrees. I am trying to
explain to one of the hotel employees that I don’t eat pork or shell fish. It presented problems until Hiro came along
and had her write out something that indicates that I don’t eat pork or shell
fish. The restaurant we landed in turned
out to be good and I did successfully eat a meal using chop sticks!
On the road to Takayama
No comments:
Post a Comment