Japan, Day 3, Saturday
6 am Kyle wakes up in the Zenjoshi temple. Very nice. Angy is still asleep so I went to take advantage of the computer facilities at the temple. It is just one computer, but it is fast enough and there doesn’t seem to be too many people trying to use it. Especially at this time in the morning. I updated our blog a little bit, added some pictures. P.S. Thanks for the comments, Angy and I really enjoy hearing from you guys. Feel free to type whatever you want.
7 am, I wake Angy up and get our stuff ready for the day. We get both get ready and pay the resident monk, “Tommy”, for the Temple stay and head across the street for the early morning special. One cup a joe (vacuum brewed), a big thick piece of toast with orange marmalade and butter, and a soft boiled egg. Quite a steal for 3 dollars.
From here we decided to lock our stuff up in a locker at the train/bus station while we went down to the river for the morning farmers market. Our bus for Shirakawa-go doesn’t leave until 1110 and it is only 0900. So we start walking to the train/bus station and we almost make to the lockers and what happens? Well, like usual Angy says she has to go to the bathroom. No big deal, she says this like 10 times a day. Except there’s a tad bit of urgency in her voice. Alright so she takes her bag off, gives me her spare change for the locker, and heads off to the bathroom.
I had to get a little more change for the locker so I went in to the conveince store near by. I whipped out my handy dandy Japanese phrasebook (Thanks Steph, it has been a huge help) and make a feeble attempt to ask for change. The girls behind the counter smile at each other with a kind of bewildered look. So, I try again. Looks like they may have understood me this time. Nope they seem to be pointing me towards somewhere else. Oh well, so much for trying Japanese. No it’s time for the universal body language. I pull out my wallet and retrieve a 1000 Yen bill and fish out what change I have out of my pocket. I act out presenting the bill to them, and then I mimick them giving me the change back. They really got it this time. Hmmm, what are those signs that they are ponting at? Oh, silly me. I guess I didn’t notice the three BIG signs in English that say “We do not make change.” Damn language barrier.
So I bought a pack of gum. Small Victory. I walk back to the locker area where I was last when ANgy went to the bathroom and set the bags down. Here comes Angy now. She looks a little sad and sluggish, I wonder why? I say, “Whats wrong honey?” She looks at me with a sad face. She says, “I pooped my pants L. What!?
Yes that’s right. She REALLY had to go, and didn’t make it to the bathroom. Apparently something didn’t agree with her this morning. Fortunately she threw away the old undies and was able to start fresh with another pair. Angy often referenced the movie that she had just seen, Sex and the City, where one of the girls had also pooped her pants. Well things can only get better from here!
We loaded our bags into the locker and bought our tickets for the bus ride to Shirakawa-go. Now we’re off to the morning market where the lonely planet guide said we can buy fresh vegetables and souveniers from gnarled farmers. Well not so much gnarled, but I did almost feel obligated to buy some wares from a few vendors just because they did look a little old and gnarled. I resisted the temptation though. Shouldn’t buy things out of pity.
The market was a great time, many things to see, and great people watching to enjoy. There were also several food stands that had great smelling food. Angy and I had these rice flour balls on a stick that were dipped in a soy type sauce and grilled. Very good. We also bought some very tender beef on stick. To die for. But 900 Yen for two skewers with about five small pieces of meat on each!
We thouroughly enjoyed sampling all the other foods that were for sale. It seemed that all the vendors wanted us to sample what they were selling, I don’t even think that they wanted us to buy their products, I sense that they just wanted our approval.
No big purchases accept of course a nice bottle of sake (boozers). Oh, I almost forgot. I had Angy buy this T-shirt. It is great. I can’t recall what it said, but I will make sure to take a picture and post it later.
Heading back to the train/bus station to catch our ride. Had to make sure Angy hit the bathroom before we left. Pretty uneventful bus ride. Took about 2 and a half hours, and it was very pretty. The city Shirakawa-go is set in middle of the mountains and is considered to be a sort of folk village. All the houses are in the style of the 15-1600’s (Gassho style houses to help with the snowy winters). They are old farm houses from around the country that were moved to this site to preserve their heritage. It is actually an UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Made it to town and we were ready for a little food, so we stopped in at a little restaurant. Angy got a Udon noddle soup, and I got curry and rice. Delicous. From there we went to the farmhouse that we were checking into and dropped of our stuff. The lady that runs the house looks at us when we walk in and says, “American!?”, we nod yes and then she disappears. Comes back and asks us again, “American?”, yes we repeat. Odd. She brings us to a room with a table with two pads to kneel on and a mat to lay our bags on. She points out a few sites around the village and tells when dinner, breakfast, and checkout time are and then leaves. Well, we assumed that this was the office and that she wanted us to follow her to our room now. Because, obviously this wasn’t the room we were sleeping in. There were no beds. Wrong, she smiled and shuffled us back to the room. We seem to have forgotten from our last time here that while we are at dinner they push aside the table and make up our beds.
We set a few things up and head off into the village. It is very pretty here, a lot of neat little houses to look at. But things here aren’t really grabbing us as much as we wanted. We have a ticket to leave here at 1215 tomorrow and seeing that we have only been in town for about four hours and we feel like we have seen everything we are going to try and change our ticket tomorrow to leave a little earlier.
Angy and I head on to the path up the side of the mountain that will bring us to the observatory to view the village from above. We passed a large tour group of Japanese people and it was a little amusing. It seems that since they are “hiking” to the observatory they all thought that it would be necessary to gear up with hiking boots and everything. The path was not certainly one you would consider strenuous or difficult. It was only a tar path that ambled up the mountain.
We made it up there and took some pictures and video. It was nice and pretty up there. Good to get a little bit of exercise. Not much though. About 15 minutes worth. Time to find something else to do.
We head down the mountain, through the village, and across the suspension bridge to the souvenier shop. Hmm what should we buy? I know! Sake!
Nothing like enjoying a tall glass of sake by the riverside in the mountains. Where Angy got bitten by a spider on her ankle, this really is not her day!
Angy and I headed back to our house and took a nice shower. Feels good after walking around and being in buses all day. We waited around for dinner to start at 630 pm. I uploaded pictures to the computer and Angy read about our next destination, Osaka, in the travel book.
We wore our yakata’s (Yakata’s are Japanese robes) to dinner. It was very good. We had a plate of baked fish (head and tail included), pickled cucumber with apples and noodles, Hida Beef, and many other yummy things. From there it was off to bed. Good night friends!
