Trip Report: Long Report on Three Week Japan Trip
 

Over the summer, my friend Laura and I took off to Japan for a three week trip with a rough plan and a college student budget. We got a great deal on airfare (800$ round trip), had rented a cell phone via rentafone, and purchased a 21 day unlimited rail pass. These three pre-purchases made up a full half of our operating budget. Neither of us had ever been to Asia; Laura had never been outside the United States. Our Japanese was rudimentary at best - Laura had taken (and barely passed) a Japanese course at our school, I had fiddled around with Rosetta Stone over the first half of the summer. Yet we weren't content to stay in Tokyo and Kyoto - our itinerary led all over the place, including a side trip up north to the Shimokita peninsula that produced only nervous, disbelieving laughs from our Japanese friends.

The point of this preface is - if we did it, anyone can!

Our goal in planning the itinerary was balance. Japan is a fairly large and very diverse country, and one could easily spend a month or more exploring a single one of its many different aspects: the bustling, chaotic metropolises, the painfully beautiful countryside, the traditional culture (castles, geisha, samurai, temples, shrines…) the modern one of technological wonders, manga, and kawaii (cute). And is it better to go go go, packing as much as you can into a few short weeks, or to relax and enjoy the decadence of hot springs and fantastic views of Mount Fuji? It’s up to the traveler, I think, but for our first trip, we wanted to sample everything. In addition to balance, we also planned our itinerary to get the best value out of our unlimited rail pass.

I feel that we did more than ‘scratch the surface’ of Japan (for travellers) – we knocked out a good chunk of the tourist destinations, but that only served to reveal more of its breadth and depth. I want to go back more than I wanted to go there to begin with.

Day One:

Arriving in Tokyo, figuring out the Subway


The flights went very smoothly. We flew from Kansas City, and we had a layover in Detroit, but after that it was a very long straight shot into Narita. Once we arrived, we rolled through customs (a breeze), turned in our 'exchange orders' for JR rail passes, and then booked seats on the Narita Express. The Narita Express is a great way to get to Tokyo from the airport. It was very fast and very comfortable. We had a whole compartment to ourselves. The Narita Express is normally one of the more expensive options for getting to and from the airport, but it is covered by the JR pass.

We had packed light, initially in order to bypass checking luggage. I'm so glad we did. Each of us had a (normal sized, think middle school) backpack and a rolling carry-on suitcase. We felt enormously bulky on trains with even that much luggage, but it was doable. Packing light also saved us when we had to tackle staircase after staircase - the Japanese don't seem to mind climbing stairs in the least, and you find long flights of them where you least expect them.

We were spending our first few nights in Japan with a friend - my roommate from the year before. She had sent us instructions to her part of town, and we clung to those few precious printed Kanji as we tried to puzzle our way through first the train and then the subway system. It really wasn't that bad. The maps were easy to understand, and in Tokyo almost every sign had names written in the roman alphabet as well as Kanji. The people working at the stations were friendly enough, efficient, and knowledgeable, so we asked questions whenever we got confused. Despite the fact that Laura had never ridden a subway, and I had only taken the Paris subway while following my parents around, our only misstep was to get on one that was the right line but the opposite direction. It was also a great relief to have the JR pass. Although it was only valid on the trains, and not the subways, we knew that if we made any mistakes on the trains, we wouldn't be accountable for any extra charges. By the time we arrived in Toranomon, we considered ourselves masters of trains and subways both. Of course we would be proven wrong many times.
Mayumi’s apartment was small but so well organized. In one room she fit her bed, chairs, tv, kitchen, and desk. Most of her clothes, and her washing machine, fit in the small bathroom. She also had one other, VERY small room, with only a toilet inside. Her grandparents lived in the same apartment complex, actually two doors down, and they also owned the room in the middle. All in all it was actually quite a bit of space for downtown Tokyo. Mayumi drew a bath and the magic bathtub heated the water and spoke when it was ready! Whether in someone’s home or in a more traditional hotel, or public baths, make sure you don’t forget to clean yourself before you get in the bath, since everyone shares the same water!
After we were clean, we found out that Mayumi’s grandmother had made dinner for us! There was some fish prepared with miso, as well as Sukiyaki (a sort of sweet stew of beef, mushrooms, and jelly noodles which you dip into raw egg before eating). It was so delicious. And I was so pleased to be able to carry on some very silly and incorrect conversations in Japanese with Mayumi’s grandmother! At this point we had been awake for two days so we went right to bed afterwards.

Day Two:
Kamakura

The next day we woke up early and headed to Kamakura. Mayumi had job interviews all day, so we wanted to make ourselves scarce. Kamakura was amazing! It was easy and very quick to get there from Tokyo. We left the apartment at 8 am, but still, there was so much in Kamakura, and it all closes fairly early, that we barely saw the things we wanted to. Before we left we booked tickets to Mutsu, where we would be going in a few days. The ticketmaster seemed really surprised that we were going there, but more on that suicide mission later.

On the way there, we accidentally got on a train that, while headed in the right direction, didn’t go all the way to Kamakura. On one stop everyone got off, and Laura and I were a bit confused. Suddenly an older man jumped on and asked in affected English where we were going. When we said Kamakura, he ushered us off the train, and said, “Next train!” We followed his instructions and the next train went straight to Kamakura.

We were delighted the moment we stepped foot in Kamakura. Tokyo, what we had seen so far of it, was a big city and basically looked like a big city with Japanese words. Kamakura was obviously different. We saw our first McDonalds, a Ghibli store, a few older people wearing traditional clothing, some strange looking mascots, some paper lanterns… I also loved the trees in Kamakura. They were just so subtly different from those we have back home. One had wrinkly skin that reminded me of an elephant’s.
The first thing we decided to look for was the Tsurugaoka Hachimangu Shrine. Our guidebook (Frommer’s) told us to look for a big red Tori. Looking across a crowded street, we saw our first Tori. It was red. We assumed it was the right one. I excitedly took a picture. Once we got a little closer, we had misgivings. There was no easy way to reach it, as we assumed there would be for such a famous shrine. So we turned right, following a sign that had a tori symbol on it. Suddenly we saw a HUGE red tori. It towered far above all the cars and even most trees. It suddenly seemed ludicrous that we had thought that tiny one was THE tori. Beyond the tori was a little bridge and a very lovely groomed tree, a little pool with waterlilies in it. It was raining but that actually made things nicer and more mysterious, never mind less crowded. There was an avenue leading to the shrine itself, which was lovely, ornate, and bright. The rain water was running off the roofs, which was really beautiful. We followed a set of stairs on the side and found a tiny miniature Inari shrine. Some girls walked by in traditional clothing. We were excited, even though we later found out that they were merely working the gift shop. They still looked lovely!

When we walked past the main buildings of the shrine, we were surprised by how large the grounds were. We passed other buildings, a huge pond full of water lilies, and a kindergarten class. We later found out that there is actually a kindergarten inside of the shrine! How would you like to go to school in a beautiful, world class tourist destination? I think the children were going home, because we were caught up in the wave of them leaving. Luckily they went in the direction we planned to go anyway, at least at first. By the time the group dispersed, we had made our way out of the temple and down the famous cherry tree lined Wakamiya Oji pedestrian street, and were somewhere in the middle of Kamakura. It took us a few minutes to find our way, and then we decided to take a brief venture off the beaten path.

Frommer’s recommended a restaurant called Raitei. Apparently it was set in some lovely gardens a short distance outside of town, and alongside fancy and expensive food, it sold cheap noodles. Admission to the garden was 500 yen, but it counted towards your meal. Even though it wasn’t on any of the maps, we decided to go for it. It was then that we first mastered a phrase we used many, many times on the trip, “_____ ni tomarimasuka?” (Does the (bus, train, whatever) stop at _______?) We found out that we had to take the same bus that went to Daibutsu, the big Buddha. What luck! Once we told the driver where we were headed, he called out on the speaker when we arrived, saying, “Raitei!” Other well meaning Japanese passengers tried to get us to get off at Daibutsu, sure that was the only place two foreigners would be headed!

The meal was lovely. It was so nice that Frommer’s had told us to expect the entry fee. The lady working at the entrance spoke no English and seemed frightened at the prospect of explaining the system to us, then relieved when we offered money. The food was delicious and relatively cheap. Afterwards we spent nearly an hour exploring the gardens. There were little pavilions and stone lanterns everywhere, as well as a bamboo thicket.

When it was time to go back, we merely caught the same bus we had come in on and rode it back, this time getting off at Daibutsu. All the maps in Kamakura were so easy to read! They showed Daibutsu, Tsurugaoka Hachimangu, and a few other locations with pictures, so there was no need to read Japanese, or even English. We went to Daibutsu first. The statue was huge and really beautiful, in a gentle and serene way. I really loved the way it was standing in the open air, as opposed to in a dark building surrounded by incense. It was somewhat unique in that regard. On the back of Daibutsu there are even windows! We paid the twenty yen (twenty cents – SO worth it) to walk inside of the statue.

From Daibutsu it was a very short walk to Hasedera. Hase Temple has a huge gilded statue of Kannon, a great view of Kamakura, a cave dedicated to Benzaiten, and tons of Jizo (children guarding statues). Everything there was lovely. The cave especially was interesting and unusual. Most things in Kamakura, and elsewhere in Japan, close at 5. It was exactly 5 when we left Hasedera, and while they weren’t shooing people out, they were gently encouraging them to start making their way towards the entrance instead of further into the grounds.

We could have taken the bus back to the station, but we walked instead because we weren’t tired yet. Mayumi had given us her key, so we could let ourselves into the apartment. When the other residents saw us, they looked really frightened, as if they never expected to see foreigners in their own home. That evening we ate sushi with Mayumi’s family. It was really delicious. It sounds cliché but it was better than the sushi I can get back home in the US, it really was. Or at least, it managed to be every bit as good as the absolute best sushi here, even without the cream cheese and other fatty additives.

We went to the top of Mayumi’s building. There was a little garden on the roof, and we tasted Japanese beer and watched the skyline. In the distance we could see a ferris wheel and rainbow bridge. We had a brilliant view of Tokyo Tower and I realized how good Mayumi’s location was. The roof was alive with the sounds of insects. I wondered how they made their way to that tiny patch of green in the middle of Tokyo. I felt I could ask the same about myself.

Day Three:
Tokyo
(Tsukiji, Asakusa, Shibuya, Fireworks Festival)

The next morning Mayumi came with us to show us around Tokyo. We went first to Tsukiji seafood market. We slept too late for it, really, since the main activities happen at six and seven a.m., and the market is absolutely over at 9. We got there right at 9 and at least were able to understanding the scope and energy of the market. It was kind of scary, really, with all the wet floors and roads and the people zooming by in trucks and on motorcycles.

On the way back to the subway we passed Rainbow Bridge, and a temple that looked very strange, not Japanese. Mayumi didn’t know the name. After searching for a few minutes on Google I later found out that it is called Tsukiji Hongan-ji. We went and looked around the building for a few minutes, it was really interesting!

We went next to Asakusa. It was really, really touristy there, and the most crowded place we had been since arriving in Japan. There were rickshaw drivers begging us to hire them. It didn’t make me feel as uncomfortable as it does in poorer countries, though… We were waiting for another Japanese friend, Mitsuki, to arrive, so we skirted the main attractions and went looking for the land of plastic food models, of all things. You see, Japan has amazing plastic food models that look like real food, and Frommer’s, and the rickshaw men, said that a huge store for them was located in Asakusa. We eventually found a few smaller stores that sold these. We only meant to look, but when we saw the prices we knew for sure that we were only looking! Each plastic food model must apparently be accepted by a real chef before it is sold. The price reflected this. Most of the pieces were at least one hundred dollars.

Mitsuki arrived and we went to eat lunch. We went to a fantastic tempura place that I believe I have identified as Daikokuya. It is over 100 years old and very busy. Although I found that they have an English website, I think it would be really difficult to go there without Japanese friends, unfortunately. It is very very busy, so unlike most restaurants they weren’t eager to cater to us or our special foreigner needs. You have to take up your shoes to go on the tatami mat, the workers didn’t seem to speak English, the toilet is Japanese style, etc. Still, it was a fantastic experience. All of us ordered the Tendon 1 Bowl. It was rice, a tempura shrimp, a tempura fish, and a tempura ‘mix’, all with this lovely sauce on it. It wasn’t super cheap but it was well worth the price.

After lunch we headed to Sensoji. The first part was Thunder gate, probably the most photographed site in Japan, with its huge lantern. On the way to the main temple from the Thunder Gate was a covered arcade, Nakamise. It was filled with people and lined with shops selling EVERYTHING. There was food, souvenirs for Japanese and foreigners alike, and even random things like those electronic ferret toys. On the other end of the tunnel we were suddenly back in the temple. There was another gate, and then a main building that resounded with the frantic noises of dozens of people tossing 5 yen coins into a bin all at any given moment. We walked in and got our fortunes told for a dollar each. Inhaling the incense that’s supposed to make you smart was free.

From Asakusa we headed to Shibuya. We saw the famous dog statue, crossed the ‘Times Square’ intersection in the rain with umbrellas out, laughing and taking pictures and totally caught up in the energy. Next was the huge shopping building, Shibuya 109, centered around a system of escalators. We rode to the top, then rode down, on each floor circling and catching brief glimpses of the clothes for sale. Much of it was normal teenage fashion. But there were definitely a few things one would never see in the states. Then we went to a small arcade and took pictures in a photo booth. In a blur of buttons and timers and flashes, what finally printed out were four tiny copies of a bunch of shots, with added in props and backgrounds and sparkles. The most amazing thing, though, was that Mayumi and Mitsuki selected an option called ‘cute’ – lo and behold, it actually somehow instant-airbrushed us. Our skin was smooth and our eyes were glowing, when in reality we were sweaty and nasty. Magic stuff.

We walked back to the station slowly along the Omotesando street, lined with lovely trees and huge shops. There was a Forever 21 shop with a Disney sized line leading up to it. Apparently they only let in a few at a time, and it’s the only Forever 21 in Japan. Wow. We stopped at a very popular vendor for crepes. They had sweet and savoury but we all got sweet. You could add icecream for only 50 yen. I got raspberry cheesecake with chocolate ice cream. It was amazing and my salivary glands actually convulsed at the taste of the sweet cream cheese. We went and sat rather precariously on a railing to eat it. A storm of people went all around us. Up against one of the buildings a band was playing in traditional clothing. When we finished the crepes we went on.

First we saw some girls in that strange fashion that’s so famous – one had long blonde curls (a wig), way too much make up, and a ridiculous dress. Lolita style, I think? The other one was cool too but I didn’t know what to call her style. Mayumi encouraged us to ask for a photo. We did so, they happily agreed. The non-Lolita girl was really surprised and pleased that we wanted her in the picture too.

Next stop: Harajuku. We went through Tokyo’s most crowded alley. It was a sea of people and we couldn’t see anything but bobbing heads and shoulders. We went down into the madness and went to a MASSIVE 100 yen store. Everything there looked so cool, but we didn’t want to buy too much at the beginning of our trip. Instead we mostly bought snacks for the evening.

Mitsuki left to go home and prepare for the evening, and we went home as well. We ate a really quick dinner of onigiri rice balls that Mayumi’s grandmother had made. They were the best Onigiri I have ever eaten. Then it was time to get ready. We were going to a fireworks festival and were dressing up in traditional clothing for it.

Mayumi’s grandmother brought two friends in to help us all change. I borrowed Mayumi’s extra yukata and Laura borrowed Mitsuki’s extra. Mine was white with small red flowers and a red obi. It took a long time to get them tied on. It was amazing, though. I found myself immediately moving different, and understood maybe something of how Mayumi moved. We had been roommates for a year and I noticed all the tiny things about her, like the way she bent down moving only her knees. In the Yukata I found myself moving like she did. I wondered if Japanese people had evolved around the Yukata or whether they had designed the Yukata for their own style of movement. Perhaps the two evolved together. Mayumi looked so stunning. The Yukata accented her body style, her narrow shoulders and slim, straight body. I was also thrilled to have long sleeves that I could carry things in.

We also had to wear geta, Japanese wooden sandles. Mayumi wore a special kind with a rubber sole, but we had to wear older hand me downs. They were difficult to walk on, and we had to take it in stages. First, we had to get out of the apartment. Then, down the street to the subway. Then down the stairs. Then onto the subway. Then keep our balance on the way there. Then follow a gravel road along a river for a mile… then down a steep muddy hill… somehow we made it. My feet were hurting but not quite bleeding. It was mostly a question of balance.

We all sat on the hill and ate the snacks. The firework show was lovely. It was so much longer than shows in America, and all at about the quality level of the very beginning or end of our shows. For forty minutes we thought the finale was going on. Mitsuki hadn’t worn a yukata after all. She didn’t have time to put it on. She still looked cute, of course. :D She brought two friends, American boys who had lived in Japan for a while and spoke fluent Japanese.

After the fireworks, we went out to do karaoke. We rented a small room and had to sing. The machines apparently made our voices better, but Laura and I were too shy to sing alone, and we were having a hard time finding songs that both of us knew out of the relatively limited English song collection. (There were thousands of songs, but Laura and I only came up with about 2 dozen songs we both knew by heart, and only about 6 of them were included). I was really shy until I drank about half a can of sake. I rarely drink so I got tipsy almost immediately and then I was much better at singing. It was surprisingly fun, but I think a little bit of alcohol is almost required.

We took cab home and passed Mayumi’s university on the way.

What a fabulous report! It's great that you were able to start your visit staying with a local person in Tokyo! Looking forward to more!

Keep going - this is great!!
Cheers.

I am really enjoying your report, Mirachan. Your trip is nearly identical to what I have planned for my sister and myself on our trip in November. Your info on Kamakura helped me to tweak our plans for that area even more, so your info is greatly appreciated! Looking forward to your next installment. :)

Fantastic start of your report mirachan! You have a wonderful style of writing. I have read a lot of trip reports over the years on this forum and this one ranks right up there with the best of them. Anxiously awaiting more.

Aloha!

Thank you for the lovely comments!

We didn't actually do much sightseeing on Day Four, it was mostly logistics and transportation, but it maybe gives you a good idea of what to expect if you're forced to communicate without a solid common language! :)

Statia - you should love Kamakura. I am excited for you. :D Where else are you headed on your trip?

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Day Four:
Taking the Trains North to Mutsu

Laura and I crept out of Mayumi’s apartment early in the morning, trying not to wake her. We had to get to Mutsu by nightfall, even though our Japanese friends had told us that this wasn’t a very good idea. Mutsu is the main city of a small peninsula in the north of Japan, right underneath Hokkaido. It is a sparsely populated peninsula where public transportation is iffy and, according to Wikitravel, “English is not spoken.” A great choice for a first trip to Japan, right? But when I heard about Osore-zan, the sulfurous wasteland that is the Japanese version of hell, and that they were having a festival that we could go to, I couldn’t resist. And, I have to admit, the challenge was appealing.

On Day Two, we had tried to get train tickets up to Mutsu. We had planned a train itinerary on the JR website (the service is not very easy to use, and this is the only time it came in handy), and it was only when we produced the printed plan that the man at the ticket counter had really started working with us. I’m not sure he believed that we were going all the way to Mutsu. Eventually he gave us tickets that took us as far as Noheji – after that we would have to figure it out ourselves.

The first leg of the journey was easy. We got on the Shinkansen Hayate, meaning Hurricane. (It’s fun to look up the names of trains – some sound rather ridiculous in English) The Hayate took us to Hachinohe, the last Shinkansen hub in the direction we were headed, in three hours. Hachinohe was a modern enough station that the shock of having left Tokyo didn’t even begin to set in.
In Hachinohe we switched to the Super-Hakucho 9 (Hakucho literally means white bird. We were riding on the Super Swan.) We arrived in Noheji in about half an hour. It was a quick stop for the Super Swan, so we had to get off quickly. When the train sped off again, we found ourselves at a small, open air station, surrounded by pine trees and silence. There were two tracks. This was where our tickets ended and we had no idea where to go from there. I laughed nervously, then a bit crazily. For a few seconds we both stood there and laughed at what we were getting ourselves into.

Then we grabbed our suitcases and headed up the stairs to the walkway that went over the tracks. It was the first of many, many times we would do so in Japan. In the walkway were time tables and maps. The only romaji in sight read “Hachinohe” and “Ominato”. I had printed out the names of all the cities we were visiting in Kanji (highly recommended), but I couldn’t find Mutsu in the list. Laura was frustrated and I was nervous. How could I forget to include Mutsu? (as it turns out, Mutsu isn't written in Kanji but actually only in Hiragana (the phonetic alphabet), which makes it somewhat of an anomaly among Japanese place names)

A group of laughing older women came up to the platform. “Sumimasen,” I said, “Mutsu?” The ladies tried very hard to help us, despite not speaking any English. I think that they weren’t entirely sure either, although they were motioning towards the Ominato sign occasionally and with uncertainty. Finally they apologetically said that they didn’t know (about the extent of my understanding), and we assured them it was okay. “Daijoubu! Arigatou!”

After they left, we found another sign referring to Ominato. The second to last stop was Mutsu, spelled inexplicably in Hiragana (phonetically) instead of with Kanji. It turned out that while Mutsu was the Northernmost stop on the line, the line then turned slightly south and made one last stop as Ominato. We saw that a train was leaving in two hours, so we decided to have lunch in Noheji first. Right as we were congratulating ourselves on our problem solving skills, a station employee ran up the stairs.

“Mutsu?” The old ladies must have summoned him.

“Hai!” we said, trying to look confident and pointing at our new sign.

“Mutsu… city?” he said.

“Hai!”

“This train.” He said, pointing down at the other tracks. He took us downstairs and put us on the train that was there. It left a few moments later. That’s when we started worrying. The train moved slowly, and it had only a single car. It was nothing like any of the trains we had ridden so far, and we suddenly worried. Was the train really going to Mutsu? If it wasn’t, could we get back to Noheji in time to make a train to Mutsu? Was the train even JR? Horrible worst case scenarios went through my head. The train would go on for hours. We would hold out hope that we were going to Mutsu next. As night fell, the conductor would attempt to explain to us that we were at the last stop and would have to disembark. We would. They would ask for money, explain that we weren’t on a JR line. We would be in a small town without any hotels. We would die.

I turned to the lady next to me. “Kono densha wa Mutsu ni tomarimasu ka?” I asked. (Does this train stop in Mutsu). “Hai.” We relaxed. I cannot recommend learning that phrase highly enough. Soon the sea opened up on our right, and shining white windmills filled the left windows. We were once again excited and confident.

We eventually got to Mutsu at about 4 in the afternoon. There were busses right outside of the train station, and when we asked a man where Mutsu City Park Hotel was, he put us on a bus and said something that I understood as “Get down at the bathrooms”. I had no idea what that was supposed to mean, and assumed I understood it wrong, but I nodded and smiled. He followed us onto the bus and told the driver where we were headed. I love Japanese people.

At one bus stop, we looked down and saw, of all things, some public bathrooms. I paused, uncertain. Suddenly the driver called out over the loudspeakers, “Gaijin! (Foreigners!), Mutsu City Park Hotel!” We thanked him and got off. The bus followed us for a block, pointing, until we were literally at the door to our hotel. It was hard to miss – one of the biggest features in downtown Mutsu.

“Well. That was fun.”

The hotel staff looked at us cautiously, with interest. A very friendly young woman was working at the front desk and got us checked in. When we tried to use the key to get into our room, however, we couldn’t figure out the mechanism. Feeling stupid, I called to a maid who was in the hall, “Sumimasen, wakarimasen.” (Excuse me, I don’t understand) and waved the key. It’s amazing how much can be communicated without words. The hotel room was small but very clean and and nice. I can highly recommend Mutsu City Park Hotel to anyone that’s actually headed to the Shimokita peninsula. From the window we could just make out spinning white windmills on a distant, sunlit hill.

We explored Mutsu a bit. It’s supposed to be one of the ugliest places in Japan, but you have to blame Japan, and not Mutsu, for that. We thought it was rather nice. Everything was grey, yes, but a pleasing sort of soft grey that matched the sky and made the pink lanterns strung up along each street stand out. There were canals running through the city, filled with fountains and ducks. We even stumbled upon a school with its own tiny shrine. Our goal was dinner, and we explored as many Konbini (convenience stores) as we could find, snacking on Octopus Balls (not good), Onigiri (very good), some weird ‘Hot dog’ (not good), and MOS Burger fries (good).

We planned out our trip to Osore-zan the next day before going to sleep. The stress of the day caught up and turned into laughter.

Wow, I love it - too funny - the bus driver calling out 'Gaijin.' Sounds like you knew enough Japanese to manage and, I agree, the Japanese people are so helpful....

Never heard of Mutsu before - this is what japan-guide says about it - sounds very interesting - http://www.japan-guide.com/e/e3727.html.

Looking forward to much more. :)

Mara - Thanks! :D I always felt that we understood BARELY enough Japanese to get by - not a word less and not a word more. Which was great, because it was always a challenge but we were rarely discouraged. Still, we owe it mostly to the Japanese, who were so kind at trying to understand us or make themselves understood!

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Day Five:
Mutsu and Osore-zan

We woke up early, went to a konbini for an onigiri breakfast (the stuff really grows on you), and then caught our bus to Osore-zan. Conveniently, the main bus terminal, handily called “Mutsu City Bus Terminal” (Though written in katakana), was almost right outside of our hotel. Our confidence had greatly increased after the events of the day before, and there were no more panic attacks, even when the bus was filled entirely with elderly women (and a few men), with not another gaijin in sight. The way up to Osore-zan was very windy. At one point they interrupted the usual background “how to pay and rules” mumbling that loops in Japanese busses to play a very strange and sad sounding recording of an old man chanting/singing. We started to pass Jizo along the road. Most of them were clothed by mothers who had lost their children.

We knew we were very close when we smelled sulfur. Sure enough, the temple came into view after the next bend. There was a brilliant blue lake surrounded by green mountains, and, on one side, a more gentle and striking white slope. We could see the temple itself ahead, with somber looking banners waving in the wind. Since we were there during the biannual Itako Taisai festival, the parking lot was crowded with busses and cars. Other reports I’ve read say that Osore-zan is normally an abandoned and desolate place. I think both sides are an interesting and worthwhile experience – we witnessed thousands of parents laying out food and toys for their children. Very sad.

Still, we didn’t feel like creepy spectators, because, as in other places, there were many Japanese tourists as well. About half the Japanese visitors were taking photographs, and perhaps one fifth of them were there only as tourists, as you could more or less tell by their happier demeanor and smiling portraits of themselves.

Entry to the temple grounds cost less than our bus fare, and then we were free to explore at our leisure. There were lots of statues, including one of five huge Jizo and one of a strange turtle emerging from an egg. The turtle statue was absolutely covered in coins that were even pouring out of his mouth. One path led a short distance up the mountain and provided a view over the whole landscape and temple complex.

After going up there, we wandered the barely defined paths between the hills of strange white sulfurous stone. Here and there were rivulets of water in all sorts of strange colours. There were black streams and red springs coming out of the bleached white earth here and there. The path led again and again to statues at whose feet were left thousands of tiny Jizo statues and children’s candy and pinwheels. The cheery colors of the pinwheels were striking against the stark colours of the landscape.

It was a sunny day, and the bright blue sky and harsh shadows made the place feel even more otherworldly. One section of the grounds had far fewer people than the others, although it was home to two beautiful bubbling ponds- one pea green, the other canary yellow.

We headed then towards the water of the Lake Usori. We passed first through a small patch of sparsely placed trees on the outskirts of the ‘wasteland’. A few hardy plants had been able to grow there, and long strips of white cloth, most painted with black Kanji, were tied to every branch. Beyond this was the water. The beach was sparkling white and the water was impossibly blue. Wikitravel was right, it looked deceptively pleasant – except for, in our case, the lines of parents huddled by the shore, and the long piece of yellow-white cloth that was drifting at the edge of the water, looking too much like a burial shroud for comfort.

Here at the beach we met the only other gaijin we found at Osore-zan, or even on the Shimokita Peninsula. There was one middle aged couple, and one larger group of mixed nationality. They were apparently working on some archaeological research nearby, and were around our age. One of them actually lived less than thirty miles from our University back home! There were others from Europe and even one from Japan. They told us that they were festival hopping.

The last place we wanted to visit was the bridge, a short distance from the temple and outside it’s grounds, that crossed over the Sanzu river, the Japanese version of the river Styx, which feeds into Lake Usori. All in all we had been at Osore-zan for about two and a half hours. We had planned to visit the free hot spring there, owned by the temple, but decided that while it was so crowded during the festival was maybe not the best time to do so.

We knew when to expect a bus back to Mutsu, but we actually caught an earlier one. Apparently they increase their service to Osore-zan during the festivals, which would make sense. Back in Mutsu, we still had the afternoon on our hands, but the public transportation on the Shimokita Hanto, such as it is, meant that at 2 o’clock we were essentially out of luck to get anywhere, do something, and get back to Mutsu before the trains or busses stopped running. (In retrospect, we might have been able to take the JR train to Ominato and back, but I’m not sure it would have been worth the trouble). I’d dearly love to return to Shimokita Hanto, preferably with a car and more knowledge of Japanese, and really do it justice. Osore-zan is just one of several delightful attractions there, such as the cliffs at Sai and the squid races.

Still, we passed an enjoyable enough evening walking around Mutsu. We found an amusing poster of Obama, a store named after a Moomin Character, Little Myy, (I learned all about them in Finland, so I had to take pictures to send to my Finnish friends), and finally, strolled through the more residential neighborhoods right on the edge of the forest. Some people stared openly at us. Many children pointed and giggled. One man on his bike nearly crashed. When a man in a car started driving in the center of the road from staring at us, we decided to head back downtown.

For dinner we went to a restaurant called Tsuki Usagi, a few blocks from our hotel. (It was recommended by the lady at the front desk, the same one who checked us in the day before. She seemed to always be working, and was always extremely nice and helpful) The prices were about 700-1400 yen, and the food was only reasonably good, but they had a lot of variety on their menu, and Laura was able to get a burger while I got fish in pumpkin sauce and noodles.
We went to bed early again. That’s what you do in Japan – go to bed early, get up early. Most things of interest to tourists are open from 8 – 5, so you have to adapt to that sort of schedule – not the easiest for two college students.

Great trip report. I am really enjoying it and looking forward to more.

For our train travel trips I had made out before we left (using hyperdia) a table indicating the name of each train, the time it left and arrived, the platform number, number of stations we had to go through and name of station preceding the one we had to get off at. The Japanese are so organised. It was amazing to be able to do this weeks before we left. Not once, was there a deviation from what my table said and we caught a lot of trains in nearly 4 weeks of travelling.

The staff were absolutely brilliant at confirming that yes we were standing in the right spot. They were so friendly desite most of them having no English and us having absolutely no Japanese. The table become our bible as we traversed away across Japan. I never thought to print out any names in Kanji but fortunately that never became an issue.

Day Six:
Mutsu to Takayama

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We got up really early, since we needed to be in Noheji by 9 and our understanding of the time schedules up to Noheji were less than perfect. After a breakfast of incredibly thick toast in Mutsu City Park Hotel (served by the same wonderful young woman who had been working at the desk almost every time we went to ask questions), we got on a bus to get to the station.

As it turns out, we were on a bus that went passed the hospital first. The bus was absolutely packed, mostly with older people, until we got there. Laura and I gave up our seats to some very surprised old ladies. We'd been told that Japanese culture is very respective of the elderly, but we didn't always notice this to be the case. No one ever seemed to expect us to give our seats up, and I don't think it was because we were foreigners. On crowded subways you would often see ladies with white hair standing while schoolboys and girls sat down... even occasionally in the priority seats.

It was a long day, but things went smoothly. From Mutsu to Noheji by local train, Noheji to Hachinohe by the Super Swan, Hachinohe to Tokyo (and didn't it feel so familiar!!) by Shinkansen, Tokyo to Nagoya by Shinkansen, and finally, the Hida Wide View Express to Takayama. The train legs averaged two and a half hours each, and the connections between them were tight - sometimes as little as ten minutes - and the trains were ALWAYS on time. Somehow there was just enough time. We never missed a train or even had to run, although we didn't waste any time and we didn't hesitate to ask questions, since we didn't have the luxury of getting lost.

We had our first and only experience with train food on this trip. We were nervous about trying to get something from the snack cart lady, but finally hunger prevailed. Now, I'm sure that the sweet snacks they carry are fine, and probably the bento boxes too (they should be at that price!), but we were ready for some real food, and wanted something cheap. We ended up paying 500 yen for a Tonkatsu sandwich. The bread was white, tasteless, and soggy, and the pork cutlet was just a piece of cold, tough pork. Easily the worst thing I've eaten in Japan. So we mostly just overdosed on sugar by surviving on our Pocky and Koara supplies from Mutsu. We could have thought ahead a little bit better.

The Shinkansen of course were nice because they were so comfortable. We could spread out and write in our journals or whatever we liked. Still, the best ride was the Hida Wideview to Takayama. Although it was raining a bit, we started passing mountains and beautiful winding streams as it got dark. I think it would be a lovely trip in the daytime. When it did get dark, we were very sick of riding on trains and getting restless. Still, we knew that we would be in Takayama in a short half hour.

Then something very unusual happened. We stopped at a station as we had stopped at many others. But we stayed stopped. I thought we would be there for ten minutes at the latest, but when ten turned into twenty, we knew something was up. The occasional announcements were only in Japanese, but no one appeared to be concerned, so we hung tight. After a full day in trains we were a bit hysterical, and started giggling more than the other passengers would perhaps have liked. (I only mention this because they were all middle aged men who were just sitting there reading their papers) But then, they didn't know what we had been through!

After more than an hour, a man appeared carrying a toolbox and wearing a yellow hard hat. He disappeared into the front of the train. Right after he left, the train began to move again. We called the hostel and told them that we'd be late.

At long last we reached Takayama. We stopped very briefly at the konbini by the station to buy instant noodles and other food for dinner. Then we went straight to the hostel. We were pretty lucky in the end - the front desk closed about fifteen minutes after we checked in. (Although if we had called by closing, they would have made arrangements for us to get in afterwards).

J-Hoppers Takayama was Laura's first hostel and only the second one for me. The first one I stayed at was in Sweden, and being an American (we are afraid of the very idea of hostels), I had been so nervous that I decided to break into the idea by getting a two person room for me and my friend. So, this was my first time in a dormitory. But I wasn't worried. I had had a good experience in Sweden, and anyway, I was in college now. I had spent the year before in a crazy freshman dorm where anything went.

We were really pleasantly surprised by J-Hoppers Takayama. There were people sitting around when we walked in, and they were friendly, saying hello to us. We were too tired to do anything but make our noodles and then sleep that night, but we still appreciated the sense of community. There was a kitchen we could use - it was small but well stocked. A group from France was in there cooking some genuine foodstuffs - broccoli and chicken, cheese sauce, and other things we could barely recognize after almost a week in Japan. There were also washers and dryers and the showers were fine.

The best, though, were the beds. Our room had six beds in it - bunked into three groups. The rungs up to the top bunks were wide, wooden, and easy on feet. Each bunk had tons of room - a spacious mattress and enough room at the head of the bed for a lamp (included), and all of your luggage. In addition, there was plenty of room above the bunk, so you could sit straight up instead of hunching over. There was even a curtain on runners that was easy to pull around the bed. When you pulled the curtain around and turned on the lamp, it was almost as if you had a tiny private room. The beds were really comfortable as well - much better than futons, and even better than the bed at Mutsu City Park Hotel. I had a down pillow. I think that night was the best sleep I got in Japan.

an impressive amount of train travel for one day.... ;-)

Well, day Six wasn't the most eventful. Having been as far as Mutsu, mostly for the challenge and novelty, for the rest of the trip we were going to do things a bit more efficiently.

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Day Seven:
Takayama

I woke up early to do laundry, and ran into an early-rising staff member named Kenji. He was walking around in his pajamas - he hadn't officially started working yet. We chatted a bit. He had apparently been all over Asia, was planning to go to Europe soon. He told me about a bike tour that was going on later that day - would I like to participate? There were two bikes left - this was obviously a sign. We would bike up to some beautiful waterfalls and one could stop at the folk museum on the way back. The paper he showed me about it said 9 - 12. It sounded perfect to me. I ran up and asked Laura if she would like to participate. After all, our only plans were to see the morning market, old town, and the folk museum. It was early enough that we could go to the morning market before the tour even started. It was 500 yen each for the bike rental and the tour - and we got to use the bikes all day.


It was only when we went outside to take the bikes to the morning market that I realized that I hadn't properly ridden a bike for years. I had brought one of my family's bikes to college but I had used it exactly once, and had the brilliance to go to the library. On the way back I had to try to balance the weight of 2 sacks full of heavy books as I cycled home. Not smart. I hoped things would go alright. The bikes were cool anyway - you inserted a key into the frame of the bike, and it unlocked the wheels. The key stayed inside while you rode around, and when you wanted to leave it somewhere, you simply removed the key. A really great system. We inserted our keys and rode the two blocks to the morning market. We managed the trip, but I was painfully aware that I had almost no experience with riding a bike in a city, around traffic and pedestrians, and that the tires of these bikes were much thinner than on American bikes. It was harder to steer straight, and harder to balance.

The morning market was adorable, if somewhat smaller than expected. There were about ten small stalls set up, selling about half tourist trinkets and half fresh fruits and vegetables. It was somewhat cool to be the only tourists there, at least at that hour. I bought presents for my best friends from High School there, and Laura bought some sort of citrus fruit, a tangerine, I think. They had tangerines that looked similar in five different crates, for different prices. The most expensive were 250 yen, the cheapest were 50 yen. Laura bought one of the 50 yen ones and said it looked better than it tasted. I guess you get what you pay for.

Before long it was time for the tour. Altogether there were six of us - Kenji (our fearless leader), Dean (Australian with tattoos all over), Laura and I, and Lind and Kim (Belgians). We went first to a grocery store and bought lunch. Kenji told us that the first part of the trip was a bit hilly, so tell him if he needed to slow down. Then we were off. The first part WAS hilly. We went through Takayama city, and had to dodge poles and pedestrians, cross streets, etc, all while dealing with a much steeper grade than I was used to as a little Missouri girl. We went into the country side and the hills, while a bit less steep, became neverending. There were no downhill stretches anymore - only up, up, steadily and rather steeply ascending into the mountains. All of us were struggling. Dean had a hangover from the night before. Laura's bad knees were giving her trouble. My calves were on fire (I have tight tendons, and I think cycling is maybe the worst thing I can do for them). Lind and Kim were simply too tall for their bikes. Only Kenji went on and on, not even breaking a sweat. We all breathed a sigh of relief when he turned in at a staircase that led away from the road. I felt that I was about at my limit. We went up the stairs and found a field of lavender. The smell was lovely. There was a solar eclipse going on and we all watched it begin, and drank water.

And then we went back down and got back on our bikes. We weren't there yet - Kenji had actually laughed at our assumption. We went on and on. Outside of the occasional intense Racquetball game, it was the hardest I'd ever pushed myself in my life. It was hot, and I was absolutely flushed - I could feel every heartbeat in the skin on my face. Lind and I held a long conversation, mostly about the year she had spent living in Nepal, volunteering with street children. Amazing. The conversation helped me forget about the pain a bit, and it kept me from falling too behind, since I was working to stay within earshot. Dean and I joked that nothing we drank the day before was still in our bodies - we had replaced every fluid we contained. We stopped twice - both under the excuse of getting a bottle of water from the vending machines that miraculously popped up in the middle of nowhere.


Once, when we were stopped, we looked up at the eclipse, which had progressed and was now in it's most dramatic stage. There were some clouds, and it hurt our eyes to look anywhere near the sun. Across the street were two Japanese men, one of them using an old welding mask to watch the eclipse. We laughed at their cleverness and resourcefulness. Then they came across the street and offered the mask to us. And there we were, on a rural road in the Japanese alps, hot and sweaty from biking into the mountains, watching the solar eclipse through an old rusty welding mask with two Japanese men.

After that we continued on still further. I kept thinking that the next curve would be the last. I kept thinking that if it wasn't, then I would collapse. But I knew I couldn't come so far only to stop. Once my calves burned so much that I had to jump off my bike and run alongside it for a minute to give those muscles a break. At long last we reached a nondescript parking lot, and stopped. Kenji was now worried about our groups ability to hike up the mountain. "I'm bad at biking," I told him, "Not hiking." Laura assured him that we loved to walk - we'd be fine. What we weren't prepared for was the way each step seemed ten times higher than usual - we were so sore from the ride there. The soreness gradually dissipated, though.


The waterfalls were amazing. I thought that the small set of falls at the bottom were nice enough, especially the cool mist rising from them, but Kenji showed us a map, and those falls weren't even shown. Instead we followed the same stream up the mountain. The entire way it tumbled on beside us - one giant, neverending set of falls. Some stretches were lovely and quieter, with white water but still almost peaceful. In other places the water crashed down from a high point and it's roar was deafening. Kenji, Laura and I put on some over-sized Crocs we had borrowed from the hostel and got in the water in a quiet stretch. The water came from melting snow, so it was numbingly cold. When we reached one of the big waterfalls, Laura and I got out. And then Kenji began to climb the waterfall. It looked dangerous and scary. We realized that not only did Kenji have endurance, he was also very strong and muscular. Who was this guy?

As the rest of us took the normal path beside the waterfall Kenji was scaling, Dean told me that Kenji had once been lost in a jungle for three days. He saw ants eating a fruit and thought it was safe, so he ate it - it turned out to be poisonous and his mouth wouldn't stop burning afterward. For three days he wandered, trying to follow water and escape the forest. He thought he was going to die. Finally he stumbled into a small village, whose language he didn't speak. They put him in jail for a few days while the authorities came. He refused to leave the jail, at first. After being lost in the jungle, he loved it there. Kenji just smiled when I asked him about the story.

After reaching the very top, we ate lunch in a pavilion up on the mountain. On the way there we saw two snakes - the only two we found in Japan - Kenji said they were harmless, but Dean screamed like a five year old and ran away. The view was beautiful, and the way back to Takayama was much easier. We simply soared downhill. The eclipse was totally over and I was suddenly very grateful to it - the sun beat down on us mercilessly the entire way back.

All of us but Kenji decided to go to the folk museum on the way back. The hill leading up to it was so steep that we had to park our bikes at the bottom and walk. For some reason, the museum was closed. I think that this is highly unusual - everyone we mentioned this to was shocked. It closes regularly one day a week, but we weren't there that day. Still, there was a garden area before the gates, that showed some of the architecture of the area. I even enjoyed visiting this garden, but it made me even sadder that the museum was closed.

When we went back to the hostel, we still had two hours before our train left. We were sore and tired, but wanted to see the Old Town before we left. As we were putting our shoes on, Kenji offered to come with us. We accepted gratefully. Along the way he told us about his life, growing up in Hokkaido, now travelling wherever he wanted to. We gathered that he hadn't many posessions - he seemed to get everywhere by hitchhiking. He had ridden with people from all walks of life - even ex-Yakuza members who had had their fingers cut off when they left the gang.


In Old Town we enjoyed the lovely wooden architecture, the summer flowers, and the aroma of sake that wafted from the hundred year old sake breweries. Each one had a giant cedar ball hung outside. Kenji arranged for us to sample the sake at one of the breweries - It was really strong, and I must have a really unsophisticated palate, because I liked the convenience store Sake just as much!

I was sad to leave Takayama. I could have stayed there for a week, easily. Still, we travelled on that night to Kanazawa. We were worried about our hotel reservation because the fine print (once we had paid a deposit online) said that guests had to be 20 years or older - we were 19. But when we got there, they simply took our money without any questions.

This is such a great an inspiring report - thank you! I'm in the middle of planning a 3 week trip to Japan myself and this is brilliant reading.