Winter Vacation - Takayama

Winter vacation started on Christmas Day and went for about two weeks. Ross and I had planned a trip to Takayama for four days, a chance to see part of rural Japan, relax and (hopefully) see snow fall. Takayama is a mountain town in Gifu Prefecture and is known as 'little Kyoto'. It reminded me of Ballarat, a big small town, with lots of old stores, little laneways and great shopping. Takayama is famous for its festivals held twice a year in Spring and Autumn, but is also known for its incredible cold climate, fabulous views of the Japanese Alps and the nearby hot springs. We left the morning after Christmas and took several local trains (lots of complicated switching but a very inexpensive way to go!) to get there. We were hoping the whole time for there to be snow, but students had told us to be wary that with all the climate change confusion, there may not be. :( About an hour from Osaka we hit Maibara, a mountain town just out of Kyoto. Looking out the window Ross noticed some small white flakes, very few of them floating in the air outside the train and said 'SNOW'. It was seriously an amazing sight - really exciting for us Aussies. As our train kept going we passed through town after town that was lightly blanketed in snow and we couldn't help ourselves; jumping out of the train quickly as it stopped to take our first snow photos! When we headed out of this region there was no snow, so again we were worried about Takayama. We accidentally took a wrong train and had to backtrack, making ourselves about an hour and a half later, and since in Winter the sun has been setting at five, we arrived in Takayama in pitch black darkness..............and SNOW> The entire town was thicky coated in snow that fell all over us and our luggage as we trundled through the town searching for our inn. We stayed in a really cute old Japanese inn with lovely hosts. It was a lovely, old fashioned, cosy place with fabulous food and an amazing old Japanese fireplace. We had organised to eat dinner the first night at the inn, mainly because of my error in judgment for our Shodoshima trip, where we ended up walking for 3km to find food. It was such a desperate situation that we planned ahead this time! The inn food also promised the famous Hida Beef from the region so we HAD to try it! It was a great meal and while we decided we wanted to try eating at other local restaurants in the area so we could try all the 'famous foods', we ended up booking in for breakfast each day. In our time in Japan, we have learned that each area is 'famous' for something, usually food. When talking with students at ECC, if we mention an area we've travelled to, they usually scratch their head, look thoughtful and say 'Ah, famous for.....' The 'famous fors' end up being anything from Kobe beef to Hokkaido rockmelons. But the Japanese are incredibly well trained - famous foods are known by everyone and in order to taste them you actually have to go to the area. They cannot be bought anywhere else. It's ridiculous. But fun. :) We settled into our room then headed out to take photos and play in the snow. It was hilarious walking in knee deep snow but i had bought $12 gumboots specifically for this and they were not going to waste. It must have been hilarious for the Japanese passersby, two westerners going out of their way to walk in the piles of snow on the side of the road. Japanese snow is difficult to ignore though - its as soft and fluffy and clean as the stuff of cartoons. We loved it. Our first day in Takayama we headed to the Hida no Sato old village area, a fifteen minute walk from our inn that took us about three hours. At first we responsibly walked along the roadside, but were quickly drawn in by the snow off the beaten track! This was a more confusing route since we couldn't tell what was road, what was garden, what was rice field (yes, I did fall in - thank goodness for gumboots- my new slogan; I'm going to make bumper stickers if you're interested), what was a path, what was a gutter, what was a private property such as an inn where monks hosted you, welcomed you and lead you to your room (whoops Ross) and what was the actual Hida no Sato. I kept referring to the map I had, exclaiming 'We're here' then realising we were still just in the streets of Takayama. Snow can be very confusing. We ended up hiking in what we have now come to call 'Narnia' where a forest was coated in incredibly beautiful, deep white snow. Finally we ended up at the Hida no Sato old village where we toured old farmhouses and read about life in a Japanese snow village - kind of like Sovereign Hill in Ballarat, I guess; a whole lot of restored buildings are arranged so that you can walk through them, like an old village. It was a lovely place to visit and really, really interesting. The second day was spent meandering through 'the old town', the section of Takayama city that sits on one side of a huge river canal where all of the old buildings are preserved and even the convenience stores are made to look old and authentic. :) We walked in the falling snow to the market outside the temple where local wares, fresh fruit, and New Years food was on sale. We ate orchard apples and wandered through the town soaking up the atmosphere and freezing our bums off! We warmed up with coffee in a cute cafe, wandered through some cute stores and ate food from street vendors before heading to a craft centre where we could make our own souvenirs. Ross made a snow globe (apprently a childhood dream) and I painted a mug which initially seemed like a great idea...I guess we'll see when the horrid-piece-of-crappiness-that-was-ridiculously-difficult-to-paint-an intricate-snowflake-pattern-on-after-all-who'd-have-thought arrives in the mail in a month's time. The third day was a bit of a bummer in that Ross had somehow pulled his neck and back out (couldn't possibly have been the futons on the floor and the rice pillows we slept on, could it?!) so we decided to seek out an onsen hot spring near the inn so that we could relax and Ross could recuperate. We read in a touristy booklet (which until this point had been very reliable) that the Kur Alp Hot Spring in the mountains overlooking Takayama was a great place to soak in a natural hot spring while overlooking the Japanese Alps. Despite Ross' head tilting to one side in a very embarassing way and my own head tilting similarly and sympathetically, we hiked up the mountain to Kur Alp. I feel that the tacky Swiss inspired name of the place should have tipped us off to the quality of the establishment, or perhaps the stifled laughter of the storekeepers we asked for directions...but at that point 'Old Leany' (as I had come to cruelly call my husband) and I were quite dedicated to Kur Alp and we pressed on. When we arrived and immediately recognised a place frighteningly similar to Ringwood Pool we still weren't going to give up, so ten minutes later we emerged from the change rooms wearing our hired swimming costumes: me in a very highcut racing suit and Ross in an incredibly tight pair of ancient greying mauve swimming trunks that may have been a deep shade of purple back in the eighties. We had hiked a considerable distance to go to a chlorinated local pool with a view of the alps...that was blocked my a very larke blue concrete wall and foggy, dirty windows. Hilarious...now. Horrendous at the time! We hiked back into town after valiantly trying to enjoy ourselves only to discover that directly opposite our inn was a very large, very luxurious natural hot spring. We used their free foot bath (an odd experience as it really felt as though we were a pair of idiotic foreigners sitting in the decorative rock pool at the front of the hotel until some Japanese people joined us) then we entered the hot spring and basked in the natural heat while the snow surrounded us. Beautiful. We headed home from Takayama as the snow stopped falling and began to melt, and when we asked about how long Takayama had had snow, we found out it had started the night before we arrived. Lucky us. :)