Kyoto, Takayama & Shirakawa-go

Japan is a country of contradictions - a mix of traditional and modern that often seem at odds but makes this place fascinating. I arrived for my trip with Kumi and Ankur in Narita on April 28th, somehow managed to navigate my way around the JR and traveled by Shinkansen to Kyoto on my own.

Kyoto

After a simple dinner of tonkatsu and other homemade Japanese dishes, Kumi took Ankur and me through the main street of Gion and down Pontocho, a traditional street, so narrow it was more alley than street, lit up with red lanterns right along the river. The city, which looked so modern during the cab ride to Kumi's place, literally melted away. It was as if we had stepped into another world. No sightings of geishas unfortunately, but already, I was enchanted by Kyoto's charming, traditional side. Kumi's parent's home was also charming - a lovely, old traditional wooden Japanese house covered with tatami mats. We slept on Japanese futons right on the tatami mats.

The next day, our only full day in Kyoto, was filled with sight-seeing. After walking through a well-preserved, old section of Kyoto, Chawan-zaka (where we sighted many fake geishas who dressed up and preened for tourists), that was lined with little shops selling local arts and crafts and delicious local snacks, we made our way up to Kiyomizu-dera Temple, one of Kyoto's most splendid. Perched on a wooded cliff overlooking Kyoto and offering spectacular views of the city, it was crowded with tourists and worshippers alike. We learned to properly pray and make an offering from Kumi. First, you ring the bell to grab God's attention, throw your money into the donation box, pray, clap twice and then back up. We also drank sacred water from the waterfall Otowa-no-taki. The Japanese are a germ-fearing bunch and the ladles we drank from were purified in UV radiation boxes.

On the way down, we grabbed some cream puffs and soft cream, then passed through Maruyama-Koen, a lovely park with cherry blossom trees before stopping at Kodai-ji, another shrine. Only a few trees still had flowers clinging onto its branches unfortunately - they would have been magnificent if we had made it for the hanami festival in early April just a few weeks back. As Kumi and Ankur can attest, I was rather obsessed with cherry blossom trees during the entire trip.

After a meal of soba and udon, we hit Fushimi-inari-taisha, a shrine dedicated to the God of Grain. The shrine was located up in the hills, and the path was lined with orange-colored tori (gates) that were reminiscent of the orange gates put up briefly in Central Park. Figures of foxes, messengers of Inari, the God of Grain, often guarded the gates, with a key to the grainery in their mouth. The quiet, heavily wooded area (you can't even tell you're in a city anymore) had a mysterious air. Some of the sections of the paths we took were completely deserted and led to small graveyards/shrines.

We ate with Kumi's parents that night in a small local restaurant. The sashimi was amazing. We went in search of jazz bars afterwards but ended up at a small basement bar with a Spanish theme. We ended the night early in preparation for our trip to Takayama in the morning.

Takayama

Ankur's obsession with onsens (hot springs) matched my obsession with sakura. Thus, we made the trip to Takayama, a charming town high up in the mountains by the Japanese alps in search of onsens. The long train ride to Takayama passed through amazing vistas. Since it was up in the mountains, the sakura here were still blooming. Sakura trees dotted the landscape - decorating it with beautiful white and pink blossoms. I could not have been happier. In Takayama, we walked around the old section of town, Sanmachi, and visited one of their morning markets, were arts and crafts and pickled vegetables were being sold. That afternoon, after visiting a brewery and grabbing a quick lunch of ramen, we made our way to Hida-no-Sato, an open-air museum that consisted of a dozen or so old Japanese farmhouses in different styles. These old farmhouses had been removed from their original locations and planted here, by a small lake, to create the most idyllic and peaceful-looking little place. It looked right out of a picture-book or a fairytale. After we made it back to Takayama, we visited Takayama-Jinya, a Tokugawa-era government office. It was a massive, traditional Japanese building, with dozens of tatami-covered rooms. Lastly, we visited the Takayama Yatai Kaikan Museum. We missed the massive matsuri (Festival) in Takayama by just a couple of weeks, but got to see 4 of the floats used in the festival at the museum. The festival is supposed to be one of the best in Japan, attracting hundreds of thousands of people, and the floats, with are over 100 years old, are intricate and beautifully decorated with golden phoenixes and dragons.

Unfortunately, Ankur's onsen dreams were temporarily dashed. We misread the bus schedule and realized there was no way we could make it there and back as we had anticipated. Thus, we made do with a quick but relaxing bath in the public bath in our ryokan (Japanese inn) before venturing out for dinner. We tried the famed Hida beef in the form of a beef cutlet with a homemade barbeque-like sauce that was delicious.

Shirakawa-go

The next morning, after eating the most elaborate breakfast of my life, a traditional Japanese breakfast with tamago, nori, hoda miso (a special Hida-region sauce made by cooking a sweet, miso paste on a leaf), rice and miso soup, we took the bus to Shirakawa-go, a World Heritage Site located deep in the Japanese alps. Shirakawa-go is famed for its gassho-zukuri, a straw-covered farmhouse. Like Hida-no-Sato, the gassho houses here (dozens of them!) were taken from its original location and placed here, in a valley surround by mountains, including the still-snow capped Japanese alps. The resulting village was so idyllic, charming and picture-perfect, that it conjured up images of the shire from Lord of the Rings. An International Herald Tribune article even noted this, and Ankur decided to call this place "Shire-kawa" instead. After walking around the town where we sampled grilled rice cake, soft cream and ice cream, and visited one of the largest Gassho houses, Nagase-ke, we hiked up to the site of the former Shirakawa-go castle for a lovely view of the entire valley. After making it back to the town, we had hida beef with hoda miso sauce. The restaurant had a beautiful view of the village. Post-lunch, we made our way back to Takayama to catch the train to Tokyo. We bought bento boxes for dinner. Even these beautifully displayed with the food laid out in the box nicely. Best of all, it was delicious. Wish we had fast food like this back at home!