Sunday, Oct 4

We had a choice of two different breakfasts at the hotel this morning: Japanese or Western. Although I’ve appreciated experiencing the Japanese culture, it was kind of nice having some bread and scrambled eggs. After breakfast, we packed up and made the short walk back to the train station. We took the Shinkansen to Nagano and then transferred to a local train for the ride to Matsumoto.

The highlight of Matsumoto is one of only four of Japan’s original castles (i.e. have not been re-built). It is an impressive looking, classic Japanese building. They even let you go inside and, better still, English language tours are available. I got the impression this was local volunteers who did this in part to help them practice their English language skills. They split our group into thirds and took us through the castle. The woman we had as our guide was very nice. She told us about the history of the castle and pointed out interesting little tidbits along the way. Overall, it was a very informative tour and well worth the hour or so we spent there.

Our next order of business was to buy supplies for the trek we’ll be doing the next three days. David had found a grocery store in a large shopping building across from the train station and we all loaded up on things like dried fruit, nuts and chocolate. We still had 45 minutes until our train left so several of us went to check out the 100 yen store (think dollar store back home). Exactly what you would expect: lots of cheap crap that you probably don’t need. We did notice that some of the dried fruit we had already bought was available for a lot less here. I bought a couple more things.

We still hadn’t eaten lunch so we decided to finally satisfy a craving that Mike R (i.e. Tuna Danish) has had ever since four of us went to the Mos Burger in Sendai. Tuna was a little jealous of us and has been looking for a Mos Burger ever since. As we were leaving the train station earlier today, he had noticed a McDonald’s. I pointed out that where there’s a McDonald’s, there must be a Mos Burger nearby. Sure enough, there it was right on the other side of the square in front of the train station. We headed over to Mos Burger after our shopping excursion and it was a  similar experience to the last time in Sendai, though the service was a little bit slower (i.e. we had actually been sitting down at our tables for a few minutes before the food arrived).

Our final destination for the evening is Kamikochi which is pretty far up in the Japanese Alps and the place where we’ll be departing from for our trek. To get there, you take a train from Matsumoto and then transfer to a bus for the rest of the trip. They actually don’t even allow private cars all the way up to Kamikochi. The trip up there is gorgeous, at least the part of it when you are not in a tunnel. You are in a valley most of the way with amazingly scenic mountains all around. The only oddity: there must have been at least 4 different dams on this river. Although that fits with the Japanese tendency to “engineer” their forests, was it really necessary?

Anyway, we got to the Nishi Itoya Sanso at Kamikochi around 5 and I spent some time packing for the hike. Dinner was pretty good, though perhaps a little more “Western-ized” than we have had in other places. We spent the rest of the evening in a meeting to work out the logistics for the hike. Everyone in the group has the option of doing either a “short” or a “long” version of the hike. In addition to being shorter (obviously), the short version does not go across the Daikiretto, the most difficult and dangerous part of the long version of the hike. I would like to challenge myself so I am planning to do the long version. We’ll see how that goes. Tomorrow will likely be the most difficult day of hiking I have ever done – 4,500 feet of elevation gain in ~12 miles. Can’t wait.

After our meeting about the hike plan, I checked my e-mail and updated my Facebook status. It is kind of amazing to me that the internet is available way up here. In addition, this place also has a fairly good sized bath with a window that must have a nice view of the mountains nearby – though I couldn’t see them because it was dark. I’m sure it will feel good to get back in there after we return to Kamikochi on Wednesday.

Go To: Previous | Top | Next