Blogs from Kamikochi, Nagano, Japan, Asia

Turning down the opportunity of the 04:30 train, our bodies now more adjusted to this time zone, we caught a more civilised 06:00 service towards Kamikochi. The journey consists of thirty minutes on a train followed by an hour on a coach. Neither of these were covered by our JR Passes and it was necessary to buy complete open return tickets for 4400 yen per person. From reading guide books I was prepared to find hoards of tourist marching in slow lines around the picturesque, but well visited Kamikochi. As we dismounted the coach at Taisho pond, I was pleasantly surprised to see only a few people around. The majority of these were elderly tourists who had come equipped with painting paraphernalia or SLRs with a bag full of lenses and clearly planned to settle in ... read more

We woke up to rain on Saturday. We ate in the communal dining room at the lodge, with bicyclists from all over the world. We left around 9:00, and took the back roads most of the way back to Matt's place. The drive was spectacular, and there were almost no cars on most of the roads. The foliage was just past its prime, but the rain really brought out the colors. It cleared part way through the morning, and we had good weather until we descended back onto the Kanto Plain and into Tokyo. We went over three main mountain passes, down into valleys in between, where there were towns and small cities. At one point we were in the clouds on a tiny road climbing high into the mountains.....! I was hoping to see monkeys, ... read more