The Highlands

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So after we left Tokyo, we took a train to Nagano, the city that hosted the 1998 Winter Olympics and also well known for the Japanese Snow Monkeys that bathes in the onsen with the humans. The city is also famous for the 3rd largest Buddhist temple in Japan (Senkoji) and soba noodles.
Awesome.
So we checked into a Ryokan right after we arrived, and walked around the city. The city is small, with it's main road leading from the train station to Senkoji, a 30 minute walk. Along the street are shops in traditional japanese buildings and a few small temples here and there. We stopped in a shop and tried some soba, and I must say it's really really good.
By the time we got to the temple, it was getting dark. Lonely Planet misinformed us and said that the temple closes at 4:30PM, but actually the temple is open all the time, and it's the shops lining the street leading up to the main temple that closes. As we walked up to the temple in dusk, the monks lit up the lanterns along the path, and brought out candles to line the street. The effect was quite dream-like, with the faint chanting of the monks from the praying halls in the temple. Somewhere in the dark, Amit and I went on different paths, and I found myself wandering through a garden to the side of the temple. The peaceful quiet contrasted greatly to the previous night in Roppongi. That night I slept peacefully, for 12 hours to be exact, and felt my mind finally taking a rest from Tokyo.
The following morning, we checked out of the Ryokan and set out for the Jigokudani Yaen-koen, or Hell's Valley, where the snow monkeys bathes with people in the hotsprings.

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Comments

[jeni]

do the monkeys also do their business in those springs? that'd be pretty sneaky, since the water's already kind of bubbly.