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Bright lights, big city.

Sea of suits spilled out onto the sidewalks.

Onsens/hot baths…soo good. The one in my Tokyo hotel was surprisingly really nice.

Conbinis on every corner.

Onigiris for breakfast, lunch and tea. An increase in rice consumption might help me put back some of the 6 kilos I’ve lost in the last couple of months.

Akeguchis. Literally, the best thing sliced bread, coz at least now you can open up a pack easily.

3-day long weekends. Thanksgiving in Tokyo.

There’s a fine line between moving on and letting go.

Spring has sprung…

Sakura abloom in Namie. A stroll along Namie’s Ukedo Riverline.

Traditional hanami picnic in Yonomori Koen.

Followed by evening yosakoi and light up hanami.

Daniel and I took Alan and Sierra to 草津温泉 Kusatsu Onsen in Gunma Prefecture. This is one of Japan’s most famous onsen. It was ranked as the number one onsen during the Edo period. We took trains the whole there again taking advantage of the 青春十八切符. We left on the 5.27am train and arrived at Naganohara Kusatsu guchi station at 1.12pm. From there we took a bus into Kusatsu onsen. We played lots of 4P games on the Nintendo DS – Mario party mini games. Kusatsu is a really cool onsen town. In the centre of town there is a 湯畑 – a hot water field that flows through the middle of the town. There are lots of natural hot springs in the area. We went to two awesome onsens. The Sai no kawara onsen 西の河原露天風呂 which features a huge rotemburo set in a park. It was a really romantic town with lots of little stores that gave away free　まんじゅう. We stayed overnight at a little pension http://www.lun.co.jp/ruhe/which served great meals. The next day we went to大滝乃湯温泉 Ohtaki no yu – another great onsen with an indoor onsen and a rotemburo. The water in Kusatsu is really good quality. It’s sulphurous and is said to have healing qualities. We also saw ゆもみ which is water massage – a method they use to cool down the hot water, becase adding cold water is said to change the water properties of the natural hot springs. I got to have a go at that. Another 9 hours of DS marathon later we made it back. Another お疲れさま weekend. 

Soubetsukai for Jeff on the weekend at Shouraku - one of my favourite restaurants in Namie.
Delicious food -bibimba, cheese mochi, chijimi and rice balls. Yum.

On the weekend we made use of the last trip on our Seishun Juhachi kippu and decided to go to Echigo Yuzawa.
Echigo Yuzawa was the setting for Yasunari Kawabata’s novel ‘Snow Country’ (雪国). Kawabata is only one of two Japanese people to have won the Nobel Peace Prize for Literature.
Echigo Yuzawa is indeed the Snow Country. There was certainly a lot of snow. There are over 20 ski resorts in the area and plenty of onsens to boot.
We did the whole trip by train, setting off at 4:19am we arrived at 9:43am. We got back that evening at 9:53pm.

At Echigo Yuzawa station itself there is an onsen at Ponshukan. Here they also have 酒　(rice wine) sampling. For 500yen you can try 96 different sake plus 20 osusume sake. They also had 55 different types of salts you can sample.
Although it was fun, I’m not a huge fan of sake I’ve decided. I much prefer ume shu, or better still, wine.
They onsen here is also pretty cool for novelty value. It is a sake onsen with sake added to the bath water.
We also got lunch (and dinner here). We got giant onigiri!!! They were called The Bomb (explosion) onigiri. It was enough to feed 8. We had it for lunch and saved the rest for dinner.

We then spent the rest of the day doing onsens. We took a bus out to Mitsumata and went to Kaido no yu. This place was pretty awesome. Really nice building and facilities. They had an onsen and a rotemburo. It was really nice to sit outdoors in the bath with the snow falling. I was lucky enough to take some photos.

We also went to the Yukiguni historical museum - a homage to the Snow Country lifestyle and Kawabata’s novel.

We also went to Yama no yu which was really small, very hot, and not really my kind of onsen. Yama no yu is famous because it is the bathhouse that Kawabata used to bathe in.

Another nice onsen weekend.
My skin is turning pruny.

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We just had a long weekend and I indulged in 温泉放題. On Saturday, friends Alan and Sierra joined Daniel and I in some onsen relaxation. We went to 赤湯温泉in Niigata prefecture. The water was a red-brown colour and very hot. Then we had lunch, which was followed by another onsen, this time at 福泉温泉 (www.ryokan-fukusen.co.jp). We had the rotemburos to ourselves. The outdoor bath looked out onto mountains and the lake below. Was sooo nice and relaxing. Onsens are great in winter, as is nabe – the ultimate winter food.

On Saturday arvo, the four of us decided to go on a spontaneous road trip. On Sunday we left for Yamagata prefecture and went to Asahi machi. There is a really nice りんご温泉 (apple onsen) to be found there. We had gone up in the summer and found it by accident on a road trip to Akita . There was so much snow in Yamagata prefecture. We had to take it easy on the roads. Unfortunately, the rotemburo was closed down for the winter, so we made do with the indoor bath. The onsen was awesome. It is set amongst an apple farm. So relaxing, warm and cleansing. The baths here have apples in them. The apples bob in the water and it’s really good for your skin. After the onsen we went 2km down the road to the Wine castle where there is free wine sampling.

We then made our way to our lodgings for the evening at Shizenkan ski resort just before it got dark. It is set deep inland, and there is a ski jou there, as well as cottages for rent (www.shizenkan.jp). We rented out a cottage which was really cheap (3675yen) per person.

The cottage was basic and cosy. We played scrabble, watched a movie, and played DVD Who wants to be a Millionaire? We drank wine and ate nabe, and basically holed ourselves up in the cottage as the snow fell outside.

On Monday we headed back home sorry to see the long weekend end.

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