Watching the monkeys skinny dip

If you were living in the Japanese Alps during winter where the north winds carry as much as 70-80 cm of snow in just one night and the temperature drops to minus 10 degrees, wouldn't you choose to escape into the nearest 41 degree warm hot spring? We would, - and so does the Japanese snow monkey we have heard, so together with Henriks parents we went to see for ourselves.

Only little snow showed its glitz to us here and there on the long 5 hours drive from Koriyama through the Japanese alps to Jigokudani Yaen-koen. The monkeys are said only to use the hot spring during the colder time of the year, so we hoped we weren't too late having already seen the cherry trees bloom in Koriyama.

After a stunning drive through mountainous landscape, we arrived at the entrance to the park, paid a fee to a lonely guard and wondered about this place. Only one other car to spot on the parking lot, no other tourists in sight. The sign to the park looked kind of worn out and we weren't really sure what it was telling us. (seems to be a common problem we encounter with Japanese signs :-)). We started to walk a trail in a direction we thought would lead us to the monkeys but instead we ended up at a private house. Or was it an onsen? Returned half way, passing two Japanese women who was about to make the same detour as us, and chose another trail. The place looked sort of closed down, but as we wondered if any monkeys would be there at all, an Italian person showed up on the trail and told us of hordes of monkeys, so we continued on.

Monkeys soon started to show up around us. Young monkeys playing around, older monkeys grooming each other, some ran away when they saw us, most didn't bother. We couldn't help smiling watching the little fellows at so close range, and the smile got even bigger as we approached the hot spring and found the monkeys were still having a blast in the hot spring. Such a rare sight! :

The monkeys are not caved. They choose by them selves to come down from the mountains to visit the hot spring almost every day during winter despite tourists that show up to stare at them.

Even a monkey can get startled by its own beauty: The monkeys traditionally feed on tree buds, flowers, bark and insects which can all be difficult to find during winter, so because of that, - and to prolong observation of the monkeys behavior, barley, soybeans and apples are served by the park employees. The monkeys love it,- but not as much as they love wild grapes and chestnuts, so in autumn the monkeys turn their noses up to the convinience of soy beans and barley to go hunting for delicacies in the forest.
The snow monkeys does not quite look as charming wet:

Miss Wet 2008:
We spent the night in a typical spa town called Yudanaka at a traditional ryokan, with access to around 10 different hot springs, all with different temperature, mineral content and size. To visit the hot springs that was scattered around the village, the ryokan kindly supplied us with Yukata and Geta (clothes and shoes) and a key and a map so we could walk from bath to bath attracting quite some attention from bypassers and shop owners. Some of the onsens were so warm that you could hardly put a foot in them. (Hot springs really heat you up as B experienced ending up fainted on the floor,- but thats another story.)
The picture on the right shows how annoyed the local shopowners are with the monkeys in town... (look for guns).

The trip back through the mountains was as beautiful as on the way up. Emphasize on THROUGH the mountains. I don't remember who won, but we had some serious competition going on in the car: How many tunnels would we pass? More than 30,- but I can't remember the right number.

We would like to go back during winter, as the snow do so well on photographs. Anyone want to join?

A rainy day in the mountains

Apparently today's plan was to go hunting for fresh bamboo shots in the mountains with the chigiri-e group. Unfortunately I had forgotten the plan, so the rest of the gang had patiently waited for me, for over an hour before they finally decided to call me...Embarrassed? Me? I bowed and gomenasaied like I had never done before!
Anyways, - off we went. First stop was at a stream to stock up on fresh drinking water. The white paper decoration on the robe is because the stream is near a shinto shrine. Usually the decorated robe indicates that the place is sacred, or it indicates the presence of the 'kami' or spirit of the place. That kind of paper decoration is said to be the earliest type of paperfolding in Japan.
The surroundings of Koriyama are beautiful, with mountains and rice fields everywhere. This is 'Sakura yama', which means the cherry tree blossom mountain:

The yet unplanted, but already water-filled ricefields offered great reflexions of the mountains.
Unfortunately the fields were not the only place filled with water and before we reached the mountain top, the rain had started to pour down making it impossible to continue on with our original plan. Instead we took a closer look at the local wind mill park (the mills are German though and not Danish hrmpf), and we stopped at a private house for lunch (which did include bamboo and the largest onigiri I have ever had).

Them we returned back to Koriyama with a few stops on the way, first one being this flower field :


Then we did a small hike,

had another sip of fresh water, with a neat drinking cup made of a leave,









and ended the day at the public footbath, with natural steaming hot spring water. Nothing can beat the feeling of soothing hot water after a hike.

Building a home

Imagine picking up, every single item in your home, relate to it and decide where it should live. You would be surprised how much history and how many memories each little item have captured for you. In the everyday life, the significance of the things tend to blur away on an unconscious level, but when you receive 126 collies of you personal stuff ( = nearly all your belongings) you have not seen for month and some cases years, you can not avoid to turn sentimental.

This Monday, all the leased furniture was removed so we spent the night at a hotel. Henrik had chosen Hananoyu. The hotel has several onsen (public baths), which we enjoyed both after dinner and again before breakfast. The men’s baths was located on the 10th floor with huge windows revealing a view of the snow-covered mountains. The women’s bath was on the ground floor, both inside and outside – and there were plenty of them. Ordinary pools, pools with natural stones, wood tree baths, very deep baths, and Barbara’s favourite, a huge ceramic pot, that only fitted one person and which was partly out side, so the snow landed on her cheeks while her body was gently heated by the steaming hot water. As always we stuck out of the crowd, so a private bath is nice.
The night at Hananoyu, was a break from reality and even though we first arrived there 7 o’clock in the evening and left again 7.30 the next morning, the time was plenty for getting this ‘holiday – away-from-it-all-pampering-feeling. Guess it is highly because of the baths.

The picture shows part of the dinner at Hananoyo...steak to eat with chopsticks!

Tuesday morning was a return to reality. Our ship freight arrived a little past nine and six hours later all 126 collies was opened and scattered around the apartment. One big mess! But a good mess though. Only some fragile lamps were damaged – and our Brazilian alcohol and French wines are missing, the rest was in good shape and it was a great feeling having our history in the hands again. :-D

Two days have passed since the stuff arrived, and everything is still a mess. We need to build shelves for the books etc, but we are facing a few challenges; like the battery for the drilling machine from Denmark needs several days to charge because of the 100 V in Japan versus 220 V in Denmark; how to find a new television set with an English menu system; and the language difficulties when we want to buy materials for building the shelves.

We hope the weekend will bring us a lot closer to the target. Henrik has taken the day off Friday, so by Monday we should have something that reminds of a home again. Including a guest room, should anyone wonder.

Our first encounter with a ski slope, ever

In Koriyama the inhabitants have two favourite sports; during summer (and many times winter) they play golf, and during winter they ski. We have never tried either, but when some of Henriks colleagues invited us to join them on their yearly ski trip, we didn’t hesitate to say yes.

It takes less than an hour to drive to the resort by car, so to go there and back in one day is pretty normal, but we were introduced to a way better way of ending the ski trip as we will tell you about later.

The trip up to the Gran Deco resort was a nice ride through the hills of sleeping rice fields, and passing a beautiful lake with many groups of Mute swans that probably had found their way to Japan from Denmark, just like us. The snow fell gently outside, but only until we arrived. Perfect; Fresh snow, still wind and a clear sky. It was the perfect day for a skiing-challenge, for both us, and the Japanese-only-speaking-instructor. "How do we close our boots?", "How do we click on the skies?" The rest of the group went to seek greater challenges on the ski slopes while we moved on learning simple manoeuvres like how to break, how to turn and how to do both in one time. For a newbie that can be really difficult!














Just before lunch, the group came to check our progress, hoping we would be ready to join them on the real slope. We looked at the instructor. He meant we were up for the challenge, so we just needed to go the 30 meters down the beginner’s slope once more and we would be by the lift. On the way down the beginner’s slope, Barbara completely lost control. She luckily succeeded to lift up a 5-year-old Japanese boy in her arms on the way, before her skies would have knocked him to the ground. He got a huge chock and wept for several minutes afterwards. Barbara felt like doing the same, having all Henriks colleagues watching her stunt. They pretty quickly agreed that it might be better we stayed on the beginners slope a little more, before we joined them on the lift to the top of the mountain, so we went on a long lunch break, for Barbara to find the courage to hit the beginners slope once more…

Practice does pay of, and in the afternoon, when we got a new invitation to join the rest of the group, we went for it. The trip up, on the lift, revealed a beautiful view of the slope and the surrounding mountains.

The slope we were about to ski was two kilometres long.


We were told it would be flat – but that was only half the truth. Barbara’s effective self-developed skill of throwing herself in the snow whenever speed had gone beyond her breaking abilities became handy whenever the slope got too steep.

Some how it did get better, and the last kilometre down the slope went quite well for both of us. Starting the day without even knowing how to click on the skies, to actually being able to control both speed and turns in the curves, make us pretty confident that during the next three years with easy accessible ski resorts open from late November to early May, we will master the sport to a degree where we actually relax while doing it.
We hope.

So, what is the best way of dealing with the weariness and pain in your body after a long day of skiing?
Our suggestion must without a doubt be to take a bath in a hot spring (onsen) and afterwards enjoy a wholesome meal accompanied with cold beer and sake in the company of friendly people.
After driving 45 minutes down the mountain towards Koriyama, we arrived at the onsen, Hakkeien, located only 13km. from Koriyama.
We were all really tired and could feel the pain in the knees and legs, so before going to dinner, we entered the revitalizing onsen: http://www.hakkeien.com/bath/index.html
In this case, the onsen was public, which means that we went to the lady’s and men’s onsen respectively and shared the onsen with Henriks colleagues. This was yet a challenge that day, since the Adam and Eve costume is not what we usually wear in public.
Actually, it really doesn’t matter; When you enter the bath and immediately start feeling the healing effects of the water on your tired body that is all that counts.
Within 15 minutes, you feel so revitalized that you almost are ready to return to the ski slopes. Almost.
After the bath, dinner was set in traditional Japanese surroundings. The dinner consisted of an uncountable number of plates and included delicacies such as miniature steaks, fried mackerel, whole marinated mini-octopus, sashimi of tuna and white fish, cubes of smoked salmon and cucumber, different types of unknown Japanese vegetables and pickles, fresh tofu, crab tales salad, miso soup, deep-fried shrimps and asparagus, boiled egg, rice, pudding, and several undefined things. A colleague supplemented the feast with his mothers home made Mochi.
Mochi is a kind of sticky rice balls, very popular to eat on New Years Eve. They can be quite difficult to chew and several people loose their life every year as they choke on the rice ball. (A 70-year-old man, was once saved by his daughter, who used a vacuum cleaner to remove the Mochi from his throat.)
Anyway, the dinner was great, and in the companionship of Henriks friendly colleagues, an ice-cold beer (one of the best in our lives) and warm sake, life seemed perfect. The only insignificant hassle was to sit on the floor, with sore legs after the day’s activity, but that's part of the deal.

That night we gladly slept on the futons on the tatami floor in the simple, yet aesthetic decorated Japanese room, and the next morning we gladly had another dip in the onsen before our fish-rich breakfast was served in the evocative atmosphere of the restaurant. The Japanese hotel (Ryokan) really oozed of a down-to-earth and friendly staff that even served coffee for us, after we had paid our bill. With this level of hospitality in Japan, we can only encourage you to come and try!
See you soon.

Weekend in Aizu-Wakamatsu

The 11th of February was the day the very first Japanese emperor was crowned; therefore this date is named the National Foundation Day (Kenkoku Kinenbi) and has become one of many national holidays derived from a prior emperor.


Since this day falls on a Monday this year, it meant a long weekend for us, so we packed the car and went to a onsen hotel in a city called Aizu-Wakamatsu. Spending time in an onsen is THE most popular way to spend your vacation here in Japan, and everybody does it several times per year.
So, what is an onsen? An onsen is a hot spring, which there by the way is many of here, due to the volcanoes. The onsens are either public or privately owned by a hotel like the one we went to.
The most important thing is that you go to the onsen to relax. It is pure pleasure – and it is said that the water, depending of its contents of minerals have healing effects on you. The baths are often separated gender wise - and the clever ones enjoy an ice-cold beer or cold sake as they soak them selves in the often unbelievable hot water.
This sounds super nice. There is just one tiny catch. You have to skinny-dip! Bathing clothes (often also tattoos) are strictly forbidden. For a shy, tall, Scandinavian girl – it can be a challenging limit to cross, to share these baths nude with several tiny Japanese women.
Anyway, this time, we paid us out of it. I mean, you need to start somewhere! We arranged a hotel room (well helped by Henriks Japanese interpreter) where we had our own private bath. Now we are talking! Not only did we have the privacy, and the benefit of sharing the bath instead of being separated in man and women baths – we also had none stop access for 24 hours to the most gorgeous steaming hot pool with a view to the mountains! If that isn’t what life is all about, what is?

Well actually we must admit, that this is not something we could just jump in to. We did try though, but jumped out of the pool even quicker than we got in. Damn it is hot! You can feel you skin reacting to the hot water, your nails tickles as if they are ready to jump off and after few minutes in the water, you prefer to sit next to the open balcony door, even though it must have been freezing cold as it snowed out side...
During the day we could gradually extend the time we spent in the bath pr time, but we honestly never got really familiar with the hot water. Anyway, we are sure, this will be an appreciated luxury way of spending many of our weekends here in Japan.

As we had one of the better rooms at the hotel it meant we had our own private garden instead of a hall! The garden had gravel to symbolize water, and bigger stones as sort of a bridge. In this context the bridge symbolized a change of mindset. You walk from your stressful normal life outside the room, and arrive at a place where it is all about finding peace and harmony in your thoughts. So neat!
The room we entered was spacious and in typical Japanese style with tatami mats at the floor, flower arrangements, green tea and legless chairs, meaning you practically sit on the floor. And then there was a really nice surprise: a super advanced electric massage chair! Did we fight over it, or what?
There were also yukatas for us, with is a kind of cotton kimonos, which is the proper dress to wear at a place like that...also at the restaurant...!

There was no place to sleep though…strange! Giving it no further thought, we went to the restaurant area for dinner. Once more, we were impressed by the creativity in the Japanese kitchen. Several dishes were lined up for us in our private booth, inclusive a fruit cocktail, we thought. The cherry turned out to be a tomato, and there were raw octopuses mixed with the fresh pineapple pieces. We also had a big bowl of boiling soymilk, to fry our chicken and shitake mushrooms in, and we had a hot stone, where we could fry scrimps and pieces of an octopussy. This was all new to us. We also had a little of the more common things for us like sashimi (raw fish), tiny whole squids and of cause we ordered beers and a bottle of sake. Campai!

When we returned to the room, the low table had been removed and our futons had been made up! A futon is basically a semi hard thin madras put directly on the floor…and it is no cliché that you need to be costumed to sleep on a futon, before you can really enjoy it. We are still in the process :o)

Aizu-Wakamatsu is not all about onsens. During the Edo period it was home to a Samurai clan, and there are several traces left behind to tell the (hi)story, like a five-floor castle, that used to be the headquarters of the clan, the mountain where a group of samurais committed suicide, and Saigo Tanomos villa named Aizu Bukeyashiki.
We went to the latter as it was on the way from our onsen to the center of Aizu.
Saigo Tanomo was a master of martial arts and a skilled military strategist. He was the retainer of the Clans chief and his Yashiki (villa) is quite impressive with 38 rooms and tons of stuff dating back to the Edo period. We passed the many different drawing rooms, the room where Tanomos wife and children committed suicide, and the lavatory secured against ninjas.
We passed samurai armors and spears, drawers and kimonos and Henrik almost bought a Samurai sword while Barbara figured out what some of Dads things really are for, like the inros for carrying medicine. The place had quite many signs in English, so we did pick up a few details about the Edo-period, but we both feel like reading up on the subject, probably starting with Shogun.
We could easily have spent much more time there than we did, but it was freezing, and as you should take of your shoes as you enter the un-heated villa, you kind of hurry through the place. We are pretty sure though, that we will take another look at the place during the summer, as well as we would love to see the other sights in Aizu...as soon as it gets warmer.

We also spent some time in the center of Aizu, where we tried a couple of restaurants and went shopping for lacquer ware.

One place we ate at was Takino. It was a very traditional place, where you have to sit on the floor to eat. This place did not have a hole under the table to stick your long legs into, as we have had all the other ‘traditional’ places we visited… nope – this was just a pillow on the floor! After trying to sit in the formal position for few minutes, we gave up and tried to sit in other positions…kept changing them, could not find a position that really worked for us – reckon we need to practice the floor sitting thing.
At Takino we had a local dish called Wappa meshi, which is steamed fish over rice, cooked and served in a round container made of tree bark. It tasted really good and special, as the food takes taste of the bark. We also got a couple of surprise side dishes... - One was horse meat! That was a new one for us.

Another restaurant we went to was Mitsutaya. We really wanted to go there, but we couldn’t find it and it was freezing cold. To get warmer, we went into a shop for browsing, and who would have imagined that we would find the restaurant in the back of the shop! We guessed that the sign outside probably told us that, but if you cant read the signs, what good does it?
We were happy that we stumbled into the place by coincidence. The restaurant was set up in a former bean-paste mill. Bean paste is very popular in Japan, as it is one of their key seasonings called Miso.
The line for the place was huge, but Henrik had us added to the waiting list anyway and we found a place to sit and wait for a table. We thought about shopping some of the many delicacies at the shop, but dropped the idea knowing we would have no clue what to do with them. A man approached us on his way out, handing us a brochure – in English, explaining all about Miso. Nice guy!
A little hour later, we got a table at the ‘bar’ and ordered the set menu, consisting of 7 different kind of Dengaku, which are bamboo skewers with grilled tofu, fish or veggies. Great taste!

We arrived back in Koriyama Monday afternoon after three nice days in Aizu, feeling we have learned quite a bit more about the magnificent place called Japan…we still have a long way to go though. Luckily!