a little rude mishmash of life: Japan in Spring, Part Two

Here comes part two!

After a good night's sleep, a beautiful morning awaits. Headed for breakie. This is the general area, in daylight. Check out the nite view here.

Since breakie was not ready, decided to head outside to have a feel of the temperature. Found a shack of some sorts at the front door which I did not see on the way in the previous day.

6deg c.

there were some pretty sakura outside

then it started snowing! can you see the flakes~

oh this is Teru Teru Bozu. a little doll to wish for good weather.

the previous nite, we enjoyed the onsen (hot spring) at the ryokan. every ryokan (traditional japanese inn) has different stay plans, some with certain type of food or rooms etc. for this ryokan, it had a special plan. It was the use of the onsen (very normal), with free flow sake in the onsen!!! sorry no pict.. basically, there was a few bottles of local sake placed beside the tub for your enjoyment. They even had waterproof novels for your reading pleasure. Anyway, it was a once in a lifetime experience.

so the next morning, after we woke up, we took a bath (no sake of course) and found that there don't seemed to be much guests whom had awoken yet. so... here are some RARE pics... of the traditional onsen in a ryokan.

on the way to the onsen, you can see the door for guys first, followed by the one for girls. no mixed bath here.

woo hoo. this is it! of course there wasn't anyone around. Just imagined the night before, with the sake and all.

time for breakie!

onsen egg! my favourite.

happy miso girl

very fresh tomato, with greedy person in background.

pouring yam on my rice

bliss

time for some fun~

the mountain top had quite a bit of snow going on. basically we were at the start of the Kurobe Alpine Route. Crossing from Nagano side to Toyama side, using different forms of transportation along the alps. Unfortunately, the weather was really bad and right on top of the mountains, it wasn't passable so the only way was to go up and come back down. No worries, safety first. Here we go!

Took a bus up to the first stop.

Next up, we queued up for the tunnel trolley bus. So many people!

Reached the Kurobe Dam.

Had to walk a long flight of stairs to the top of the dam, along the way, free spring water for everyone!

Oh my. This is Kurobe Dam. What a magnificent view.

hee

more spring water

okay, tourists posing.

Then we took a tunnel train to the next stop.

food!

After a cable car ride, we reached Murodo. The highest point. This is the part where we have to turn back down because the previous night, there was a heavy snowfall so roads down the other side of the mountain (by bus) were all snowed in. No go.

Here you can see they brought out the heavy machinery to clear the roads.