The next two stops on the itinerary were the charming small town of Obuse, in the Nagano prefecture, and the larger, but also charming city of Kanazawa (both one night stays). My friend Heather had stayed in both destinations and had particularly enjoyed Obuse, and I was interested in getting out of the city to see a different side of Japan. 

First Step: Get out of Tokyo

We had mapped the route to Obuse from the Park Hyatt, and decided that our best bet would be to take the hotel shuttle to Shinjuku Station, redeem our vouchers for our Japan Rail (JR) passes there, take the train to Tokyo Station, then board our first bullet train (Shinkansen) to Nagano, and finally board the local train to Obuse. All in all, it would be over four hours of travel, and quite a big of logistics, but we were ready to tackle Japan’s train system, of which we had heard so much.

Before we checked out, we asked about the schedule for the Shinjuku Station shuttle and were told that we’d be better off taking a taxi to the station, as it was a large station, and this way we’d be dropped off right by the Travel Service Center, where we needed to go to get our passes. So glad we asked! 

Hold that thought. After being in the taxi for less than a minute, our driver pulled over and started to consult his map, mumbling to himself in Japanese. The station should have been a five minute drive away, so I wasn’t sure how he didn’t know where to go, or why he didn’t ask the Japanese-speaking staff at the Park Hyatt for more instructions. We pulled out our own map and started to ask questions with the help of the Google Translate app. After a few minutes, he seemed to figure out what to do, and we were back on our way.

Or so it seemed. Over 20 minutes later we still weren’t at the station. Instead, we were driving in circles all around it, trying to find the correct entrance. We had fortunately given ourselves plenty of time to catch our intended train, but as the minutes ticked by, I began to grow anxious. How much longer was this going to take?

After what seemed like an eternity, our driver finally stopped the car and we raced out to find the Travel Service Center. Thankfully, he had eventually found the right place, and we didn’t have far to go. However, the office was packed with travelers waiting in a long line. The Park Hyatt had warned us that we should get to the station at least 30 minutes early since it was peak travel season. I’m so glad that we erred on the side of caution and left the hotel over an hour before we needed to catch the train to Tokyo Station, because our lost taxi driver ate up a bunch of our buffer time. The line gradually moved, the JR workers were pleasant and efficient as I’d come to expect of everyone in Japan, and we were soon the proud owners of 14 day JR passes. 

One note of advice if you plan to travel to Japan with a JR pass: I’d recommend dealing with this process before you need to, if at all possible. We were able to order the vouchers online and have them FedExed to us in the States, but still needed to redeem the vouchers for the actual passes once we got to Japan. Our original plan was to handle the exchange at the Travel Service Center at Narita airport when we first landed, and we went so far as to get in line there. However, a woman advised us that because we didn’t want to have our passes begin on the 28th, but instead on the 31st, we’d still have to go back to a station in Tokyo to have the start date changed. Well, either she misinterpreted our question, or we misinterpreted her response because that was absolutely not true. You choose the date that you want your pass to start being active when you redeem your voucher, and you can select a date in advance. Once you have chosen the date range and received your pass, it is impossible to change. The woman at the counter in Shinjuku made that crystal clear to us.

The 15 minute ride to Tokyo Station was uneventful, but when we arrived at the station, it was a zoo. It reminded me of being back in Times Square, except this time I was lugging heavy baggage with me, I didn’t know my way around and I didn’t understand the language. Fun times.

We finally figured it out and actually had a bit of time to kill, so I got in the queue to board the train and Lauren stopped at the convenience store kiosk on the platform to buy a snack. She returned with some mixed nuts, rice crackers and two beers. Brilliant! Just what I needed after a stressful couple of hours.

Once we found the platform, everything about riding the Shinkansen was a terrific experience. All the signs are very clearly marked telling you where to stand to board the train based on which car you are sitting in and which train you are taking. We had asked for reserved seats when we got our JR passes, so we were sitting in one of the reserved cars for our first ride (after that we always rode the bullet trains without reserved seats and it was fine; there are numerous non-reserved cars on each train. The exception to that statement is the Narita Express… more on that later).

The train itself was very clean and spacious, with large windows, plenty of legroom, seats that recline decently, trays for food, drinks or laptops and plenty of space to store luggage.

We arrived in Nagano a couple of minutes before schedule, which was good because we had a tight connection and had to figure out how to get to the local train, plus buy tickets to Obuse. We encountered a friendly man who pointed us in the right direction as we were getting off the train. I then proceeded to attempt to go out the wrong exit, but was stopped by a Japan Rail worker, who got us back on the right track (literally). We made it to the platform for the local train with several minutes to spare. Our first stressful transfer was a success.

Arriving in Obuse

Next we spent an hour on a train where we were the only foreigners (I caught a little kid laughing at me at one point, and I have no clue why, but he was cute, so I just laughed back). It was only a ten minute walk to our hotel in Obuse, but it was cold and our bags were heavy, so when we found a taxi sitting right outside the tiny station, we grabbed him. Like most taxi drivers in Japan, he spoke very little English, but he was a good sport about our abundance of luggage.

Our hotel, Masuichi Kyakuden, was beautiful, and worth the trip alone. With only a handful of rooms, the property felt very private and peaceful; we saw one (Japanese) couple when we were checking in, but otherwise felt like we were the only guests. In addition to the rooms, the property contained a Japanese restaurant, an Italian restaurant and a sake tasting room, all housed in separate buildings. Our room itself included a number of luxurious touches, such as as heated wood floors and a huge bathtub. 

Unfortunately, we arrived too late to visit the sake tasting room, but we found a couple shops that were still open and we wandered the small town for a bit until we got cold and decided to relax in our room before dinner. Our stay included both dinner and breakfast, and I was curious to see what they’d be feeding us for dinner.

Upon arrival at the Japanese restaurant, we were seated at a table in the back corner, where we had a view of the empty dining room (we were the only diners the entire evening). We ordered some sake and the multi-course event began.

There really wasn’t anything to do in sleepy Obuse after dinner, so we enjoyed our welcome tea and sweets in our room and called it a night.

Morning in Obuse

My original intent when including Obuse in my itinerary was to visit Snow Monkey Park. My friend Heather had also stayed in Obuse and loved the charming little town, as well as the wonderful Masuichi Kyakuden. However, I then stumbled upon this blog post, which made me think twice about supporting a tourist attraction that didn’t treat its animals very well. It would take nearly two and a half hours to reach our next destination (Kanazawa), so we decided to spend a relaxed morning wandering through some of the shops in Obuse before heading back to the train station.

We awoke to a sunny morning (finally), although the temperature was still chilly. Feeling the warmth of the sun was a very welcome change, however. Our breakfast in the Italian restaurant was an absolute pleasure; my scrambled egg whites and salad tasted fresh and healthy, and once again, we were treated to a private dining experience.

Despite its small size, the town was clearly a tourist destination. As we were finishing breakfast, we noticed a few large tour buses parking in the lot by our hotel (all full of Japanese people). The shops were also geared toward visitors, selling trinkets and local delicacies. We each picked up some of the sake that we had drank with dinner (we decided it was too early in the morning to do a tasting), and Lauren also found some tea good for colds (especially perfect since she had been fighting a cold for the past few days).

Then, it was time to begin our journey to Kanazawa. As we were waiting for the train in Obuse, an enthusiastic older man working in the visitor information center was delighted when Lauren wandered into his office. He seemingly didn’t get to talk with people very much. In broken English, he listed all the highlights for Lauren to see in Obuse, despite the fact that our stay was over and we were leaving. 

Finally, Lauren escaped and came to join me in the adjoining cafe, where I was savoring a coffee. Not so fast. The man came toward us and started to tell us we were something that started with a “b,” but which we couldn’t understand. Finally, Google Translate helped to clarify. “To me, you are beauty,” he was saying. Aw, well that was sweet. “Arigato,” we told him graciously. Then he proceeded to make some gestures that would be inappropriate for a man to make in the US, so I’m pretty sure they aren’t considered appropriate in Japan either. We couldn’t decipher anything else he was saying, but if his words matched his hand gestures, we didn’t want the translation. We grabbed our bags and headed to the platform. The man didn’t seem to mean any harm, but we didn’t feel the need to figure out how to inform him he was behaving like a dirty old man.

Arrival in Kanazawa

To get to Kanazawa, we took the local train back to Nagano Station, then boarded the Shinkansen (bullet train) to Kanazawa. We passed beautiful snow-capped mountains along the way, and could see long ski runs etched into some of them.  It almost made me want to ski. However, we didn’t have any of the right gear, and we only had a day to explore Kanazawa, so skiing would have to occur on another trip.

Once in Kanazawa, we got a taxi to drive us to our ryokan since it was approximately a 30 minute walk. We marveled at the fact that the sky was so sunny, since our weather apps were telling us it was going to rain in Kanazawa that day. “Yes, it is going to rain today,” our taxi driver told us (he spoke the best English of any of our taxi drivers throughout the entire trip). “It should start around 4pm.” The Japanese, always so precise. It was only 1pm, so at least we still had a few dry hours to take advantage of.

We reached Sumiyoshiya, our ryokan in Kanazawa, where our room was ready for us. I hadn’t been thrilled with the hotel options in Kanazawa, so I chose this destination for our most traditional ryokan stay. We took off our shoes and put on slippers when we arrived, and the owner took us upstairs to our tatami mat room.

We would later be served dinner at this table, but for now, we could sit and enjoy some tea and welcome treats (we were learning that this was standard practice at every new place that we stayed). Then, they would move the table and prepare our “beds” so we could sleep.

The ryokan also included a public bath where guests could relax and, well, bathe, but I had specifically chosen a room that had a private shower and bath. Not having my own shower just felt a little too foreign to me.

After warming up with some hot tea, we were off to begin our explorations. The first stop was the fish market located just a couple blocks from the ryokan, where we wanted to find some lunch. 

Eyes wide, we surveyed all the unique (to us, at least) types of seafood presented at the first couple of food stalls in the market. Then, I spotted a sake store, and made a beeline for the place where I’d be much more likely to find something I’d want to consume. Of course all of the signage and labels were in Japanese, so we pulled up Google Translate and asked for a recommendation. We were pointed toward a locally produced dry sake, which sounded good to me. Then I spotted a small bottle of liquid infused with what looked like a spicy red pepper. Lauren and I are both big fans of spice, and had been finding the food in Japan very mild for our tastes. I scanned the bottle with the Translate app. “Hot chili seasoning” appeared over the Japanese characters. YES!

As we were checking out with our loot, Lauren asked for a recommendation on where to get the best sashimi in the market. Time for one last use of our new favorite app. The woman at the register pulled out a map and pointed us to the right. Once at the sushi store, we bumbled around as we tried to figure out how to order (again, almost all the signage was in Japanese and there were seemingly several different places one could order from). We identified the sushi window and ordered tuna sushi and yellowtail and salmon sashimi, then identified the drinks window and ordered a couple of Kirin beers.

The tuna arrived first and was such a welcome treat. We both really like sushi, and I will admit that the majority of my Japanese dining experiences before this trip centered around sushi. I had already been a lot more adventurous during my first four days in Japan, but Lauren and I were both craving some fresh, local, melt-in-your-mouth raw fish. Lauren asked for some wasabi to pair with the sushi, and after some awkward gestures and attempted explanations, we realized that the sushi came already dressed with wasabi and soy sauce. Oh yes, I should’ve known that. I also should’ve know that the Japanese eat sushi with their hands – no need for chopsticks, soy sauce or wasabi until the sashimi course.

After some confusion with the pager that the store provided when we placed our order, the salmon sashimi arrived  It was also very good, although the texture wasn’t quite as smooth as the tuna, which we had both loved. We waited a bit longer for the yellowtail while I began to think about what we had been charged. Each dish was between 500-700 yen and we had been paid 1100 yen… so, somehow we hadn’t ordered yellowtail after all. I went back up to the counter and attempted to place an order for real this time. Some more confusion ensued with a lot of hand gestures and words I didn’t understand, and I finally got the point: they had a special yellowtail today that was more expensive. Ohhhh, okay. It was 1100 yen. Yes, we still wanted it.

This exchange was pretty typical of a lot of our experiences in Japan. I know that the country is making a big effort to prepare for the expected rush of visitors that will come with the Tokyo Olympics next year, so a lot of the signage in major cities and along major transportation routes has been updated to include English. However, many of the people speak very little English, and it is obviously impossible for English speakers to attempt to read Japanese characters, whereas we can at least recognize text written in Latin letters, and can then attempt to pronounce the words. While each exchange was a challenge for us, the Japanese people were always very eager to help us. They would go out of their way to ensure we were going to the right place or ordering the right item. They would also always help with smiles on their faces, although they very well may have been cursing us in their heads.

As much as we were enjoying the local sushi, we had some sights to see, ideally before the rain started. We headed out of the market to find that the blue sky had been replaced with gray clouds and a steady drizzle. Well, we may not have packed gear that was as warm as we would have liked, but we at least had umbrellas and we wanted to see some more of Kanazawa, rain or shine.

We first headed to Kanazawa Castle, which was in use from 1580-1945, but also burnt down multiple times over the centuries. Now, all of the buildings are actually reconstructions of the original castle, and they were beautiful.

The grounds contained rows of cherry blossom trees that were beginning to bloom (it was colder here than in Tokyo, so the blooms were a week or so behind). If the weather had been more pleasant, I would’ve enjoyed wandering through all the paths and structures, but I was cold and we still had a lot more on our sightseeing list.

Next up was the Kenroku-en Gardens, adjoining the castle. The grounds were absolutely stunning, despite the inclement weather. We weren’t the only ones who weren’t going to let a little rain stop us; in addition to numerous other umbrella-toting travelers (many also wearing rain jackets… I was seriously missing my Patagonia wardrobe on this trip), four Japanese girls adorned in bright kimonos were wandering the park, posing for picture after picture. We saw this phenomenon in all of the major tourist destinations that we visited; I had heard that people could rent kimonos and parade around town in their fancy garb, but I had assumed that most of the people partaking would be foreign tourists. Instead, it seemed to be mostly Japanese women. I can make some of my own inferences as to why someone from Japan would want to do this, but I was never able to obtain a first-hand account to confirm, so I will keep my guesses to myself.

I really did enjoy the Kenrouken Gardens, but I found myself wishing wistfully that I could be there a few days later, when the sun would be shining and the cherry blossom trees would be in full bloom. I can only imagine what the place would look like at peak bloom, but it is a testament to the gardens’ beauty that I was in awe even on a gloomy day in early spring. The park is maintained in pristine condition, and really reflects the emphasis that the Japanese place on design and aesthetics.

After wandering through most of the park, we decided to move on. But first, we needed a break for a warm cafe and a matcha latte while we discussed our next stop. Kanazawa is home to a geisha district called Higashi Chaya that is supposed to be quite charming. We could walk there in about 15 minutes, so we headed on our way. As we neared the fork where we could either turn toward the geishas, or return to our ryokan, Lauren piped up. “Do you really want to go to Higashi Chaya? I’m okay if you want to go back to the ryokan.” Honestly, that was fine with me, too. We turned left instead of right and happily eased out of our wet shoes and into our warm slippers back at Sumiyoshiya.

Another nice touch at all of the places where we stayed in Japan: we were given a yukata, a light, cotton Japanese robe that can be worn when relaxing or in common areas. In the smaller, more traditional places, people would wear their yukatas to meals, but we did not see this at all in the larger, Western hotels in major cities. I was happy to don my yukata and hang out in the warm, dry room for the rest of the evening.

The final event of the day was dinner, served in our room. The ryokan owner showed up at our door promptly at 7pm, carrying large trays full of small plates. I think we ended up with just as much food (maybe more) that we were served at Masuichi Kyakuden, but things came all at once for the most part. The meal included sashimi, tempura, grilled eel, salmon, pickled vegetables… We could tell that most or all of the dishes came from the local market, and it all tasted very fresh. Like many of my meals in Japan, some of the options fell outside of my comfort zone, but I wanted to try everything nonetheless.

After our cozy meal, the owner returned to take our trays and make our beds. Once she left, we realized that we didn’t really have anywhere to sit in our room, so we each got in bed and were fast asleep by 10pm. I’d like to blame jet lag, as I had been waking up early every day so far, but it also felt really nice to just go to sleep after a day of travel and battling the elements. 

Final Morning in Kanazawa

We still had a couple places to check out in Kanazawa: particularly the DT Suzuki Museum and the 21st Century Museum, both of which had been closed the day prior (Monday). Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t any better; in fact, it was worse. The temperatures had gotten even colder, and the rain had turned to sleet. While a museum is typically a good indoor, rainy day activity, both of the museums in Kanazawa featured a lot of notable outdoor elements, and I just did not have it in me to suffer outside in sleet and near freezing weather while wearing a leather jacket and flats. I have gotten a lot better at handling the cold over the years, but I need the right gear. Plus, our next destination was Kyoto, where the weather looked to be somewhat better, and where we had a long list of sights to see. It was time to move on. Continue reading here