Aoni Onsen

This weekend Chris and I took advantage of a few extra days off and went to Aoni Onsen. Brief explanation of onsens in Japan - Japan sits on a fault line so there are thousands of natural hot springs across the country. For hundreds of years the Japanese people have used these hot springs for bathing, relaxation, and to cure various ailments. 

Aoni Onsen is located in the mountains a couple of hours from our house. It is famous for being lit solely by oil lamps. Many onsens used to be lit by oil lamps before electricity was carried out to the more remote areas but Aoni onsen is one of the few (if only) that continues to be lamp lit and virtually electricity-free.

It's definitely off the beaten path... after about an hour of winding through the mountains on a narrow two-lane road, you turn off the two-lane road to an even narrower, one-and-a-half-lane road (you can hardly call it a two-lane road) and wind slowly deeper in to the mountains for about twenty minutes. The onsen and ryokan (traditional Japanese style inn) are nestled up against a mountain stream and perched over several natural hot springs.

This was the main entrance to the main building.

We stayed in room 205. Inside the entryway there was a simple, square room with tatami mats on the floor and a low table in the middle. The room had one oil lamp at the center, a flashlight and some tea on the table, and some futon cushions in the closet to pull out at night.

The room also had a yukata for each of us to wear around the hotel and back and forth between the baths and a set of onsen towels for each of us. Our room was just a few feet from the mountain stream.

Inside this building was my favorite of the four baths. Outside, where the woman is sitting, was a foot onsen.  The woman, I found out later, has a daughter who lives in Wisconsin. Weird.

I think this bridge may be solely maintained by beavers. In spite of the robust support in the middle, the bridge still sagged and swayed quite a bit when I ventured out on it.

Standing on the bridge, this was the view of the main building where we slept.

Dinner and breakfast were included in our stay. Dinner was awesome. It was all laid out for us when we arrived and there were at least 13 separate dishes per person including all you could eat rice and miso soup. It was all locally grown or locally caught food and, even though we couldn't identify any of the vegetables except a single carrot and some celery, it was pretty tasty.

The rest of the dining hall with guests.

This entire fish was edible according to our fellow Japanese diners, but fish heads and tails have never really appealed to me. I think I did pretty good.

The following morning when we woke up to take our first bath, the onsen was completely empty so I snapped a few pictures. This was the undressing/dressing area before you reached the bath.

Inside the bath, there was a small washing station. It's very important to clean thoroughly outside of the bath before entering the main, shared bath. The buckets were used to dip and pour water.

After cleaning you proceed to the hot baths to soak, relax, and enjoy the view.

To the side of the main bath was this outdoor bath with slightly cooler water (a welcome break from the super hot main bath). You could bathe in the large barrel, or in the lower rock lined pool. Each offered great views of the stream and surrounding vegetation.

Clean, refreshed, and ready for breakfast.  All weekend it felt like were were just lounging in our pjs. They even provided slippers to slip on so you didn't have to worry about your shoes.

To be honest, breakfast was a little difficult. You'll notice it looked a lot like dinner. Fish, rice, and miso soup. The biggest difference was that the breakfast foods were even more unidentifiable. 

We powered through it though. Here I am, cooking my egg in a sort of vegetable/scallop/soup/scramble.  It was alright except it had a pretty soupy texture. There were definitely some granola bars in the room that we chowed down on later.

Tanbo Rice Art

Last weekend we visited the Tanbo Rice Fields. The wikipedia link says it all much better than I could. All I'll say was that they were amazing. 

There kind of out in the middle of nowhere but they've become a huge tourist attraction.  I think they might have built this tower specifically to view the Rice Art. I'm sure it was all explained in my Japanese travel brochure I picked up.

Every year, the farmers plant a different mural. I can guess about this one based on rumors I've heard. I believe these women riding the waves represent the tsunami (again, this is a guess). 

I'm told the writing says "Don't Give Up Japan!!" The people on the right seem to represent the Japanese people affected by the March 11 earthquake/tsunami. 

Sometimes the fields are called the "painted rice fields". This is misleading because there was obviously lots of work going into planting the different varieties of rice to make the mural.

I had no idea there were so many varieties and colors of rice. I think I counted at least 7 different colors.

Sendai Baseball Game

Over the 4th of July weekend, Chris and I joined some friends to drive down to Sendai to catch a baseball game.

Our hotel was about a 30 minute walk from the stadium.

It was a pretty fun group of people.

The beer girls wore keg backpacks so you could get a freshly poured draft beer. They carried those backpacks up and down the stadium stairs for hours, and always wore a smile. 

Chris is a fan, obviously.

The stadium was so CLEAN. Everyone picked up their trash and brought it to these trash centers, were workers sorted out everything into recycle bins.

During the seventh inning stretch, everyone in the stadium blew up red balloons and then released them together. 

When the home team won, the stadium released white balloons. 

On our walk home from the stadium, we found this great little (miniscule really) karaoke bar. We sung all the American classics as the owner of the bar conducted our harmonious voices.

Karaoke should always be a group effort.

The owners brought us Japanese cherries and crackers to munch on... on the house. Maybe to quiet us down for a bit?

The next day, on our way out of town, we drove by some of the areas hit the hardest by the earthquake/tsunami.

A sobering end to a wonderful trip.

American Day Flyover

Do you ever wonder how flyovers are always perfectly timed to hit at the last note of the national anthem? No, it's not because the singers or the bands time their song down to the second. It's because usually there's somebody up on a roof somewhere, listening to the song and calling in the jets at the correct moment. 

During American Day, Chris and I got to help with that role. Ok... Chris was really calling in the jets. But I took pictures! And helped watch the clock!

Occasionally there's a problem establishing radio contact with the formation... fortunately for us everything worked out okay because the anthem was sung about 13 minutes too late. Needless to say, that kind of information is important to be able to communicate to the pilots.

Another perfectly timed flyover. Nice job guys.

Catch-Up! Hakodate (May 27-29)

I'm way behind on blogging... I think I kind of forgot I had a blog. But now I'm ready to do some catching up. 

While Chris was on reconstitution (the two weeks of vacation he received after returning from Iraq), we took a short trip north to Hakodate. Hakodate is a port town on the southern edge of the northern island of Hokkaido. 

We stayed in the brick warehouse district, full of shops, restaurants and tourist traps. The first day we were there we had a rare bit of sunshine... the rest of the trip was pretty overcast, but at least we didn't get rained on.

We had a weekend pass for the trolley, which took us anywhere we wanted to go. 

One of our first stops was the British Consulate. It came highly recommend for the excellent tea. 

One of many strange experiences I've had while living in Japan... Afternoon tea and scones at the British Consulate in Hokkaido.

After our afternoon tea, we took the ropeway to the top of Mt Hakodate for one of the "most famous nighttime views in the world".

It actually was a pretty awesome view.

Add caption

The brick warehouse district was all lit up at night... 

And the lights led Chris directly to the Hakodate brewery:)

If there is a brewery in the vicinity, Chris can sniff it out.

The highlight of the trip for us was the open-air, rooftop onsen in our hotel. For all the 'Mericans reading this blog, an onsen is a public bath. The hotel provided these unisex-one-size-fits-most-Japanese-and-only-a-few-American pajamas to wear around the hotel and to the onsen. The provided slippers were just barely big enough for my feet, but Chris had to delicately balance on the balls of his feet in order to walk.

We even got baskets with towels and disposable combs/razors for use in the onsen.

Coffee the next morning was fresh ground, French press goodness... way better than plain ole' fresh brewed coffee. I could get used to this (except my arm was getting sore right about now from grinding coffee beans).

Later that morning we went to the Morning Market. We were almost eaten by a crab.

More of the Morning Market... this was mostly fresh produce.

See the crabs escaping? I told you we were almost eaten by a crab.

Our incredible roomy (for a Japanese hotel) room.