A weekend in the mountains

So the weekend following the conference, a group of us JETs decided to take some time and run away into the mountains of Ibaraki. There is a little village in the mountains called Daigo and we were able to see some beautiful signs of autumn and relax a bit. Our time spent at that conference was a bit tiring, so this was a much needed weekend.

It began with everyone meeting at Gaijinbucks (this is what we called the Starbucks in Mito - gaijin means foreigner) on Saturday morning. After a long train ride from Mito, we arrived at the teeniest tiniest train station in Daigo. There is definitely something to be said for the public transportation in Japan. As I ride through country towns zipping through rice fields and past open nothingness, I just think, "wouldn't it be funny if there were a train in my back yard?" You can take a train from absolutely anywhere in the country to anywhere else. Sometimes the route is not quite direct and a bit convoluted, but it is completely possible! So anyway, we arrive in Daigo and the first thing we do is start our trek from the station to the acclaimed waterfall.

We walk on little country roads for about half an hour before reaching the base of the waterfall. Once here, we meet up with some JETs that actually live this far north in Ibaraki and have a quick snack of onigiri (rice ball with seaweed). As a group we start through the touristy streets lining the path up to the waterfall observation point. Along the way we pass all the common trinkety, tourist trap items - but there was quite the surprising little toy for sale in one of the shops. I think this says something about Japan and what they find acceptable for public display. While looking through a very normal omiyage shop, we come across this bouncy ball of sorts. The difference with this ball is that it is shaped and colored like a woman's breast, complete with nipple and all. And better yet, when you bounce the ball, there is a sound box inside and the ball starts moaning. Talk about appropriate for the kiddies, right?! It boggles the mind the way things that like are common and not considered shocking or inappropriate for this setting!

After our moment of horror and amusement, we continue up the path and arrive at the entrance of a tunnel. The path that tourists are supposed to take goes directly through the mountain so as to get the best head on view of the waterfall. Again Japan, taking the natural and beautiful and old and turning it into something accessible and modern. The tunnel was cut into the middle of this beautiful mountain and was complete with electric lighting and smoothed concrete with hand rails on either side.

The observation deck had a really nice view and we were able to get some great pictures. The poor waterfall though looked a little dryer than a waterfall should. I was a bit surprised given all the rain we had been getting, but the scene was still nice to look at and be a part of. After this we took the path over a swinging footbridge to a set of stairs. Everyone had the option of climbing the stairs if they wanted to get to the very top of the mountain and look down on the waterfall. At the base of the stairs it said it took about 40 minutes to climb halfway. I decided to opt out, and instead Lauren, Amber, Sam and I went to this little outdoor cafe of sorts and had some lunch.

We got some udon noodles in soup with some hot green tea. Being up in the mountains was a bit chilly, so it was nice to be eating all the hot food. The portions were huge, and I just couldn't finish my whole meal. I have been running into that problem quite a lot lately actually - I just can't seem to finish all my food at any given meal. I guess that is a good sign.

Anyway, after our hike up to check out the waterfall, we ventured back down to hurry and travel to the apple onsen. An onsen is a Japanese public bath house. The bath is created from a natural hot spring and the whole experience is incredibly relaxing. Essentially there are two rooms, one for men and one for women - naturally. The procedure is such that everyone is expected to bathe at the showers provided and just get completely clean and then afterward, there is the large pool filled with extremely hot water and you just soak until you're content. At first thought, I guess it seems a little awkward to be bathing with strangers, naked and whatnot - but it just seems normal and you just don't think about it any more. Or maybe all my modesty has just flown out the window - but it's not like their co-ed!!! The special thing about this particular onsen was that they put apples in the water. I kind of felt like we should be bobbing for apples, or like I was in some kind of soup!

After the onsen, we made the trip back to our hotel in shifts. We all had to drop off our belongings and then run to dinner. But the problem was, there was only one car and about 12 people at the onsen. So we called a taxi, but there was only one taxi for the whole town, so it had to make trips back and forth in order to pick up everyone. The only problem with mountain towns is that nothing seems to be open past 8pm. So by the time we got back to the hotel and dropped our things, it was quite a task to find an open restaurant for dinner. Finally we found one that seemed to be closing, but we bombarded and looked like sad, hungry foreigners that didn't know any better. The nice people took us in and feed us a wonderful hot meal and it was really cheap too! Score!

After dinner we hung out some more at the hotel and just chatted for about 3 hours down in the lobby of the hotel. It was such a great time to just sit around talking to people and making new friends. We talked about all those things you aren't supposed to, but always seem to come up anyway - politics and religion....haha.

The next morning, we got up, checked out of the hotel and made our way to the apple orchard. The only place I have ever picked apples was at my grandparents' house when I was kid. And even then it was mostly picking up the yucky apples from the ground just to bring home and feed to the neighbors pigs. So this was quite the fun time. I only picked about 6 apples though because apples are heavy and they were $5 a kilo. After this we ventured onto the place where we could make our own sweets.

They ushered us into a little room, and gave us all the supplies for each of us to make 5 dumplings. The little lady showed us how to make them. First we had to cover our hands with flour so that the dough wouldn't stick to our hands. We had to take each ball of dough and flatten it out a bit like a pizza crust of sorts. Then we take the filling - either apple or pumpkin - and we put it in the center of our circle of dough. After that we wrap the dough around our filling and smash it a little into a dumpling shape. Then the lady brought out some food coloring paint and we each got to paint our dumplings however we wanted. I am severely lacking in this kind of artistic skill, so I mainly stayed with geometric shapes and patterns! haha Some of the people were just so creative and made some awesome dumplings.

After we were finished painting them, the little lady came back and took them into the next room to be baked. In about 15 minutes, they brought out our hot dumplings. We each tried one and they were delicious! It was so much fun to be able to make something, but to not have to do all the prep work and then clean up!! After our time at the bakery, we went back to the station and headed off in our separate directions for home. My commute back home took me about 4 hours, but it was okay, because I could sleep and read on the train. Once I finally got home though, I completely crashed. My relaxing mountain weekend was fun, but I needed to recoup.