All-in-one resort capital in the Japan Alps, Day 2

Destination:  Kurumayama Plateau, Nagano Prefecture (Distance from Tokyo: 195km, approximately 122 miles)

Map → http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/location/regional/nagano/sirakabako_yatugatake.html 　

Date:  August, 2007
--------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Most of us, I believe, want to keep dreaming of a good dream and don’t want to wake up halfway through to the end of a fantasy story.  Maybe you wanna hire Leonardo DiCaprio to make your dream more enjoyable.  But the power of nature just wakes you up every morning and your escape from the reality is over.   

 The dream time of my wife and her friends was also
over next morning after the brilliant stars were gone.  But lucky enough for them, they were still
able to put themselves in a dreamy world in Nagano. 
Kurumayama Plateau welcomed the ladies with the cool fresh air in the
morning.  No sticky heat wave, no loud
noise of vehicles, no rush hour train ride to go their office.  Very slow and placid morning.  It was such a dreamy moment for them.

Breakfast @ Bonheur

Breakfast @ Bonheur

On the second day, after checking out the hotel, the ladies headed out to the Tateshina Craft Village which was built by the local young artists.

@ the craft villa

@ the craft villa

@ the craft villa

They joined a class to experience the ceramic art making.  My wife tried to make something like a mug, but her effort unfortunately didn’t turn out to be a good work. Her friends failed, too.  But they still enjoyed crafting something on their own.

Professional works. 

She got these ones @ a souvenir shop

of the villa.

Amateur work. Her try didn't succeed.

They had no time to waste by the small disappointment and these travel savvy ladies quickly found an alternative attraction inside the village. 

There was an open-air café nearby the crafting studio.  It was a perfect place to refresh themselves and have a lunch break.  My wife had a yummy chicken curry rice plate.

@ the cafe of the villa

@ the cafe of the villa

They continued to explore the inside of the village after the lunch and found this artistic site was quite enjoyable to look around and feel the grace of nature. 

@ the craft villa

They spent only 2 days on their trip.  But at least 3 days would be recommended to get around the Kurumayama area and avoid making your itinerary tight.  And the more the cheaper to split the cost for using a car.  We also suggest that you’d better not visit there in the winter unless you ski or snowboard.  Many of tourist places are closed during the winter season.  And more than that, it’s too cold to go around the outside in the snow season.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Traveling Tips in Kurumayama

-  Getting there by:

Train;  Nagano Shinkansen to Sakudaira  (70 minutes). JPY12,340 for a one-way ticket.  (http://www.jreast.co.jp/e/routemaps/naganoshinkansen.html) 

Bus;  There are some companies offering highway bus services from Tokyo to the Kurumayama area (2.5 hours – 3 hours).  Approximately JPY5,000 for a round-trip ticket.

FYI → (http://www.alpico.co.jp/access/express/suwa_shinjuku/info_e.html)  

Car;  Chuo Expressway (2.5 hours – 3 hours) from central Tokyo.

-  To get around the Kurumayama area:

Strongly recommend to have a car.  Otherwise you need to depend on using local bus services or taxis to go around in the broad area which is, time-wise and cost-wise, not a good idea. If 3-4 people share the cost of renting a car, it shouldn’t be so high.

FYI →　（http://www.ekiren.co.jp/index.html） (http://rent.toyota.co.jp/en/index.html) 

-  Accommodation in Kurumayama:           

Many lodges, resorts inns and hotels.　She stayed at Kurumayama Skypark Hotel in 2006. She remembers the hotel had a magnificent view from her room and thetir onsen facility was great.

-  Affordable Hotels in Kurumayama:

FYI →　(http://rurubu.travel/hotel-list/200405/ <Japanese>)

-  Travel Expenses:

JPY 35,000 - 40,000 at most including everything.  The more the cheaper by sharing a rental car.

-  Local Tourist Information Center:

Kurumayama Kogen Tourism Association  

Nagano Prefecture Tourism Association

All-in-one resort capital in the Japan Alps, Star-Watching Waking Tour

Destination:  Kurumayama Plateau, Nagano Prefecture (Distance from Tokyo: 195km, approximately 122 miles)

Map → http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/location/regional/nagano/sirakabako_yatugatake.html 　

Date:  August, 2007　

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

What do you usually see in your town, when you look up to the sky at night? Can you see stars shining like diamonds above your head?  If so, that’s great.  But in big cities, there is usually no starlight you can clearly see at night.  Showy neon signs and street lights are much brighter than the stars are under the smoggy sky.  No exception here in Tokyo.   

So you have to get out of town to let them catch your eyes and have such a romantic moment.  And the three ladies knew what they had to do to make it happen to them. 

After their dinner, they participated in the main event of the trip, which was a star-watching walking tour.  

This tour offers you a real planetarium environment.  It began with a brief session at Sky City Café located at the halfway to the top of Mt. Kuruma around 8:00pm.  A couple of tour guides were waiting for the participants coming into the café which showed a mystic atmosphere in the darkness of the mountain.  Some tasty herb tea was served and then the guides gave the people the kind explanation about the stars they could see during the tour.

Photo of Sky City Cafe from a website.
A camera of my wife didn't work well to take
a night picture.

 A session at the cafe
Photo extracted from a website 

Booklet about the stars on Mt. Kuruma

After the quick lesson, people filled out an insurance form to prepare for an unpredictable accident. The “be prepared and have no worries” approach was needed to the mountain at night. After they were all set, it was time to take off.  

All of them were fascinated by the spectacle illumination of shining stars as soon as they got out the café.  The myriad radiant stars were all over the sky and dazzled the participants with their beauty.  Everywhere they looked up, there was nothing but the stars.  

The surroundings were all dark and no light existed except the small flashlights they held in their hands.  Only the stars were shinning and the people realized how they could twinkle so brightly in the circumstances of no artificial lights.

Stars of Mt. Kuruma.
Photo extracted from a website.
Her camera was totally no use for 
taking this type of picture.

They walked down about 30 minutes and the tour came to end with a small surprise. Each of them was given a star sign card according to their own sign at the end of the tour. None of them expected that they’d get a gift like that.

Star sign card.
The sign of my wife is basically the Cancer, 
but the card says the Gemini because of a 
different zodiac system the tour uses.

But one question quickly came up to my wife’s mind, that is “how did they get to know our birthdays??”  One of the tour guides gave her another kind explanation about a trick.

" You gave it to us about half hour ago."

" What?  We didn't.  I didn't talk about any personal stuff even with other participants.  How did you get it? "

" Here is a copy of your insurance form. "

As you may guess, those people were required to write down their date of birth on the form.  So filling out it had another purpose which was to allow the tour organizers to know the birthdays of all participants.  Such a nice arrangement.  

My wife said, if you are interested in a woman and want to win her heart, take this tour for her.    Too easy (sorry, too romantic) to let her fall in love with you. The beautiful stars in the sky will help you be successful with attracting somebody’s heart to you and those diamonds given by the nature are the most valuable things you can’t buy at any shop.  

At last, I got one more piece of advice from the ladies.  Don’t forget to take a light jacket out with you.  It’s a bit cold out there at night.  No jacket might decrease the interest of your favorite girl in the stars as well as in you. Good luck.

-------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------

Traveling Tips in Kurumayama

-  Getting there by:

Train;  Nagano Shinkansen to Sakudaira  (70 minutes). JPY12,340 for a one-way ticket.  (http://www.jreast.co.jp/e/routemaps/naganoshinkansen.html) 

Bus;  There are some companies offering highway bus services from Tokyo to the Kurumayama area (2.5 hours – 3 hours).  Approximately JPY5,000 for a round-trip ticket.

FYI → (http://www.alpico.co.jp/access/express/suwa_shinjuku/info_e.html)  

Car;  Chuo Expressway (2.5 hours – 3 hours) from central Tokyo.

-  To get around the Kurumayama area:

Strongly recommend to have a car.  Otherwise you need to depend on using local bus services or taxis to go around in the broad area which is, time-wise and cost-wise, not a good idea. If 3-4 people share the cost of renting a car, it shouldn’t be so high.

FYI →　（http://www.ekiren.co.jp/index.html） (http://rent.toyota.co.jp/en/index.html) 

-  Accommodation in Kurumayama:           

Many lodges, resorts inns and hotels.　She stayed at Kurumayama Skypark Hotel in 2006. She remembers the hotel had a magnificent view from her room and thetir onsen facility was great.

-  Affordable Hotels in Kurumayama:

FYI →　(http://rurubu.travel/hotel-list/200405/ <Japanese>)

-  Travel Expenses:

JPY 35,000 - 40,000 at most including everything.  The more the cheaper by sharing a rental car.

-  Local Tourist Information Center:

Kurumayama Kogen Tourism Association  

Nagano Prefecture Tourism Association

All-in-one resort capital in the Japan Alps

Destination:  Kurumayama Plateau, Nagano Prefecture (Distance from Tokyo: 195km, approximately 122 miles)

Map →  http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/location/regional/nagano/sirakabako_yatugatake.html 　

Date:  August, 2007　

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Do you know how hot it is in Japan in the summer?  Maybe you don’t wanna know, because it’s CRAZY hot and muggy, too.  You can go crazier than the weather is by the heat waves.  Especially in big cities like Tokyo, it’s like hell because of the heat island effect and maybe more of the global warming. You feel the high temperature is attributed to something unnatural such as exhaust gas from vehicles.

So you wannna get away?  Of course you do.  So does everybody.  But do you have an idea of where to go to pursue the natural mild summer weather in Japan?  Ask my wife. She knows how to cool herself down in a summer retreat. 

In August of 2007, she had a 2-day trip to Kurumayama Plateau in Nagano prefecture with two friends of her to be revitalized. Me? Left behind in a hell of the hot city.  But it’s OK.  I’m happy as long as she is happy.  Anyway the following story is about the memories of her and her friends.

Friends of her

Nagano is, as many of you may know, famous for its abundance of nature.  A lot of mountains, plateaus, lakes, camping sites, onsens, etc.  Probably only missing element is beaches, because the prefecture doesn’t face any coastline within their municipal limits.

Except that disadvantage, this alpine prefecture is one of the best resort destinations in the country.  Many people are attracted by the cool highland weather in the summer, while skiers/snowboarders can relish the powder snow on the slopes in the winter.  Any season is great to visit Nagano and it is equipped with a lot of pleasures. It’s an all-in-one resort capital.

And Kurumayama Plateau centering around Mt. Kuruma is located almost in the middle of the prefecture.  Its average elevation is higher than 1,500m (approximately higher than 4,920ft) and there are many tourist attraction places in it and the neighbor areas.

My wife and her company hit the road towards Mt. Kuruma.  After getting off from the Chuo Expressway, a beautiful scenic drive course, called Venus Line, was waiting for them. 

They drove through several sightseeing spots such as Tateshina Farm, Lake Shirakaba, Kirigamine Plateau on the way to the final destination.   The rich greenery of grass and trees and a variety of alpine flowers were greeting three ladies. 

@ an observation deck of Venus Line

 Venus Line landscape

    

Venus Line landscape

@ an observation area

They arrived at Mt. Kurama in the afternoon and took a casual half-day trekking tour to explore the mountain.  They first visited Yashimahara Wetland which is a main featuring spot of the tour.  There are more than 500 species of alpine plants existing out there. They enjoyed the blessings of nature with the spectacular landscape.

Yashimahara Weltland

Yashimahara Wetland

  

After they hiked down about 3 hours, they reached Kurumayama Wetland which is another wetland of the mountain.  And they had a late lunch break at a café of Colobockle Hütte, a famous hut built in 1956 beside the wetland (their blog page →　http://koro1956.exblog.jp <Japanese>).  

This hut (a rough translation of its name is “hut of plant fairies”) not only provides you the accommodation but serves the tasty homemade food.  My wife enjoyed a dish of mushroom pilaf, cheese cake, and special coffee brewed with the natural mineral water they got from their deep well.  The lunch time also gave the ladies a magnificent view by allowing them to overlook the whole area of the wetland from a patio of the café.

On the trekking course

On the trekking course

On the trekking course

Kurumayama Wetland

After the full range of activities they were able to do, they finally checked in a very cozy resort inn, Bonheur.  She said a full-course French dinner was great, but she lost pictures of them.

Bonheur

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Traveling Tips in Kurumayama

-  Getting there by:

Train;  Nagano Shinkansen to Sakudaira  (70 minutes). JPY12,340 for a one-way ticket.  (http://www.jreast.co.jp/e/routemaps/naganoshinkansen.html) 

Bus;  There are some companies offering highway bus services from Tokyo to the Kurumayama area (2.5 hours – 3 hours).  Approximately JPY5,000 for a round-trip ticket.

FYI → (http://www.alpico.co.jp/access/express/suwa_shinjuku/info_e.html)  

Car;  Chuo Expressway (2.5 hours – 3 hours) from central Tokyo.

-  To get around the Kurumayama area:

Strongly recommend to have a car.  Otherwise you need to depend on using local bus services or taxis to go around in the broad area which is, time-wise and cost-wise, not a good idea. If 3-4 people share the cost of renting a car, it shouldn’t be so high.

FYI →　（http://www.ekiren.co.jp/index.html） (http://rent.toyota.co.jp/en/index.html) 

-  Accommodation in Kurumayama:            

Many lodges, resorts inns and hotels.　She stayed at Kurumayama Skypark Hotel in 2006. She remembers the hotel had a magnificent view from her room and thetir onsen facility was great.

-  Affordable Hotels in Kurumayama:

FYI →  http://rurubu.travel/hotel-list/200405/ (Japanese)

-  Travel Expenses:

JPY 40,000 at most including everything.  The more the cheaper by sharing a rental car. 

-  Local Tourist Information Center:

Kurumayama Kogen Tourism Association  http://www.kurumayama.com/e/index.htm 

Nagano Prefecture Tourism Association  http://www.go-nagano.net/ (Japanese)

Onsen Trip to Hakone, Day 2

Destination:  Hakone, Kanagawa Prefecture (Distance from Tokyo: 96km, approximately 60 miles)

Map →  http://www.jnto.go.jp/eng/location/regional/kanagawa/hakone.html 　

Date:  November, 2007
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Have you waken up early in the morning and injected a lot of fresh clean air of highland into your body?  If so, you might know how it feels. It’s so nice huh? (unless you have a hangover).  On the second day of our stay in Hakone, we got up around 6:00am and started the day with taking a walk in the hotel’s neighborhood to get that feeling.

The whole Hakone area actually consists of several onsen towns from the foot of its mountains near Hakone Yumoto station. And the town we stayed is, called Sengokuhara, the highest and deepest onsen spot in the area.

Sengokuhara

  

Sengokuhara in the morning

The higher the better was true in Hakone. It was very quiet only with the sound of breeze and singing voice of birds.  Our 60-minute walk was nothing but awesome. We were totally refreshed by the clean air of mountain plateau. It was a good exercise to wake up our stomach, too.  A buffet style normal breakfast became look like a special meal to us.

After checking out the hotel, we went to Mt. Komagatake which stands beside Lake Ashi and is probably the best viewing spot for the lake, Mt. Fuji.

Mt. Fuji from Mt. Komagatake

@ the top of Mt. Komagatake

@ the top of Mt. Komagatake

    

@ the top of Mt. Komagatake

You might see the famous coastline of Shonan beach from its crest, if you are lucky enough to hold the weather. It did happen to us, but not clear enough to take a good picture. So please take a look at one form a website  ↓↓↓

Shonan Coastline

Unfortunately the Hakone Freepass didn’t cover the transportation fares to access to the top of the mountain. We had to use different bus and cable car services, but wasn’t expensive.

We came back down to the lakeshore and stopped by at a shopping facility  which is operated by a famous hotel company for lunch.  This place is probably the best to get your Hakone souvenir because of the variation of goods.

But we found more important stuff for ourselves than something for somebody else.  Another locally brewed beer, Hakone Beer.  No description needed. Just try it. I can promise you it’s so good.

Hakone Beer

This beer brewery runs their own restaurant which is a couple of stations away from Hakone Yumoto.   You can enjoy their lineup with great local food out there.

We came back to Shinjuku station around 7:00 PM after the full of enjoyment in Hakone. It was still a bit too early go home without having additional post-journey excitement. So we dropped in at a bar nearby the station and talked about how fun our trip was with some beer.

Hakone’s one of big advantages is this – the closeness to central Tokyo. You can enjoy an extra night activity back in Tokyo after your trip, if your energy remains.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Traveling Tips in Hakone

-  Getting there by:

Train;  Odakyu Line from Shinjuku Station (90 minutes). JPY 5,000 for a 2-Day Hakone Freepass ticket.  (http://www.odakyu.jp/english/freepass/hakone_01.html)

Bus;  Bus service wouldn’t be a good option to get there from Tokyo. 

FYI → (http://www.odakyu-hakonehighway.co.jp/pdf/english.pdf)

Car;  Tomei Expressway (2 -3 hrs) from the central Tokyo

-  To get around the Hakone area:

The Hakone Freepass works best to explore the Hakone area.  It allows you to use the public transportation services, trains, cable cars, buses, and boat on Lake Ashi without any additional charge.  You can get to most of the sightseeing spots of Hakone with the pass.

-  Accommodation in Hakone:      

The hotel rates in Hakone are expensive.  It’s unavoidable. Finding good accommodation at an inexpensive price might be a tall order.  But you’d better not be stingy to make your trip memorable.  The cheaper, the worse in Hakone.  Although you don’t have to stay at a super deluxe hotel, those hotels are definitely worth of the price.

-  Affordable Hotels in Hakone:

FYI  → http://www.hoteltravel.com/japan/hakone/hotels.htm (Japanese)

-  Travel Expenses:

We spent approximately JPY 18,000 apiece for the 2-day trip including everything.  You might have to prepare additional JPY 10,000 – 20,000 for your lodging expense.  But the total cost wouldn’t much exceed it thanks to the service package of Hakonne Freepass. Everything else other than hotel fees remains at the normal price.

-  Local Tourist Information Center:

Hakone Town Tourist Association  http://www.hakone.or.jp/english/index.html

Hakne Navi  http://www.hakonenavi.jp/english/index.html