Off to Nikkō

Nikkō is about 150 kms N of Tokyo in the mountains - about 1.5 hrs by Limited Express train. It is a long weekend so I am expecting things to be busy.

We needed time on leaving our apartment to make sure we had ticked off the 'to-do' list. We had allowed plenty of time to walk to the Tobu-Asakusa station including picking up stuff for breakfast and lunch at 7-Eleven. 

We were not at all hungry despite us only having a meagre snacking for ‘dinner’ last night; probably our big bowl of soba noodles at lunchtime yesterday at Ueno station held us through. Nevertheless, we enjoyed our brekky on the train.

Stairs only at the station - ugh. But very smart platform: a cut above the usual.

We were half an hour early but the train arrived then too (!): the Spacia-X and very space age-looking too!

There wasn’t much in the way of scenery until towards the end of the journey.

I finally had the chance to finish ‘An Artist of the Floating World’. A fascinating book about an artist (Ono-san) in post-war Japan after the surrender. Ono reflects on the past but ultimately wishes success for the new generation; he acknowledges that his past glory (his life and career floating away) is gone forever but finds gladness in his country’s recovery.

I did find it difficult to keep track of the various characters at times but I think this was because my reading of the book has been so stop-start.  

Kazuo Ishiguro has written several books including ‘Remains of the Day’ which was made into a film. He has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature and the Booker Prize and was knighted for services to literature.

I read the last page as the train pulled into Tobu-Nikkō Stn.

We pushed our suitcases into a locker and set off. Our Nikkō Pass covers the train (and our return) plus buses for 4 days.

We were the last to squeeze onto one of the buses and arrived a couple of kms later at the shrines.

Nikkō has long been a mountain retreat and the imperial family established a summer palace here in 1899; it is now a public memorial park.

Nikkō's origins go back to a mountain hermitage for a Buddhist priest in the 8th century and rose to fame in the 17th century when it was chosen as the site for the mausoleum of the powerful shogun, Tokugawa Ieyasu who unified Japan in 1603.

And can you believe, we are at 634 m - same height as the Tokyo Skytree!

We visited the Futarasan-Jinja shrine and then walked through an impressive avenue of giant cedar trees (the Nikkō Kaido Cedar Avenue created 400 years ago as a grand entrance to Tōshōgū shrine – and is the longest treed avenue in the world). 

Nice pair of boots!

We had a combination ticket and thought it included the Tōshōgū shrine - but didn’t. And only worked this out when we walked back along the avenue of cedars to the ticket office where we were put straight - and then walked BACK along the avenue of cedars - so we ticked that one off!!! 

We had a half-decent coffee at a museum cafe nearby - and ‘regrouped’.

The combo ticket included Rinno-Ji temple and Taiyu-in mausoleum - quite interesting with the three huge gold Buddhas 7.5 m high.

Now to do the Tōshōgū complex with its highly decorative shrine which honours the powerful shogun. 

Near the ticket station is a  nice 5-storey pagoda. 

This place was tourist-central! My goodness!! The queue for tickets was immense (and not helped by the fact that purchase was by machine-only and ours wouldn’t accept card and so we had to stuff in cash). I’m glad we started early today!! It was by now about 1:30 p.m. HUGE crowds. 

My favourite bits were the ‘Three Wise Monkeys’ carving and the Nemuri-neko ("sleeping cat") wood carving above the big gate that you walk through for the path leading up to the mausoleum of Tokugawa Ieyasu. Mind you, the path led to 207 stone steps: I have to admit to being quite breathless by the end!

It WAS pretty amazing but we definitely felt templed out and shrined out by the end. Two more (pikkies) for the road:

It was ‘only’ 3 o’clock but, being an overcast day, it felt much later. We walked down to a bus stop but found ourselves at the lovely red-arched Shinkyo (sacred) bridge. We had to ‘fight’ for a break for a photo opportunity in between people standing on it to get their photo taken.

By now it had started to rain - right on queue as per forecast - so we have been very lucky with the weather today.

We decided to walk the entire way back to the station; the buses were all full anyway. We soon came across a place advertising craft beer and really enjoyed one with a couple of women from the US who came in and joined us; it didn’t take long for the conversation to turn to Trump … we really enjoyed their company but now the tiny little place was ‘bulging at the seams’ with people, so we pressed on.

Still raining, we came to our hotel back near the station and checked in; dropped our backpacks in the room and set off to retrieve our luggage from the lockers at the station.

I noticed lots of food stalls across the road and saw how they did not have a lot left. We bought a potato dumpling each: the sign said 8 left: make that 6!

We trotted off with our bags and I said to MF-san that I reckon we should return soon as I felt they were likely to finish up (IT WAS ONLY 4:30 …).

Sure enough, we returned after dropping off our bags at the hotel and even in that short time, several stalls had sold out and were packing up. We bought 4 steamed buns and 4 parcels of rice and meat wrapped in bamboo I think and tied with string (?chimaki) which were delicious! Ate them at a chair outside. Sum total: 2000 yen ($A20). THAT solved dinner.

Back to the hotel which has surprised me as I thought it would be quite basic but it is quite comfortable - and has an onsen! Oh, how I have missed this the past 2 days with all the walking we have done! I enjoyed a good soak!

We have three nights at Nikkō but only one at this particular accommodation.

Walked 11 kms (but oh my: some of those stairs today!!