Higashinihon Morioka

I'm going to do this entry in 2 parts since there are so many pictures and it was a very long day.  We started out at 8:30 and headed to Dakikaeri Gorge.  This was very beautiful since the river that runs through the gorge is the most lovely shade of blue that is offset wonderfully by the lush green trees that surround it.  It seemed like we had a lot of time here but after trying to reach the waterfall ...

... to craftwork to survive. Which means that a lot of the houses here are involved in brewing soy sauce or miso, or making things with cherry bark, or ceramics. All this was nice to see too, and bad for my wallet, but it was the houses themselves that were the best. Many of the families have these giant thick barn-like buildings that are used as storehouses for things like pickles or family treasures. During the festival, the families put their prized heirlooms in the vault for people ...

La legende dit qu'un jour, la jolie princesse Takko Himme, voulant devenir encore plue jolie bu beaucoup d'eau de la region. Elle fut punie de son avidité en etant transformee en dragon d'eau. Cette transformation declencha de violents orages et la colere des elements naturels, ce qui aboutit a la creation du lac Tazawa, le plus profonf du Japon (423m). Non loin de la, Hachirotaro du ...

... il y a certaines especes non repertoriees de cerisiers pleureurs, des croisements qu'ils n'arrivent plus a faire de nos jours). Au nord de la ville il y a un grand Bouddha en bois de 10m de haut, impressionnant ! Experience interessante d'ailleurs puisqu'on a essaye d'y aller a pied mais trompé par une carte non a l'echelle, on a sous-estime la distance. Une dame qui passait par la a eu pitie de nous et nous y a conduit en voiture ! Kakunodate est un ...

I stopped off here on the way to Hokkaido to break up the journey. It was actually a bit of a let down as I seemed to arrive on a holiday and there was nothing open and I couldnt find the temples and museums I was looking for! There were some nice ice sculptures though and I had a good hike up a very steep hill. It is very mountainous here and quite beautiful.

... look out of the warm train window as the snow blanketed everything. Got on the next train just in time, this train was bound for Hachinohe and went back under the sea through the long tunnel to 'mainland' Japan. Then we got the bullet train, which seemed even faster after being on slower trains for a while, back to Morioka. We had some takeaway sushi on the train which was very nice as our first experience of it (although we went vegetarian, just in case). Once ...

... However after about 5 mins walk they'd caught up with us and asked us if we wanted to hop in with them. En route to the station we stopped to have a quick look at a view point looking over the valley. Beautiful, clear gorgeous crisp blue sky and all the red maple trees. As we got to the station we realised that all 5 of us from the lodge where heading in the same direction, at least to start with. It was nice talking to one of the ...

... suis partie faire le tour de la ville a la recherhce d'un starbuck cofee. entre temps je suis arriver par hasard au ruines de l'ancien chateau de morioka. la ville a transformer les fondations en un mega parc. Avec l'eclairage et les feuilles de toutes les couleurs, c'etait beau, mais encore une fois, les photos ne sont pas terrible. J'ai finalement trouver le starbuck coffee de morioka, je suis venu dejeuner ici pour profiter du wifi gratuit.

apres 4 heures de train, je suis arriver vers 14:00 a hakunodate, un village entoure de montagne qui contient un quartier de samourai. Dans ce quartier, il y a des anciennes maisons de samourais, ce sont plus des anciens domaines que des maisons. sur chaque site, il y a plusieur batiment, le tout derriere une palissade de bois. c`etait ben beau, mais comme la ...

... of tuna (fast becoming our favourite fish), salmon etc, on our way to the train, Jon bought a custard fish (a sweet fish shaped waffle stuffed with custard) , it was easily the best sweet thing We had eaten in a long time, most Japanese prefer red bean stuffing, we have tried this but it is really not so nice especially when compared to the custard one. Then we hopped back on the Shinkansen before reading all the way until we arrived back in the metropolis.