Japan 4: It is a new day, Part I

I surprisingly slept fairly well throughout the night.  Breakfast was vegetables and eggs.  Eggs tend to give me stomach problems, but as I didn't want to offend, I ate them anyway.  I had to come to a decision on what to do today.  One reason I tend not to do many "day trips" is because of my stomach problems.  On a bad day, travelling long distance back and forth from a place can be very, very bad.  Another reason, on this trip, is that with the driving being quite a bit different than I am used to, I'd rather keep it to a minimum.  There was also a third component in this situation.  No ryokan would take me for two nights in a row, so I had to have them book two different ryokans for a night each, in order to stay here for two nights.  Checkout is by 10 at the first place and check in at the second place was not til 3.  I could drop off the luggage, but it would be a bit weird that I arrived so early.

I decided to pack up my bags, put them in the car, and head out for the day.  There are a few things on the outskirts of Takayama, my next location, that I would not be able to get to easily without the car.  I am to drop off the car tomorrow, before checking in.  The drop off time for tomorrow is 12:00 pm, which would not give me much time to sightsee ahead of time.  Therefore, I decided to go there first.  I'd have the option to stop at the halfway point on the way back, at Shirakawago, the more commercial of these grass houses.

The drive to Takayama was about an hour and ten minutes.  About 2/3 of it was through endless tunnels under mountains.  As soon as I finished one, a few hundred feet later, a new one would start.  For a single tunnel, one was longer than any I had been in before.  They make the Holland and Lincoln tunnels into New York City seem like amateur hour.

I decided to start at a temple that had good reviews on google map, called Sukyo Mahikari.  It is a temple of a small religion, dedicated to finding "Light" inside of us and using it to heal others and so on.



The fountain is modeled after the Mayan style according to the pamphlet they gave me.



No photographs of the inside were allowed.  I was not even able to take one of the information pamphlet.



Next up was an open air museum about five minutes away from the temple, with the type of buildings present in the town that I am staying at.  They relocated a village and added information and exhibits to the houses.



One house had silk worms on a table, which were alive.  They gave information about making silk.  In the same house was a man sitting on the floor, created sandals out of what I assume is rope.



Another buildings had information about marriage that was fairly interesting.



They had even worse bathrooms than Vietnam.



In another house was a man that used a single handed blade to hand carve art.



An attraction that I was on the fence was nearby, a sort of bear museum.  It turned out to be a seven minute walk from where I was, so I decided to go for it.



I walked in and no one was at the ticket booth.  I tried saying "excuse me" and "good afternoon" a few times, louder and louder.  No one answered.  I let myself in.  The museum in and of itself is a little weird, but it was made even more weird and a bit creepy with no one around.  The following is a TON of pictures from the museums.  If you don't have interest in stuffed bears, skip to the next blog entry!



When I returned to the entrance, after having seen the whole place, a woman was sitting at the front desk.  I paid for admission and she directed me inwards.  I explained that I had seen the whole place already, and she directed me to the gift shop.  Gift shops in Japan continued the trend of being awesome.  This one was no different, albeit very expensive.  I will take pictures of all purchases from gift shops when I return from the trip and add a blog post about them.

The rest of my day continues in part 2.