You might spend your holidays relaxing by the pool, reading a gripping novel or having lie-ins. While I do enjoy all of those things, I also have an incredible urge to do and see everything I possibly can in the limited time I have and so, at 7am I jumped out of bed and started getting ready. To be fair I didn’t really jump. I rolled and was half dead for a good hour but come 8.15am we were on our way to the subway, bound for Takayama. While the subway was crowded the Shikansen was comfortable and almost as relaxing as sitting by the pool reading a gripping novel. Almost.
I really enjoy seeing the country from a train window – you get a brief glimpse of all aspects of life from cities to small tows and the countryside in between. We saw homes, factories, skyscrapers and most impressively – mountains! The iconic layout of Takayama dates back to the 17th century and as one of Japans most atmospheric townscapes and the gateway to the Japanese alps and the Shirakawa-go UNESCO World Heritage Site, we knew we had to visit, even if it was only for one night! We arrived and made a beeline for our traditional guest house, Sumiyoshi Ryokan. Rated as TripAdvisor’s number one accommodation, this Meiji-era merchant’s house is home to the friendliest Japanese couple and within minutes had far surpassed our expectations. Our room, with traditional tatami mats, overlooked the river and came with traditional Japanese robes. We received welcome Macha Tea (which to be completely honest, was absolutely disgusting – Rory drank his and while I did try, mine went straight down the sink!) and once we’d freshened up we ventured out to explore the town.
All the walking had left us feeling pretty peckish so we headed off in search of the local speciality – Hida beef. We found a local restaurant and ordered two steaks (fillet for me and rump for Rory, obviously) which came with all the trimmings – salad, soup, appetisers, breads and the most tender steak I’ve ever had! I It was cooked to perfection and of such a high quality that I didn’t even notice a difference between the two cuts! Thoroughly satisfied we headed back to our Ryokan where our host had set up our beds, changed in to our traditional robes and headed to the private Onsen where we soaked in steaming hot water. After a busy few days this was the perfect end to the day and we got in to our beds feeling toasty warm and incredibly lucky to have experienced another exceptional day!
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