Distance Walked - 14km
Only a short day of walking today for which I was very grateful. We started by visiting a museum at the barrier station at Kiso-Fukushima and getting the history of how/when people could travel during the Tokugawa Shogunate. It was a very controlled society.
Afterwards we were bused to the base of a beautiful waterfall. We took a detour from the Nakasendo Way today to climb up to the Kaida plateau. This is actually the caldera of a dormant/extinct (I hope) volcano. It was huge - about 12km in diameter. We climbed up to the plateau over the Jizo Pass. It was tough - 300m ascent over about 2.5km. I was really struggling after yesterday.
After getting to the top there was an easy, level walk to our lunch stop at Kanda-Popoya. This is a restaurant/gift shop in a small village run by this mad couple who have retired from Tokyo. There were spectacular views of the snow capped peaks of the nearby active Mt Ontake volcano from their patio.
They fed us salad (chopped, raw cabbage) and bread (!) rolls - made with walnuts and raisins. Then we had pizza (!) - alsmost a biscuity textured base topped with miso, mushrooms, tomato and too much cheese. For dessert we got to have either apple cake or chocolate cake. While we were eating dessert the husband played us a tune on a traditional 3 stringed guitar-like instrument. Then we all sang (the chorus) of a traditional folk song. After that the wife played us a couple of songs on her harmonica - she was very good. Finally the husband turned on his model railway that ran through the garden.
After this mad experience we hiked on to stables where they rear the local Kaida ponies, stopping to pat them and take many photos. Then on to a local bus stop. We took this bus to the base of a peak which I think was the remains of a volcanic plug or perhaps just a lump of harder rock left over after our volcano collapsed.
Climbing this peak was even tougher - 300m ascent again but over only 1.5km. It had become overcast and drizzly but we all did it. We all even took the 400m detour from the path over the pass to the very peak. Even though the clouds were coming down the 360 degree views of the rim and the surrounding mountains with all the villages in the plateau were superb and well worth the effort. Then it wa a quick, downhill walk through the rain, to our inn for the night.
Again, I have an enormous room with "just" an ensuite toilet and sink. The onsen here are real mineral springs. All of us, except Paula, went immediately for a good, long soak before dinner. Paula waited until we were all done.
Dinner included the traditional whole trout (I'm getting very tired of it) plus beef cooked in miso over a hot cube of ethanol (yum - the beef not the ethanol) plus grandma's homemade soba noodles. And so to bed.
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