Today the skiew were overcast so we rethought our plans. Originally we were going to do the walk between Tsumago and Magome, two old post towns in Gifu-ken, however the weather did not bode well for walking. Indtead we headed up to Suwa lake where there was allegedly a natural geyser. The rain on the way was torrential but stopped when we arrived. As with many tourist attractions, they are not signposted but we took a guess and parked up near an old steam locamo...

Today we went for a walk around Matsumoto city. We ate breakfast at a coffee shop by the station Vie de France, which sold all sorts of unusual cakes, such as anko paste doughnuts, sweet potato muffins, pumpkin stuffed muffins and many more.Then we walked towards the castle. On the way we past the Yokashira shrine. Alongside it is a narrow street of shops and eateries, where frogs seem to be the coomon theme. There was a huge sculture of a lizard fighting a frog,...

We set off early towards the Tateyama National Park. We had a few doubts about the efficiency of the Sat Nav as it seemed to take us round in almost circles. We were heading up to Murudo to see Mt Tateyama, but all of a sudden the Sat Nav lost the route. We saw a sign for Shimyo Falls so decided to head up there. It wasn't far and at the Falls we saw a map which showed where Murodo was. We decided to walk up to the Falls which was about half an hours stroll. The ...

We were woken by the guests on the coach leaving. They had dressed, breakfasted and checked out by 7.30 am. We were not far behind. The Landlady and her daughter and grandchild wished us Goodbye and we realised that not a word of English had been spoken since we arrived. Joan explained in a round about way that she had once lived in Gifu-ken, After another potato salad "Morning set", we headed towards the UNESCO heritage site at Shirakawa valley. When Joan first ...

The inn we were staying at was on the outskirts of town, so we drove in to Takayama, parked by the station and ate breakfast in a cafe serving "Morning set" which are usually at reasonable rates. Kevin and had different breakfasts but both seemed to come with ice cream. Kevin was surprised when it turned out this was potato salad. Takayama is a small city but has lots of heritage. We crossed the river and came across the market where vegetables, pickles and Hida...