Roving Japan

Day 78 Photoset

Mr. Itoh scheduled the interview for this afternoon at a Nakasendo post town called Okute-juku.

We arrived with all our gear packed up and ready to go. I didn’t want the reporter to look at our bags and see empty water bottles or something. We were fully loaded.

The town was pretty small, and I don’t think there was a single shop open. But it was still neat looking, and we managed to get a couple decent photos. One interesting thing was the old fire hydrant (basically a wooden bucket with water inside).

The reporter showed up about 10minutes after we did, and the three of us sat down and talked about our trip. She asked us questions about what we thought of Japan, and where our favorite places are. She also wanted to know what we thought about Gifu prefecture. We talked for about 20minutes, then we took a photo by the old bulletin boards as you enter the town.

While we were doing this, Hiro was taking photos with his camera. We haven’t gotten his copies yet, so I’ll post them when we get them.

The reporter told us that the story would run in the paper in 2 days at the earliest. In 2 days we should still be in Gifu, so hopefully we can see the article. If not, I bet Kazuhiko or someone in the family can save us a copy.

After the reporter left, Mr. Itoh took us on a drive around the town. Tomorrow we will start walking again, but we going to start from the next post town. Since we will miss this area, Mr. Itoh wanted us to see what we would be missing!

We are really glad he did, because this stretch of the Nakasendo is actually one of the best preserved. At one point we got out of the car and followed the old road up into the mountain. It was really cool since this stretch had the original stone pavement.

We almost missed it, but Mr. Itoh also wanted to show us the “Ichiri-zuka”. These two large grassy hills built next to the road were actually original markers on the Nakesendo. Back when the highway was still in use, these mounds were found every 4km.

Since this was our last night, we stopped at a grocery store on the way home and stocked up on supplies. We bought a new umbrella to replace the one I forgot at Kazuhiko’s house - I decided to get a bright orange umbrella so cars can see us easier. We also got new water bottles and some snacks. Woohoo!

Today was the last day of the sumo tournament, Kotooshu had a good showing, but lost the title to the Yokozuna Hakuho. Oh well, it was still an exciting tournament!

This evening we all went to the Onsen and had a nice good-bye dinner. Mr. Itoh’s dad had some friends from Taiwan visiting, so they joined us as well.

I lasted about 14minutes in the sauna this time. It was torture. I still can’t believe these guys do it every night.

Tomorrow morning we are going to get a ride to Kamado where we will start walking again!