The posts and summary for the whole trip, can be found here
♥November 29th Friday Night♥
Heavy snow fall started after we left Takayama 高山, and it slowed us down getting to Shirakawa-go 白川郷.
(A bit about Shirakawa-go 白川郷. From Japan-guide.com and Wiki : The Shirakawa-go 白川郷 and neighboring Gokayama 五箇山 regions line the Shogawa River Valley in the remote mountains that span from Gifu to Toyama Prefectures. Declared a UNESCO world heritage site in 1995, these villages are famous for their traditional gassho-zukuri 合掌造り farmhouses, some of which are more than 250 years old.
The Gasshō-zukuri, "prayer-hands construction" style is characterized by a thatched and steeply slanting roof resembling two hands joined in prayer. The design is exceptionally strong and, in combination with the unique properties of the thatching, allow the houses to withstand and shed the weight of the region's heavy snowfalls in winter.)
We were adviced by Shirakawa-go Tourist Association 白川郷観光協会, where we booked our farm stay from, to arrive at the information centre before 5pm to be shown to our farm house.
When we got to Ogimachi Village 荻町集落, the biggest and more popular village for tourists, where we would be spending the night in, it was after 5pm and it was pitch dark, except for a convenient store. The hubs went to ask for direction to Yoshiro 与四郎, where we'll be staying. A lady came out of the store and told us to follow her car, in the heavy snow fall! I'm really in awe of all the help we'd received in Japan!
Yoshiro 与四郎 is a small farm house with about 4 rooms. It wasn't one of my choices when I sent my inquiries to Shirakawa-go Tourist Association, but glad that we were assigned this farm house. Another group from Thailand arrived at the same time as us. The 4 Thais, refusing to be split into 2 rooms had to be given the bigger room which the owner, an elderly lady, had originally assigned to us. The owner kept apologising to us, "I am sorry. I am sorry." and bowed her head. She told us that Zaria will not be charged anything (we were meant to pay ￥5,000 for Zaria).
The room we got was small but clean, rooms were not en suite. I went with the girls to bath at the common bath room, where a big hot tub of water was awaiting us.
Dinner was served at the common dining room at 7pm. Although children were charged at a cheaper rate (and Zaria free this round), all the portions served were the same. Zaria's main was Hida beef slices, while we got chicken. (And Zaria said her beef was so soft and very yummy).
We were overfed and the food was delicious!
We were then entertained by the owner playing popular Japanese tunes (Doraemon theme song, Sakura) on her shanisen 三味線, a Japanese instruments with 3 strings.
And she asked us to play for her after that, all of us had a go, but no one could produce tunes she did. We had great fun though, laughing at each other's attempts.
The dining room was filled with laughter from all our failed attempts!
While we were dining and being entertained, someone went to our room to set up our futons. Because of the cold, we each had a heater box placed under our blankets. As there was nothing else to do, we all had an early night.
♥November 30th Saturday♥
We were woken up by hub's return from his early drive out. He told us it was beautiful outside, everything was covered in snow!
He showed us the photos he took where everything was covered in snow, and the girls immediately got up from their warm futons and wanted to go out and play. I insisted we have breakfast first as it was ready.
We were served a big breakfast, with rice and a hotpot of chicken (which were not in the picture).
I did the packing, and the hubs brought the girls out to play.
The girls were so happy to step on crisp snow!
We thanked the owner, while she kept repeating "I am sorry. I am sorry."; paid her (and yes, she didn't charge Zaria), and left Yoshiro.
The hubs brought us to the viewing point, which he went in the morning.
The good thing about staying in the farm house is, we got to enjoy the place before the first bus from nearby cities arrived.
But looks like some early riser beat us to making the first snow man.
We quickly got to work and made ours too.
We got a really good view of Ogimachi Village 荻町集落 from the viewing point.
The area around view point seems like it's popular for locals to exercise too.
The girls had their share of exercise too by gathering balls of snow, and tossing at each other, dodging and laughing all the time. It's nice to see them so happy enjoying the snow.
We went back to the village. It was a sunny day, and the snow was melting away, so it got pretty wet every where. However, it was still beautiful and serene.
The girls, especially Zaria, was enjoying all the slopes she could find climbing up them, sliding down on her buttocks, doing cart wheels or whatever stunt.
We thought we would visit another village in Gokayama 五箇山 area, and we picked the nearest Suganuma Village 菅沼集落. It's a small and quiet village with not many tourists nor locals.
We break for tea at a quaint cafe 茶房掌, even in such a small village, the coffee and biscuit served were really good.
And then attracted by a sweet aroma, we stopped at a snack shop for Gohei Mochi 五平餅, a snack available in this region made with rice, coated with miso sauce and then grilled; and a bowl of red bean soup
Before we headed to our next destination, Zara and Zaria enjoyed the last bit of snow available right outside the restroom at Suganuma Village parking lot. It would probably be a while before they get to see snow again.
♥November 29th Friday Night♥
Heavy snow fall started after we left Takayama 高山, and it slowed us down getting to Shirakawa-go 白川郷.
(A bit about Shirakawa-go 白川郷. From Japan-guide.com and Wiki : The Shirakawa-go 白川郷 and neighboring Gokayama 五箇山 regions line the Shogawa River Valley in the remote mountains that span from Gifu to Toyama Prefectures. Declared a UNESCO world heritage site in 1995, these villages are famous for their traditional gassho-zukuri 合掌造り farmhouses, some of which are more than 250 years old.
The Gasshō-zukuri, "prayer-hands construction" style is characterized by a thatched and steeply slanting roof resembling two hands joined in prayer. The design is exceptionally strong and, in combination with the unique properties of the thatching, allow the houses to withstand and shed the weight of the region's heavy snowfalls in winter.)
We were adviced by Shirakawa-go Tourist Association 白川郷観光協会, where we booked our farm stay from, to arrive at the information centre before 5pm to be shown to our farm house.
When we got to Ogimachi Village 荻町集落, the biggest and more popular village for tourists, where we would be spending the night in, it was after 5pm and it was pitch dark, except for a convenient store. The hubs went to ask for direction to Yoshiro 与四郎, where we'll be staying. A lady came out of the store and told us to follow her car, in the heavy snow fall! I'm really in awe of all the help we'd received in Japan!
Yoshiro 与四郎 is a small farm house with about 4 rooms. It wasn't one of my choices when I sent my inquiries to Shirakawa-go Tourist Association, but glad that we were assigned this farm house. Another group from Thailand arrived at the same time as us. The 4 Thais, refusing to be split into 2 rooms had to be given the bigger room which the owner, an elderly lady, had originally assigned to us. The owner kept apologising to us, "I am sorry. I am sorry." and bowed her head. She told us that Zaria will not be charged anything (we were meant to pay ￥5,000 for Zaria).
The room we got was small but clean, rooms were not en suite. I went with the girls to bath at the common bath room, where a big hot tub of water was awaiting us.
Dinner was served at the common dining room at 7pm. Although children were charged at a cheaper rate (and Zaria free this round), all the portions served were the same. Zaria's main was Hida beef slices, while we got chicken. (And Zaria said her beef was so soft and very yummy).
We were overfed and the food was delicious!
We were then entertained by the owner playing popular Japanese tunes (Doraemon theme song, Sakura) on her shanisen 三味線, a Japanese instruments with 3 strings.
And she asked us to play for her after that, all of us had a go, but no one could produce tunes she did. We had great fun though, laughing at each other's attempts.
The dining room was filled with laughter from all our failed attempts!
While we were dining and being entertained, someone went to our room to set up our futons. Because of the cold, we each had a heater box placed under our blankets. As there was nothing else to do, we all had an early night.
♥November 30th Saturday♥
We were woken up by hub's return from his early drive out. He told us it was beautiful outside, everything was covered in snow!
He showed us the photos he took where everything was covered in snow, and the girls immediately got up from their warm futons and wanted to go out and play. I insisted we have breakfast first as it was ready.
We were served a big breakfast, with rice and a hotpot of chicken (which were not in the picture).
I did the packing, and the hubs brought the girls out to play.
The girls were so happy to step on crisp snow!We thanked the owner, while she kept repeating "I am sorry. I am sorry."; paid her (and yes, she didn't charge Zaria), and left Yoshiro.
The hubs brought us to the viewing point, which he went in the morning.
The good thing about staying in the farm house is, we got to enjoy the place before the first bus from nearby cities arrived.
But looks like some early riser beat us to making the first snow man.
We quickly got to work and made ours too.
We got a really good view of Ogimachi Village 荻町集落 from the viewing point.
The area around view point seems like it's popular for locals to exercise too.
The girls had their share of exercise too by gathering balls of snow, and tossing at each other, dodging and laughing all the time. It's nice to see them so happy enjoying the snow.
We went back to the village. It was a sunny day, and the snow was melting away, so it got pretty wet every where. However, it was still beautiful and serene.
The girls, especially Zaria, was enjoying all the slopes she could find climbing up them, sliding down on her buttocks, doing cart wheels or whatever stunt.
We thought we would visit another village in Gokayama 五箇山 area, and we picked the nearest Suganuma Village 菅沼集落. It's a small and quiet village with not many tourists nor locals.
We break for tea at a quaint cafe 茶房掌, even in such a small village, the coffee and biscuit served were really good.
And then attracted by a sweet aroma, we stopped at a snack shop for Gohei Mochi 五平餅, a snack available in this region made with rice, coated with miso sauce and then grilled; and a bowl of red bean soup
Before we headed to our next destination, Zara and Zaria enjoyed the last bit of snow available right outside the restroom at Suganuma Village parking lot. It would probably be a while before they get to see snow again.
