Autumn and Colours

When people think of Japan's most beautiful season, they think spring - and what with all the cherry blossoms that bloom for that so-short time, you can't blame them. But autumn here is at least just as beautiful. Last year I wasn't expecting it, and was totally gobsmacked by the fiery colours that vividly lit up the mountains. Well, it's that time of year again, and the kouyou (紅葉 - changing colours) season has begun, so last weekend I was out to see and experience it. And let me tell you, I'm just as stunned this year as I was last year.

I caught up with my friend Noriko, and one of her friends Asami came along too. We drove out of the city for what must've been close to two hours, and driving past I got my first good look at the kouyou.



Our destination was actually a small art museum - not for the art, but for the food! Turns out they're into African dance, and another of their friends (who had lived in Africa for 2 years prior) was running a cafe with African food. Well, you all know how much I love food.

The food was fantastic and different, a nice change from Japanese flavours. It was a really good day, albeit a bit difficult, since 80% of the time I had to speak Japanese. Which, although my Japanese has improved a lot this year, and although it was awesome practice, can still be an exhausting task for a whole day.

Anyway, yesterday I headed up into the mountains with Luke and Scott. I've been to Togakushi a few times before - the first time, bare, twiggy trees jutted out of the snow. The second time, the trees were full, moist and green. (You might remember my comparison shot last year of the torii gate.) This time, most of the trees were shining anything from soft yellow to heavy crimson. Just beautiful.



Togakushi is famous for soba (noodles), and we were pretty set on having them for lunch... except that by the time we got there, the soba shops had closed. But we found a nice little pizza-pasta joint instead, for an early dinner. Imagine this: relaxing back in a cosy, warm log cabin, eating delicious pasta, with beautiful piano music playing in the background, while outside the mountain faded to pitch-black and was dead-quiet. Even when we left the restaraunt, we were the only sounds. It was so serene and peaceful... I could live there.

If you click on this sentence, you will be magically teleported to another page where you can view my photos of this year's kouyou season so far.

Now, I haven't updated for a while, so let's back-track a few weeks, back to when Claire and Lucy came to stay in Nagano!



I took them to Zenkoji Temple (Nagano's famous temple) and we went through the spiritual underground passage beneath it - which, I might add, is completely dark. The Buddhist monks of old times must have had nightvision goggles or something... Anyway, apart from that eternally-scarring moment in the passage where Claire wondered if she'd ever see daylight again, I think they both enjoyed themselves!