Haven't We Been Here Before?

We left Narusawa Lodge around 6am, determined to get a bold start to what was going to be a difficult climb. We were only going to cycle about 30km, but it was all uphill. Starting in Nikko, at an elevation of 570m, we slowly worked our way along the Japan Romantic Highway, up towards Lake Yunoko. 

Leaving Nikko, we were struck by the beauty of the place. There's a reason this is one of the prime vacation spots in all of Japan.

and leaving the town didn't change that at all.

A light sprinkle made everything a little misty

Gigi comes up for some air.

There is a section of the Romantic Highway called the "Iroha Slope" that is famous for the amount of hairpin turns as it climbs and descends. It is so tight, there are two slopes, one on the north side, one on the south side, that are one way traffic only. Iroha is essentially the ABCs in Japanese. There are 48 phonetic characters that make up Japanese kana. There are a total of 48 curves between the two, one for each Japanese hiragana character.

Here's a map of the slope we took. There are monkeys. Did I mention monkeys?

The curves and the climb did not disappoint.

Yuji-san said these slopes were popular for "drifting".
A driving technique I'll let you Google yourselves.
I doubt most of them survive.

At some of the curves, they posted elevation. This one is 1,173m (3,848ft)

It took us a good hour or so to make the climb. At the top, we were greeted by a few things

1. A level road, which felt like heaven
2. The TOP of the ropeway that takes people to the top of the mountain for skiing
3. A 2 mile long tunnel.

Better check your lights

Now, long tunnels can be pretty nerve wracking, especially if there's no sidewalk (there wasn't) and there's a lot of traffic (there was). However, this tunnel also had one thing going for it. It was all downhill. Like REALLY downhill. We sped through it without much pedaling in a matter of minutes, only seeing a handful of vehicles. It was a fantastic way to end a grueling climb.

Descending a short ways beyond the tunnel, we arrived at Lake Chuzenji, a large mountain lake near the very impressive Kegon Falls. The falls were pretty dangerous to climb to, so the Japanese, being Japanese, dug an elevator shaft 100m down through solid rock to a viewing area where visitors can now see the falls in all their majesty.

The main fall is about 100m

Pictures rarely do these things justice, so Sumi attempted to capture the scope on video.

At the top of the falls, there were, of course, stands selling stuff. This area is well known for Yuba, a soy-based paste they make many things with. One stand was selling Yuba croquettes, which we tried. They were quite yummy!

Cute? depictions of the croquettes...

Working our way along the northern shores of Lake Chuzenji, we came across the second of three Futarasan Shrines (the first was next to Toshogu back in Nikko). This Futarasan serves as the gateway to Mount Nantai and is known as one of the oldest shrines in Japan, dating back to 782.

Stairs...

and about 9,000 more stairs

The third Futarasan shrine is located at the summit of Futarasan, which is another name for Mount Nantai. This is the trailhead. It is 2,500m high and a seven hour hike. We passed. Maybe someday, but not during a cycling trip through the mountains. We barely made it up to this point.

As we continued along Lake Chuzenji, we realized we had been here before. Last year, when visiting Nikko for a few days before our taiko workshop, we had one not raining afternoon and took a bus out this way to visit the falls. In fact, we hiked all along the Senjougahara Plains and climbed the Ryuuzu no Taki falls to Lake Yunoko. It was very different cycling up here, but it was still just as beautiful. If you'd like some pictures, look here

Finally arriving at Lake Yunoko, elevation 1,478m, the smell of sulphur assaulted us.

Smelly, but beautiful

At the end of our 1000m climb, we rolled into Ohruri Sanso, the discount onsen resort hotel we had booked, and were quite relieved to sink into semi-luxury (onsen baths, included dinner, full size room). I say semi because:

1. Sumi accurately described the baths as "soaking in sulphur". I'm sure they'll say there's some health benefit for smelling like eggs after a bath.
2. We were sharing the onsen with tour groups of old Japanese people and some art school trip. 
3. The dinner was Haafubaikingu. This translates to "Half Viking". What? Well, only half the dinner was Viking. Still confused? You should be.

So, in the 50's a manager from the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo visited Sweden and was entranced with the Smörgåsbord (all-you-can-eat buffet) and brought the idea back to the hotel, where it was a hit. The problem was, Japanese are traditionally pretty bad at pronouncing other languages. Sumougasuboudo wasn't going to work for advertising, and there was no good way to shorten it. But wait, Viking! Vikings are Scandanavian! Smörgåsbord is Scandanavian! They're practically the same, really! As far as the Japanese were concerned anyway. So, they started calling their buffets "Viking" or "baikingu".

I have never seen such an aggressive queue as old Japanese people lining up for a buffet. They were quite literally lined up a good 20 minutes before they started serving. The non-Viking half of the meal was really quality looking raw fish, the rest was typical buffet food, for which I was grateful.

In any case, a good night, plus we get a full Viking breakfast tomorrow before leaving.