Mike picked me up and we went to the Katsumata’s log cabin, which had come a long way since we picked rice for them. I slept there with Kinko (their daughter) and Masa-san slept upstairs (Kinko’s friend who was going with us). Before going to bed we had tea and talk, and after the Katsumatas and Mike left Kinko, Masa and I continued to talk about all kinds of things. Their English is quite good so we had no trouble. At one point the conversation turned to my reasons for being in Japan and since I mentioned learning Japanese as one reason Masa-san said we should talk in Japanese then. I was wonderfully encouraged by the conversation. I can’t express myself very well, but I was amazing with how well I understood their questions. I spoke my mostly using nouns and gestures since I don’t know how to construct sentences well, but we talked for at least half an hour. I was free to ask about a word if I didn’t know it, but for the most part we got along decently in Japanese. I might be making this sound like I know more Japanese than I do, but I was so thrilled to go that long even if it was mostly do to their patient help. We went to bed far too late for getting up at 4:30am . . .
Saturday, Nov. 4th we left the house at 5am and were on our way to Nikko. The Kastumatas had come over at that crazy hour to give us tea and rice balls for the trip! Nikko is a few hours north of Tokyo, so it took us about seven hours to get there. We did some sightseeing along the way, so it wasn’t quite that far, but it was quite far! The four of us (Mike, Kinko, Masa, and I) had a good time talking. Masa-san lives in Tokyo and words as a security guard. We stopped at a number of waterfalls and enjoyed the changing leaves and nature. At one point we saw two deer! I was managing my cold pretty well. It was dumb not to get sleep especially with my cold and in the morning it was all I could do to keep from throwing up in the car. That lasted only an hour or so and the rest of the trip was fine, but for the fact that I got tired more easily when we were out hiking.
When we arrived in Nikko the traffic was crazy. Ever since they named one of the Nikko shrines a World Heritage Site the tourism has been steady. When we arrived, Kinko and I opted for a nap and the boys went for a walk. I would have loved to go, but I was exhausted. We woke up in time for a lovely dinner provided by the pension house. Afterwards we enjoyed the onsen (hot spring bath) and went to bed. Mike and Kinko got up for a run, but I slept until breakfast (also provided by the pension) and then we spent the day looking at the shrines and temples. I hadn’t realized that the three moneys of see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil, were famously carved here.
There were some other cool moments, but sadly I don’t know enough about the area to truly appreciate it. I enjoyed the time, though. We had dinner, bought some quick omiyage and headed home. They dropped me off at the Otsuki train station in time for me to get a train that got me home just before 11pm. I went right to bed after unpacking, so it made for an exhausting, though enjoyable weekend.