After Jigokudani, we got on the train to Takayama. Takayama is a small town nestled in the mountains with many well-preserved buildings from the Edo period, making it quite popular for tourists. I must confess, most of my pictures from here are the food!
Takayama is famous for its Hida beef, which is similar to Kobe beef but less pricey. It is served raw for the customer to cook over a tiny stove. It was amazing. We also got to try beef nigiri, which was to die for. And I had the best beef buns that I have ever tasted. I forgot what they’re called, but they sell them everywhere in Takayama and they’re SO GOOD.
We stayed at Hiroto’s AirBnB on 107 Sōyūjimachi. Hiroto runs a sento (traditional Japanese bathhouse). There is a tiny a spare room in the sento which he rents out to travelers. It was certainly not our most luxurious accommodations, but was quite culturally interesting. Hiroto let us have the sento to ourselves before the bathhouse opened, which was really nice and relaxing. On the night we arrived, Hiroto took us out to dinner at this one tiny bar that had 5 seats. There, we drank Kirin and sake and had the best yakisoba and fried oysters of our lives. We also had amazing salmon sashimi, which was better than the sashimi I had in Tokyo. We liked the restaurant so much that we came back the following night, and tried to order the same food using liberal helpings of Google Translate. We were mostly successful!
We also visited the Hida no Sato folk village, which is easily accessible by bus or by foot from downtown Takayama. Hida no Sato is an open air museum consisting of over 30 traditional houses from the Hida region during the Edo period. Many of the homes have thatched roofs and giant firepits. Several traditional artists have taken up residence in the village, and you can watch them practice their craft. The village holds daily craft classes where you can learn to make traditional Japanese crafts. Unfortunately some of the classes were full or ended early, so I would recommend looking up the schedule in advance.
WanderLiz 