It’s around this point in a trip (or sooner) that I begin to miss my heated toilet seats. Not on this trip. My princess buns are toasty and happy. I have yet to encounter an unheated toilet seat, even on the train.

After Kyoto is the part of the trip that our robot overlord chose for us, and a place I have never been: up and into the middle region of Japan, between Kyoto and Tokyo. It is very functionally named “the middle region” (Chuubu/中部) so you can guess exactly where it is. It’s almost like the Danish named it (looking at you, Copenhagen/”Buying port”).

First, we go from Kyoto to Takayama, changing from the shinkansen to a local express in Nagoya. You take a train up and into the mountains, winding through a river through the mountain. They tell you Gifu Facts periodically as you go – about the crafts that depend on the river, the purity of the water, or the fishing technique the locals employed which used birds to fish. NEAT.

Takayama station is oddly trendy and tidy and also the station that time forgot because there are no IC cards at the gate. I physically handed a guy my tickets. That confused me. It was sure to confuse me when we leave, too. Please don’t tell me I am so far in the sticks that I have to use my cash money in this town because I like refilling my Suica IC Card in apple wallet with my Amex and paying with my phone, thus netting me a better exchange rate over cash money.

Fortunately, the station was just a weird outlier. I only have to use cash in vending machines and at the farmers’ market.

Takayama is known for its spring festival that uses big traditional parade floats. We’re a few weeks ahead of the festival but we’re here for the traditional town charm, the open-air market, street food, and noodles. Lots of noodles. Noodles made from the special Gifu Water that they told us about on the train.

I picked a temple stay for this leg of our trip because why not. I haven’t stayed in a temple before – we were going to in Korea, but it didn’t work out. So we’re at Zenkouji, which is a small guesthouse and a working temple.

It was too early for check-in, which meant it was noodles o’clock. We stopped at an old noodle shop, where they handmake the noodles using the local Gifu water. The noodles are goooood and the lowest sodium Japanese noodles I can have (shock!) so guess what I’ll be eating the rest of the trip (it’s zarusoba).

After noodle time, we wandered to the historic district to see some of the historic manors. We picked the Kusakabe house, which was filled with local crafts and belonged to a traditional moneylender. The house is totally ginormous, except for all of the low thresholds. Rhett does not bonk his head and we both in fact survive the death stairs. The little garden in back is beautiful.

The Kusakabe house is next to the Yoshijima house, which was owned by a sake brewer. This one has since been updated with more artistic touches, and there are some articles in the building (in Japanese) which talked about how the style of this home in the early 1900s influenced the arts & crafts movement. You can definitely get mid century modern vibes from it.

I fell prey to a melon soda topped with cotton candy on the way back from ye olde houses. It was like the one I had at the state fair but there were way less bees, so I was happy. I also wanted to see if I still hated Dango (mochi but hot & grilled) and to see if Rhett liked it, so we got some dango too. Shockingly, I no longer gag on the dango mouthfeel, but Rhett doesn’t like the flavor. Fair. And science: achieved.

The temple staff (members? monks?? people???) were super helpful and kind when we checked in. We got a history of the temple, a tour, and learned how to pray at a temple. I’ve actually never learned more than what we gleaned from Japanese friends in college…so the lesson was interesting and informative. Our room also came with a little book on Buddhism in Japan.

Our dinner was Indian food and it was the slowest dinner of my LIFE. It took our food an hour and a half to come and they didn’t even bring us water. That was probably the only time in my life I have ever seriously considered just leaving a restaurant. The honey cheese naan, when it came, was good though. As for the chana masala – well, I can make better. In less than 90 minutes, even if I am the one doing all the chopping.

The Australian Indians who sat next to us helped us heckle them and we complained about Japan’s lack of vegetarian food despite the strong buddhist traditions present. I gave them tips for Kyoto vegan restaurants and we were confused about Japan and honey cheese naan together. I wonder if they are still in that restaurant.

In the morning, I attended the prayer service the temple offered (at 7am!!!). We burned incense and joined in with chanting the heart sutra. It was a calming and meditative way to start my day off. The monk offered his own insight on what enlightenment meant to him – focusing on living in the present, like when you are focused on chanting one of the sutras. It was overall a worthwhile experience and they seemed really happy to share in their faith and the service with us.

Our morning mosey was over to the morning market in the old town. It it’s on the west side of the old town, next to the river.

There are street vendors selling produce, cappuccino in a cup made of a cookie (why do I get these things when I don’t like coffee?) which was good (!!), and then some taiyaki. It’s a bit early so there’s not a lot of produce, but the snacks and crafts were neat.

We visited the nearby shrine because we were right by it. This is the shrine that houses all of the temple floats and things for the spring festival. This place was surrounded by beautiful evergreen trees and smelled great. They had a gimmicky o-mikuji (fortunes) which would appear if you dunked them in the temple’s water. I couldn’t find them til the exit since the signs didn’t say where to buy them, so I got a normal one out of impatience. At least this lead to getting very good luck! (Stay away Menieres, please don’t be triggered)

After resisting all of the souvenir shops on the way home, we relaxed in the temple common area for an hour until it was train time. After much struggling, I managed to fold an origami grasshopper, my new pride and joy. Time for Kanazawa!