Day 7 – Transit Day to Matsumoto

We awoke after a nice sleep in our traditional ryokan room. The host lady had aired our wet clothes and jackets from yesterday in a drying room and had them nicely waiting for us in a basket outside of our room. Breakfast was at 7:30am and, like dinner, included a whole bunch of different dishes. There wasn’t a menu, but it included salmon, eggs, rice, miso soup, and a variety of vegetables.

Forunately the rain clouds had lifted and we enjoyed a stroll through the beautifully preserved edo era village and being impressed by the architecture. The village runs in a straight line and is a kilometer long. The buildings are all wood, with eaves that jut over the street, and there are cute signs and lanterns outside the shops.

We caught the 11:20am train to Matsumoto, arriving at 12:20pm, and headed to our hotel, Onyado Nono Matsumoto. They wouldn’t let us check in early, but we dropped off our bags and took a walk through the night life area by the train station (pretty dead during the day) and then to a neighbourhood along the river that had a lot more going on (lots of school kids buying ice cream and some sort of local cold drinks). We ate at a “french cafe”, where Viki had a baked potato (which was a potato surrounded by pastry, with a horseradish sauce, and I had a deep fried curry pastry. We shared a chocolate scone, which had a lot more chocolate, and of higher quality, than what would be in such a scone back home. We also chatted with a Dutch family who had been travelling around Asia for 5 months with a 2.5 year old daughter and 4.5 year old son.

After lunch we headed back to check in to our hotel, which is quite nice. It’s a small room, but conveniently set up to make the most of the limited space. There was also a free welcome drink, free after 9:30pm soba noodles, free ice cream, and an incredible onsen. We took it in turns to go to the onsen, where there’s an indoor and outdoor hot pool along with a cold pool. It’s on the 10th floor and from the pools there are views over the surrounding mountains (remember, we’re still in the “Japanese Alps”).

Around 6pm we headed to a ramen resaurant “Ramen Sakura”, recommended by the hotel staff. It was miso ramen with spicy ground pork. Super flavourful, and very hearty. Henry ate quite a lot too. We then went for an evening stroll, saw Matsumoto Castle by twilight, and headed back by 8pm to put Henry to bed.