Wednesday, 14 May 2025

14th May - Omihachiman

A rare day of being self-propelled - no buses or trains, though we did use a cableway to go up a small hill.

Up this morning at a more sedate hour than has been normal for this trip and away on foot to go up Omihachiman's hill by cableway. At the base of the hill was yet another shrine. Just as well they are all very different as we have seen probably hundreds.

Up to the top of the hill on the funny little cableway, which only had two cars, one heading up as the other heads down. Great views from the top of the hill, looking back over Omihachiman and out the other way to Azuchi where we were yesterday. Quite a few steep step from the cableway end to the very top, and more coming down. Our legs are a little weary after three consecutive days of very tall and steep steps.


Looking back to Azuchi Hill where we were yesterday

The maples are spectacular, green or red

On coming back down we thought we'd have a look at La Collina, a strange place that was a mix of a theme park and gifts shops. The architecture was interesting, with various gift shops all round a central garden area. One shop for example had a London bus, a Fiat 500 and an old Citroen van, who knows why, as its private theme, but was in fact just a cafe. 


The prime place was a factory producing little sponge rolls, where you could see the whole process and then buy a few rolls afterwards at vast expense - over $20 for three slices. Almost every Japanese group leaving the complex was carrying a little bag of goodies.

A small part of the sponge roll production line

On our way back to our room we were looking for antique shops and had tagged a few on Google Maps, but we stumbled on another on the way, and managed to find half a dozen of the little sake bowls we have collected each previous trip. Better still, they were priced at rates we saw on our first Japan trip, i.e $1-3 each!

Back to our room for the afternoon to sort things for the next leg to Matsumoto.

Dinner was fun. We have had very few udon or soba noodle meals, so thought we'd try for one tonight, given our next two nights are already sorted. It was tricky finding one, but we did find one in the end and headed out at 6pm. It was a bit of a walk and so it was quite disappointing to be turned away at the door as the restaurant was full. We found another using Google (the wifi gizmo we carry has been invaluable) and headed off an another 15 minutes' walk. This next restaurant was open.

It was a family udon fast-food place. You stand in a queue, let the first staff member know what you want and you collect a tray. You can see the nice fat noodles being cooked in front of you. He dips them in boiling water again, then puts them in a vacuum machine which sucks away the water. They are dropped in your huge, large or standard noodle bowl on the tray. You collect another flat dish and load that with any extras you choose, from a selection of tempura goodies - shiitake, prawns, sweet potato, fish etc. 

Prepping the noodles

Collecting tray, noodles and extras

As you get to the other end of the counter the till lady looks at the tag you've been given (blue=meat) and the size of the bowl to work out the cost. She has seen your tag and already has your chosen main toppings sizzling away ready to de dropped on your noodles. After you've paid, you use a dashi tap to add the amount of nice dashi soup you desire. It's then off to another table where you add tempura bits, nori seaweed, spring onions, chilli, garlic and ginger. You fill a little bowl of tempura dipping sauce and take it all to your table.

Adding toppings to my udon

It was delicious, as good as we've had. And what a lot of fun working out the menus and how it all works. We have had to stand back and observe many times this trip to see how to go about things, from the automatic coffee machines at 7-Eleven, to how to order and then deal with your used plates at a restaurant. Mostly we get it sorted ourselves, sometimes somebody comes and helps.