North to Nikko

Friday saw us head 150km north to the beautiful  traditional town of Nikko where Buddhist and Shinto shrines and temples exist side by side and have done so for some 1200 years.   The shrine area celebrates the Tokogawa shogunate – and is a particularly pretty town and a very popular tourist attraction.  The shrine, which consists of several buildings, is magnificent, ornately decorated and beautifully maintained and the autumn colours are just starting to show in the surrounding trees.  A long climb to the top of the mountain where the Shogun is buried certainly tested our fitness and we felt the effects on our calves and quads for quite some time afterwards.  A magnificent lunch in one of the local restaurants was another highlight.  The lunch consisted of a duck and noodle hot-pot, tempura vegetables and prawn, with pickled and fresh vegetables and mountain ferns with a bowl of rice and pots of green tea.

 On the return journey to Tokyo we visited the Meiji Emperor’s summer palace where the fantastic  gardens are just starting to show the autumn colours and we loved the walk around the gardens as well as our tour through the palace which is a huge timber house of many rooms – very simple and very beautiful.  There is little ornamentation and no furniture or pictures, the beauty lies in the simplicity and proportions of the rooms.  The inner court-yards which help to keep the house cool in the summer, are accessed by sliding screens and windows and create picture- like views of the gardens – a quite stunning experience.