Ikaho Onsen – Oyado Tamaki MOKUREN

Posted on November 8, 2024 by borysSNORC

While we were off exploring, the staff at Oyado Tamaki moved our things into our other room for the next two nights.

I had a chance to take a few more photographs of the entrance to the ryokan when we returned from being out all day. I have to say that is a strange, and I am sure unintended, side effect of the overt hospitality of staying at these lovely inns… when you arrive, there are always staff *outside* to meet you, to help you with your bags and to valet park your car for you and usher you into the inn. The downside of this wonderfully welcoming hospitality, is that if you wanted a moment to take a couple of pictures of the beautiful gardens or the thoughtfully designed entrance to your ryokan you kinda can’t without gumming up the works. First there will be staff there, and you want to try to respect their privacy and not take their photography, and secondly, they are gently ushering you inside to welcome you with tea or beer and snacks, so it feels rude to keep them waiting! 🙂

This is the main genkan for the entire ryokan, it is quite large and has a big stove to warm guests in the winter.

We had returned a little earlier than expected so decided to take tea in the lobby, so got to enjoy the garden views for a short time while answering some emails.

Our new room was just down the hall in the opposite direct to our original room.

The ryokan is full of carefully arranged trinkets and artworks to define the season and give the ryokan an ambiance. I know this job falls to the landlady, as with any flower or plant arrangements may be in the display nooks, and I wonder whether it is an easy, second nature task for her or if she agonises over which little ornament to put where and worries over how the lights play over the objects etc.

We had several spaces with little ornaments in display in our room – is the landlady responsible for all of these things? How often do small children come along and make treasures of these attractive little displays?

Wow, so this suite is enormous. We first opened the door to a genkan (entry room/foyer), that I think might have been roughly the size of a hotel room we once booked in Shinjuku a few years back! 🙂

The main room was about the size of my kitchen/dining room combined… a gorgeous Japanese furnished living room with tatami mats and chabudai (low Japanese table), as well as rocking chairs and two enormous bean bags!

The bedroom, which was able to be separated using sliding paper screen doors, had very comfy western style beds and a large desk to work at (which is really going came in handy as tomorrow is going to be all work).

I found these chairs which are only a couple of inches off the ground to be far more comfortable than the older style ones which are flat on the floor with a cushion and a back. I would not have thought being barely 4” off the floor would make much difference.

Our room keys had the same well loved/well lived look of the furniture in our other room.

We found some small welcome snacks, some sakura wagashi, little chocolate flavoured beans and crispy coloured sugar snowflakes?

We had glassware and cups, tea pot and tea and coffee making bits enough for four guests. Everything was catered for…

We also had a fairly large fridge full of free beer and soft drinks, that were replenished when the staff serviced the room.

Matcha tea service and another cute sewing kit.

Mr K already at work as I am still checking out the space.

We had a lovely large balcony with views over the mountains – the weather has been glorious to us so far. This time last year we had early snow and it was fun, but also made some of the mountain roads a little hairy!

Hold your hats and add to the slipper collection! Ryokan slippers, room slippers, toilet slippers and now balcony slippers! 🙂

The bathroom was very stylish and modern… and the towel warmer was a lot calmer than the Agent Orange one.

We are just as over the top with the amenities as always, and we have some sort of crazy space age looking hair dryer that I am sure the Japanese vloggers are thrilled about!

The shower room was large enough for two – easily! This is a huge suite.

Oh, and the best bit for last… the open air bath. All these wooden slatted doors were on sliders so you could open the entire space to the views if you wished (being simultaneously aware that doing so mean you were opening the view in too!).

The water quality here was simply exquisite. It felt soft and silky, and left my skin feeling so amazingly soft. I wish we could take this home with us!

Loved it! The entire decor, the whole suite, it is just beautiful.

We had an enormous range of clothing available for our use during our stay, hanten coats, more yukata in so many sizes, samue pyjamas, more tabi socks etc. We also found a stack of futons in the closet – I dare say the room could comfortably accomodate 5 or 6, though you wouldn’t want to all be trying to use the bath!

There is always some cute little ‘lost in translation’ weirdness. 🙂

Pre-dinner soak and saké time…

Feeling so relaxed as we dressed to go down to dinner… it’s actually really nice to get clean and sort of dress ‘down’ to go to dinner rather than dress ‘up’!

We were a little early for dinner so took a wander around the lobby area and had a poke through the gift shop. Gunma-chan, lots of local plum sweets and things, and these interesting long long scrolls that I haven’t seen in shops here before… they have seasonal designs on them and a couple with Chinese zodiac symbols, are made of lush fabric and appear to be hand painted and weighted; presumably so they don’t fly around in the breeze too much.

The restaurant is directly below our room, and is the same space we had meals in last night.

I think this display had changed from yesterday…

Funoataki Premium Junmai – Shibasaki Sake Brewery in Yoshioka. Love the cups.

The meal started with a yuzu aperitif and appetisers of: Braised mushrooms with chrysanthemum petals; Shrimp and duck loin stew; Princess Turban shell pumpkin Castello; Salmon and cream cheese roll; Taro dengakuji.

Sea soup: bream, anpei white maitake mushrooms and stalk vegetables. This was absolutely delicious – just a really light and flavourful broth.

Sashimi course: tuna, scallops, flounder, button shrimp.

Simmered dish: steamed tilefish.

Strong Joshu beef shabu-shabu… Joshu is the traditional name of the Gunma prefecture, and the beef of this region is particularly famous. Though I am starting to think they all say that… the Gifu prefecture would say their Hida beef is the most famous, the Kobe beef… it’s all amazing if you ask me!

Shabu-shabu paired with ponzu and sesame sauces… the ponzu was delicious paired with the beef, I found the sesame was extremely tasty but also quite a strong flavour that overpower the meat somewhat.

Steamed shark fin.

All served with noodles, rice and pickles.

There are noodles in this dish under all the yummy vegetables.

Dessert: Melon and Kyoto persimmon… our waiter told us a local saying ‘When persimmon is red, doctor’s face is white’. It’s effectively ‘an apple a day keeps the doctor away’, becasue the more red the persimmon, the higher the vitamin C content; eat lots of persimmon and send your doctor broke!

As I was going through these I realised I am taking an awful lot of photos of food… I kinda can’t help myself. Once upon a time I studied to be a creative advertising photographer and now when I see such carefully styled food, I just have to take a photo! “The camera eats first!” I should get that translated into Latin.

A few pics of Ikaho at night… some taken from our balcony, some from in town.

After dinner it was back upstairs to let our dinner settle before having another lovely soak in the bath before an early night… so lucky to be here for another night after this! No second guessing who has leaned into the saké tonight!

Woke up to this gorgeous pre-dawn light! Just glorious! Mt Akagi, Mt Myogi and Mt Haruna in the distance…

You know what? I don’t know which is which and probably have been listing them out of order!

Breakfast was another delicious affair of fresh local produce… I really could get used to this, which is odd given I am a skip breakfast kinda person at home normally.

Salmon, Tamago, rice and pickles, salads, miso soup, yoghurt, fruit… lots of delicious healthy things.

Tamago, grated yam, salad.

Salmon and tofu (below)… I always get Mr K’s mushrooms! 🙂

Miso soup with the little baby clams… I don’t know if you’re just supposed to just drink the soup and leave the little clams, or am I supposed to be there working the clams out with my chopsticks!

Fresh Japanese pears.

Today we spent the day alternatively working, hoping in the onsen, drinking saké, and watching the world fucking burn… it is just utterly unfuckingbelievable. By the end of the day I was having trouble believing that there are any intelligent, competent, compassionate or sensible people left in the world. It has been a truly troubling day that left me feeling really unsettled and shaking my head in disbelief.

Because we were in for the whole day working, we chose not to have the staff service the room, when we did surface, we discovered they had left us a trolley full of fresh bathrobes, towels, onsen towels, tabi socks, tea no coffee resupplies, and some refreshed snacks! When you put out the ‘do not disturb’ in Western hotels, you‘re lucky if they even remember you are there!

We’ve really enjoyed our stay at Oyado Tamaki – it’s a beautiful ryokan with a blend of traditional and modern elements. Western beds if you want them, low Japanese furniture, comfortable rooms, amazing onsen baths, and incredible Japanese kaiseki meals… each night seemingly outdoing the night before. I can’t recommend it enough. And with breakfast being so substantial, we skipped lunch knowing we had another lovely meal coming this evening.

This food is so beautiful plated, I couldn’t *not* take pictures, though I had intended to just leave off.

Aperitif: Yuzu liqueur… with dinner, I chose a glass of lightly yuzu saké. I couldn’t risk Kazushi’s (our waiter the last three night) and his look of concern and/or approbation by ordering a whole 300ml of saké all to myself again! 🙂

How beautiful is this? The appetisers were a light dash broth, some additional sashimi – very unusual but the staff had been making a fuss about our three night stay and seems the chef also seemed to think a three night stay was important.

Soup bowl: sea urchin, white onion, daikon radish, ginger and abalone. *chefs kiss*… magic!

Sashimi course: tuna and flounder slices.

Boiled Unagi Hakata – so named because the design made by the layered unagi looks like a hakata obi belt… absolutely delicious! I’ve never had unagi prepared like this before and it was really light and so tasty.

Famous Matsutake mushrooms, served with rice, miso soup and pickles.

Mushroom and pork hot pot.

Dessert course featured Warabimochi (matcha mochi served with a thick molasses like syrup), fresh pears and crème brûlée.

Gochisōsamadeshita!

Dinner was followed by another terribly tedious night of having to soak away our troubles in the onsen!

Add enough saké until the eyes sparkle was the order of the evening… honestly, it seems the only sensible way to deal with the sense of impending doom that was suddenly pervading our trip. There have been plenty of horrors this day, and so much hate, negativity and disappointment in the media… but hopefully we can put the angst behind us as quickly as possible, and worry about the fall out when we get home.

Woke up early to discover a gorgeous colourful skies over the mountains! Simply glorious.

#NoFilter – on the mountains that is… the selfies are always kawaii filtered here. 🙂

I noticed a town worker outside diligently cleaning the steps that the golden onsen waters run down in the middle of the Stone Steps Street – he obviously has the power to turn off the water!

Then it was time for final breakfast before we checked out from Oyado Tamaki. Glorious view from the restaurant this morning.

If you’ve ever been looking at quality Japanese crockery items before, you’ll know that this assortment of small plates, bowls, pinch pots and dishes are worth hundreds for everyone in here. It’s all so carefully curated. I really appreciate the attention to detail that the Japanese put to small details.

Tuna, chicken dumpling, beef in our breakfast salad today.

Butterfish… I’m not sure I’ve had this before, but it was light and soft, with a texture like salmon; prepared with light miso flavours, it was delicious.

I’m getting quite a fondness for Japanese pickles with good quality Niigata rice… I’m going to have to start stocking up more to take home seeing I’m declaring them anyway!

Sadly, (after two more soaks in the onsen), it was time to pack up and move on to Shibukawa for work for the day, which often means emptying the fridge. Normally this would involve packing up some beers and saké to take to our next abode… on this occasion, I found a lonely puddling that needed consuming before we left. Famous Ikaho mid-morning pudding? Yikes! Oh well, I guess that is what holidays are for, thankfully Mr K managed most of it.

The lovely landlady, whose name I wasn’t able to catch, saw us off with a lovely gift. She made comments several times that it was special it was for people to stay with them for three nights and how thrilled she was to have us – and to be honest if you have the time and the money, it was totally worth it! The Dinner No.3 was spectacular with all the stops pulled out in the Japanese delicacies department. I thanked her using Google Translate, telling her that we had such a a lovely stay, that they inn is extremely comfortable, the dinners were amazing and the staff were very friendly and welcoming and she was just delighted. She even insisted on taking our photo before we left.

I can thoroughly recommend this ryokan for a traditional Japanese ryokan experience, with very few international tourists around. We loved everything about it.

Ikaho

Posted on November 7, 2024 by borysSNORC

Ikaho is a small town of around 4,000 people; together with the villages of Akagi, Komochi and Onogami, they comprise the merged city of Shibukawa. Ikaho is located on the slopes of an extinct volcano and, (no one will be surprised to read this bit seeing we are here!), it is widely renown for its hot springs!

On our way into town, there was apparently a very well knonw ‘Must-Do’ stop at the Ikaho Pudding House Crayon. I found out about it by persevering with YouTube videos done by Japanese content creators – not the easiest way to get your travel hints when nothing is in English, but.. famous puddings, you say? To take to our ryokan? Don’t mind if we do!

So much pudding! Pudding isn’t really a big thing in Australian – as far as I’m aware anyway! I don’t usually have much of a sweet tooth, so don’t tend to seek these sorts of things out when I’m at home. However, Japanese sweets tend to have less overpoweringly processed ‘flavour’ added. I can’t quite explain it, but something here that is melon flavoured, will in fact taste like melon rather than some amped up over-sweetened version of a ‘melon flavour’. Anyway, famous puddings flavoured in Royal milk tea, matcha tea, chocolate, strawberry, salted caramel, lavender; it goes on. Thankfully they have these teeny small taster sized portions so you can choose a few flavours without consuming your body weight in pudding! (Edit: predictably, the salted caramel was the best!)

Throughout Japan, you will see tiny little police stations, they are like teeny one man booths, this is the second police station that I have seen that actually appears to be a larger presence – the other being the one we spent over two hours at, on our last trip (J4), when Mr K was given a moving violation for crossing a solid line on the highway right in front of some cops less than four hours after we arrived into the country! Good times!

I LOVE this little police car! You can see by its sleek design that it is definitely made for high speed pursuits. 😀 We also thought the sign out front which shows two horse-police people wearing masks, was really typically Japanese cute! Joshu-kan and Miyama-chan are the police mascots here. I can’t decide if their names are some sort of piss take? Joshu and Miyama are both fairly famous types of beef!

The most well-known Ikaho landmark is the famous stone staircase that runs through the centre of the entire town. The steps number exactly 365 and lead up to the Ikaho shrine; ‘the steps stretch out like aiming for heaven’ is the original plan. The steps are believed to have been here for over 400 years, and were most recently refurbished in 2007, where the new plan is explained (in writing!) as 365 steps leading to visitors to the town 365 days a year! That is Fair. Totally fair. Without tourism, a lot of these small towns would be in real trouble.

Now, I haven’t written much about it at all – I intended to, but got distracted – but I had a total knee replacement in August… nearly 12 weeks ago. Given I live in a low set house (ranch style if you’re an American), there are ZERO steps in my house. So I’ve been doing my physio and doing my hydrotherapy exercises since the surgery, and visited a friend for a weekend who has steps in their house, but that is the most ‘stairs’ that have been in my life since the surgery. Naturally, the best thing I can do here is attempt to walk up all 365 of these steps!

I wasn’t really thinking about whether or not I *should* climb these stairs and was far more focused on whether or not I physically *could* climb these stairs. Which may or may not have been a mistake, I’m not sure. Thankfully we were in no particular hurry and I had the assurance of knowing that there was a wonderful private onsen bath for me at the end of this ordeal if it went poorly.

The town’s onsen waters flow straight down the middle of the street. You can see it here at the base of the steps as the water cascades down the steps, and at various other points further up you can see it gushing down the street through some glass viewing points.

Intermittently at the tops of small flights of stairs, there are terraces for resting, for smoking rooms, or that go off down little alleyways for cafes, restaurants, bunny shops (?) and gaming alleys … it all feels a bit like a fete or carnival with the street food and side show alley type games. The scenery was just magic every time I took a breather to look back down the steps.

The entire street is lined with quaint little shops.

This ‘shrine’ looking spot is actually a rubbish bin! It has been decorated with rubber ducks which seems to be one of the popularly won prizes in the side show alley games.

Also lining the street are a number of public onsens… sadly they are not available for those of us wearing permanent marker.

Cute little winding alleyways built on the slopes that house tiny little cafes, ice cream shops, and other stalls selling local onsen buns.

Taking a moment to rest and look back down the stairs is highly recommended… not just for the break for the broken knees but also for the views which improved the higher up the steps we climbed!

Glorious day for it! The three peaks of Mt Akagi, Mt Myogi and Mt Haruna are well framed from this photo point.

There are several little foot baths where weary tourists can stop and soak their feet on their way up the sacred steps. Speaking of tourists – we accounted for two of the four western tourists we saw all day on the steps. Ikaho is only two and a half hour train then bus trip out of Tokyo, so it’s doable in a day (a long day), but it’s not as accessible as many other destinations where there are better train services. There is no easy train here. To come stay, you’d need to train, then bus, then get your ryokan/hotel to come collect you and your luggage from the bus station. So it tends to be a very popular spot for domestic Japanese tourists, but not so commonly visited by foreigners.

There were many convenient little rest areas on the way up the steps… though I think the town provides them mostly so you have somewhere to sit and consume the onsen buns and ice creams that they want you to buy as you make your way up through the town.

The Komaguchi is the river that branches from the onsen source of the Yumoto. In the stone steps there are four small viewing windows or ‘mouths’ that allow you to see the water gushing down the street – and it’s seriously pumping out a LOT of very hot water.

Also, in the stone steps there are 12 hot spring inns that have been owned by the same families of landlords for over 200 years. Each of these landlords has a zodiac sign inlaid into the stone in brass to locate where their inn is – much like a family crest, only a chosen zodiac sign. I saw a few of them, but was so focused on how many steps we had gone up, that I wasn’t seriously searching for them. This (no doubt very clever, clever) rat is kinda cute.

One area of the steps has a poem by the Akiko Yosano inscribed into the steps, I can’t for the life of me find a translation of this poem on the internets, which is a little disappointing – I’d like to know what it says. Edited to add: The poem is called “The Town of Ikaho” and describes a scene of Ikaho in the early Taisho period (1912-1926), but further than that, a translation I can not find!

Above and below: Some of the carnival / side show alley gaming shops.

We found a little cafe to stop at around the 230 steps up… Mr K needed a coffee and I caught sight of some cute (notably Insta-famous) steamed buns. 😀 It was a pricey little steamed bun – but also the tastiest one I’ve ever tried here, so I forgave it.

A Daruma sundae… again we find that the sweets here are not so sweet and something labeled as strawberry flavoured, actually taste like strawberries, not just the sickly sweet pretend strawberry flavour you find in ice cream or milkshakes back home. This was strawberry, rose hip and hibiscus flavoured, all made with local produce from the Gunma Prefecture. It was quite flavourful and refreshing.

There are numbers on the steps telling you exactly how many more you have to go started to be encouraging at this point; which was appreciated given they were a little distressing at the beginning when my knee was already complaining at steps numbered 12 and 15! We stopped into some cute little knickknack shops – and there are several of them scattered about the terraces. I saw this cool canvas bag depicting the Seven Gods, which I couldn’t figure out a use for, so I didn’t buy it. Retail remorse has since ensued and I wished I had picked it up. It was only ¥800… but c’est la vie! I’m so not going back up the 240 odd steps to go get one tomorrow!

This little guy is Ishidan-kun and he/she/it/they is the mascot of Ikaho… which should be fairly evident from his little onsen hat and his stairs for an apron! lol

The Ikaho Bakery… which didn’t appear to sell any baked goods, but did sell… wait for it… moar pudding!

Now, I reckon we have to be all pudding’d out by this point, but they had a neat little insulated bag there that I thought would be useful for the rest of the trip as we are trafficking our saké around, so we picked up two little puddings for after dinner, so I could buy their insulated cold bag.

These were called ‘Stone Steps Pudding’ and were a traditional style egg pudding, and were not sweet at all. A bit like a light vanilla creme brûlée style deal without the sugary crust.

Another zodiac… no metal pig though.

Japanese manhole covers are famous the world over for being works of art. This one for Shibukawa is so famous it can be found on coasters, washcloths, plates, and all sorts of merch.

The last stretch to the top! It was really busy at this point of the steps – the shrine is just at the top of this next stage. I was worried about how slow (and carefully) I was walking and getting in people’s way and holding them up… and also lamenting that I wouldn’t be able to get any pics without people in them.

I stopped to gather my breath and stretch my knee a bit, and held a spot waiting for a break in the traffic. Patience is a virtue I don’t usually posses… until it comes to trying to take a photo without tourists in it! Then I seem to find the will to wait until the people have passed. Worth it!

The Ikaho Shrine… complete with queue of people waiting to pay their respects and ask for the blessings and cast their wishes. Apparently it gets crazy busy here at New Year.

I know in the big scheme of things, walking up 365 steps is not a big deal… but seeing it was so soon after getting huge chunks of my knee removed and bits of titanium and chromium cobalt implanted, and going from not being able to even hobble unaided from my bedroom to the kitchen in my house 12 weeks ago, this felt like a HUGE achievement. So I’m pretty damn happy with my wash!

It should be noted that I couldn’t have gone *back down* those 365 for love or money! Going up is one thing, but going down steps at the moment is still quite another. NOPE. We had to find a circuitous route down via the winding roads that meander in and around the steps to service the hotels. Still, small victories and all that.

On the way out of Ikaho, we made a stop at the Kajika bridge… the bridge is a famous photo stop, being strikingly red in the middle of summer green leaves, stunning when surrounded by autumn foliage, but also looks amazing when covered in snow. I guess this means we need to come back and see it in all seasons.

It feels like that is all a town needs to do in Japan to get people to come by – have some gorgeous Japanese maples carefully planted intermingled with cherry blossom trees, add one strikingly red bridge across a small ravine or creek. Add a couple of food stalls and get some tourists to start sharing photos of it it to make that thing Insta-famous. Build it and they will come!

The red bridges are such an iconic Japanese object that they never fail to be beautiful and feel ‘typically’ Japan.

We ❤️ Ikaho… I’ll definitely be back.

Ikaho Onsen – Oyado Tamaki HORAI

Posted on November 5, 2024 by borysSNORC

We decided to spend three nights in Ikaho, which it turns out is practically unheard of… no one comes to Ikaho for three nights. Foreigners in particular very rarely come to Ikaho at all let alone stay three nights, (we saw only two other western tourists the entire three days we were there), but even the Japanese tourists who come to visit Ikaho never come and stay three nights in Ikaho apparently!

However, we had work to do and so we planned for a three night stay. Only problem was – it was seriously near impossible to find a place with three consecutive nights accomodation available, so I ended up choosing one ryokan and booking one night in one type of room and two nights in another. It might have been different if I could read or speak Japanese, which might have meant I could have contacted establishments directly a little easier, but using their (all Japanese and not easy to translate, websites) or trying affiliate sites like the dreaded booking dot com or Agoda or Japanican … it worked out easier to book direct and just suck it up that we would be changing rooms.

It ultimately worked out really well. The staff at Oyado Tamaki were so so wonderfully attentive because we were staying for three nights! It was quite a big deal for them to have us stay so long… it was actually really cute. The landlady in particular was especially friendly, welcoming and appreciative.

Oyado Tamaki is a wonderful blend of traditional Japanese ryokan with Western comfort, without going overboard with the Western elements so as to lose the Japanese culture that you come fro in the first place. There was a lovely comfortable lobby and bar area where we were welcomed with yuzu tea and a snack. Again, the Japanese love of viewing/engaging with nature was evident in the design of these public spaces as the lounge seating is arranged with large picture windows to overlook a gorgeous Japanese garden.

Our first night was in a ‘Horai’ Western style room with a cypress indoor bath.

The room genkan was a spacious and welcoming space where you could put all your luggage… as is rapidly becoming the norm, we left our shoes at the genkan to the ryokan, where we were given slippers to wear around the ryokan, where we arrived at the room to find other slippers to wear in our room, and I bet there are different slippers for the toilet too!

His and hers… quite often though, ‘His’ won’t fit Western men with large feet!

Our room was a very tastefully decorated space with an incredibly high ceiling and views over the base of the famous Ikaho Stone Steps.

It had a comfortable sitting area where we could see the sunrise/sunset and this turned into a nice spot to work.

Welcome snacks… local Gunma mochi and some barley crackers.

The ceiling in this rooms was impressive, it must have been 16’ high, and with it’s timber spokes and fabric-like design, felt oddly Turkish…?

Mr K always appreciates a hotel room with a decent desk – I don’t know what’s going on in contemporary western hotel design, but the ‘desk’ seems to often be some 40cm wide thing that is inconveniently under a massive television and you can barely sit a laptop on it, so would more accurately be described as a ‘shelf’. You can’t work on those stupid things.

All the furniture in this ryokan from the lobby to the rooms, felt like it all had stories to tell, like it had been deployed in different configuration for decades, but was lovingly used and worn and even revarnished and repaired… not quite antique, but not slick IKEA modern either. It felt comfortably lived in.

We found comfortable yukata, tabi socks, onsen towels, and a sewing kit among the room’s amenities.

And then in the closet, we were also provided with Hanten coats, and even more yukata in a range of different sizes (by height), so it was easy to find something comfortable to fit.

The kitchenette nook was well equiped with tea, green tea and coffee making facilities. Also a fridge full of complimentary beer, juices soft drink and water. I do love how they look after you and there is no minibar price list in sight.

After so many open air baths, this was quite different. The bath was long and deep and definitely large enough for two with a view out a near window of some beautiful autumn leaves towards the mountains.

The propensity here for going completely overboard on the individually packaged ammenities is still rather puzzling… surely Japanese travellers bring *some* toiletries and things with them when they travel. I’m not sure why they provide quite so much disposable stuff; the packaging alone is enough to make you look at it with concern. We very rarely open any of it.

The bright orange towel warmer felt oddly out of place, but at the same time was extremely welcome! It was starting to get cold up here in the mountains. Hanging your massive fluffy bathrobe up on a towel warmer while you are in the bath is like the epitome of luxury.

Indoor bath saké just doesn’t have the right feels about it… can’t quite put my finger on why. 🙂

I had seen in my research that this ryokan was known for its excellent kaiseki meals, so was really looking forward to dinner.

Unexpectedly, we saw this wonderful display of local saké at the entrance to the restaurant. We have found in some places, they are putting more and more focus on Western wines over local sakés, which no doubt it to cater to the domestic tourists who see the imported wines as exotic and elegant, but as a foreign tourist, we are all about wanting to try the local sakés – which I know is quite unusual. Lots of foreigner visitors never get a taste for saké.

The Autumn menu looked absolutely amazing! Everything so beautifully presented, and lovingly created. It was called the ‘Shimotsuki Menu’, and started with appetisers of: Marinated mackerel; Smoked daikon radish and cheese, Purple lily root; Kusunoki crystal egg yolk; Roe with kelp. And a soup made of: Chasen eggplant, yukiwaritake mushroom, shirareitake mushroom.

I ordered a saké tasting flight and surprised absolutely no one when the junmai daiginjo was my favourite.

We were also served a ‘special dish’ that was not on the menu: shrimp, pickles, knotted mushrooms and a small crab cake cooked on lava stone.

Sashimi course: Kina, Iwana fresh water fish, a selection of tuna, Hakojima, and some carp sashimi.

Handmade steamed tofu with famous autumnal Matsutake mushrooms, Fukurutake mushrooms, crab meatball, maple leaf lotus root, chrysanthemum sauce and fresh shrimp. I love these steamed dishes at this time of year, so warming and often packed full of subtle and delicious umami flavours.

Silk salmon in autumn flower arrangement; autum fruits and nuts, apple and fig, roasted chestnuts stewed in honey, deep fried ginko nuts.

Joshu Akagi beef steak, sweet pepper, petal mushroom, and ponzu sauce.

Joshu local chicken steamed with abalone, shrimp, Anpel Kujo green onion. Served with local Koshihikari Niigata rice, pickles and miso soup.

Soy milk tofu with pear, and muscat grapes, served with green tea for dessert.

Gochisōsamadeshita! Dinner was absolutely lovely. It really is nice to have a delicious Japanese meal provided for you at the ryokan and you don’t have to get dressed and go out to find dinner.

After dinner, I went for a wander around the ryokan to see what I could find and hopefully find the public onsens empty so I could capture a few images – us tattoo’d folks aren’t allowed in the public onsens; it’s a terrible shame to have to be consistently booking the rooms with a private bath. Woe is us! 😀
Admittedly, it is always the more expensive option, but at least I know I won’t be breaking any cultural taboos or making people uncomfortable.

First thing I found though was a saké cellar! With a sign outside saying, ‘Come fill a cup for ¥500. Nice! There was quite a fancy selection in the cellar an half a dozen in the fridge to help yourself on an honesty system, where you can just write down what you have had for the landlady.

The women’s onsen was deserted so I had a quiet look around. There was plenty of space in the dressing rooms for changing and storing your things while you bathed.

Numerous spaces to shower yourself before getting into the onsen baths.

I found one small outdoor onsen for a group of friends to enjoy and larger onsens as well.

Ikaho Onsen is famous for having two types of rare hot spring water. The first is “Kogane no Yu” an is the golden hot spring water. The Golden onsen water is rich in iron which causes the water to become a rich yellowish/brown colour when it comes into contact with oxygen. These waters are believed to offer many health benefits, particularly for women. The Kogane no Yu is said to also have healing effects on medical ailments including skin issues like cuts and burns.

The second water is the “Shirogane no Yu” and is known as the silver hot spring water, which is a relatively newer hot spring to the area. It is said to have natural moisturising components that help smooth and refresh this skin. This is the type of water in our room’s onsen, and I fully believe it – my skin has never felt so soft!

I also found a small area set up for small children to bathe in more temperate appropriate baths. The water temperature at this onsen is quite high, so you find yourself having multiple short baths each day rather than long soaking baths.

For what is normally a busy town full of domestic tourists, Ikaho is rather quiet at night… there are clubs and restaurants around, but I wonder if most visitors are all happily tucked in, enjoying the hospitality of their ryokan inns.

Woke up unhappily before the sunrise; was rewarded with this beautiful quality light though.

Mt Akagi, Mt Myogi, and Mt Haruna are out here somewhere… though not sure which elevation is which. If these names sounds familiar, it could be because the beef in Japan seems to carry the same name as the mountain it was raised on. Regional naming protocols no doubt.