Matsumoto castle is the only still standing 5-tier castle in Japan and also one of the oldest: it has had no catastrophic damage since it's construction in 1517.
There were lots of relics and neat stuff in the castle as well as the adjoining museum. Unfortunately, the stairs in this thing are steep:
What does 55-61 degrees mean? It means it's like going up a ladder. Which means it's also like going down a ladder, except you are supposed to go down it like they're stairs. And you're in your socks. on polished wood.
The way up wasn't bad, of course. And the view was gorgeous:
That's from nearly 200 feet up. Pretty cool huh?
Going down though, that was a different matter. I was wound so tight, trying to make sure I didn't slip. This had ramifications. Having been over 24 hours since being at the castle, my quads are destroyed. That includes stretching off and on yesterday and today.
Afterwards, we meandered around, and found the PARCO shopping district, which was a good laugh for seeing people pay outragous prices for clothing (as well as check out the fly honey's). It was neat though, that on the top floor they had an art display, with some really neat works. Here is one of them:
We then made our way to the old city, and cought dinner at a hole-in-the-wall ramen shop, which was delicious because it was about 6 and we had ended up missing lunch. :-P
Afterwards we started walking around looking for an izukaya to snag some drinks, and we were having pretty crummy luck with it. Then it starts to rain, and we say 'screw it!' and ran into the nearest one we could find. Turned out to be a really nice place! We had a nice time trying some different things and sang happy birthday to a woman with the rest of the bar as she was surprised by a little cake with a sparkler on it (awesome!).
these greeted me above the door in the men's restroom. lol.
NWS: http://i477.photobucket.com/albums/rr133/dglinsma/DSC06256.jpg
It was getting late and the last train we could catch was at 9:07. It was just past 8 and we wanted to snag some karaoke still, so we found out that there was a karaoke place next to the station. So we made our way over there, and asked for a room. Well, I had to do the filling out of all the information because Dave had thought it would be a good idea to keep pace with me at the izukaya, and the guy's like, 1/2 my size.
The best of the entire night happened next: the lady tells us to head over to the elevator and head up to our room (lots of karaoke places have the first floor as a sign-in, and then you take the elevator up to your room.) Well, Dave heads over, and hits the elevator button. Except he actually hit the emergency button, which kicks out a lever. Well, his first response is to try and push this lever back in. I'm of course pretty much stunned / mortified that's going on. The kicker though, was that by hitting the button, a door started sliding down from the ceiling to block the elevator. A guy ran over and held it, and I asked him, embarrassed as anything, if everything was all right. He said it was fine and sent us to our room. As soon as we were in our elevator I burst into laughter. That was absolutely ridiculous. Here's the over the top control to pick the song you want:
Here are some other random shots from the day:
Old guns before they were outlawed by the Tokugawa.
bullet holes in this armor:
A woman picking flowers next to the river that goes through the center of town.
try these out?
I did end up getting my phone on Friday too. It's fantastic! :-D Here's a pic of it:
1 comment:
Quote from Pete: "A pink phone. Go figure!" :-)
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