What's shaking in Nikko - Day 8

Steve Leung, Amelia

— 4 min read
What's shaking in Nikko - Day 8

We had a small earthquake here this morning!

Hey, that's where we are!

Amelia and Marcus slept right through it though.

It was small enough that you could barely feel it, and caused no damage, thankfully.

We went down for breakfast at 7:30 am, and it was similar to yesterday- breakfast was lots of little dishes and little cook stoves for everyone.

It was pretty good; a lot of pickled stuff and tofu (🐶). Not the kids favourite, but good to try new things.

A gourmet family breakfast

Next we went to the famous bridge in Nikko: Shinkyo. Though it was a bit busy, it was worth it.

It was raining- or more like drizzling- when we got out there, so we had to borrow umbrellas from the hotel. The whole day it was raining, so it was a bit annoying on that part.

Bridge from far away
Nice red leaves!
View from bridge

From there, we walked into the collection of shrines and temples in Nikko that make it a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There were a lot of stairs, but we made it!

Fall colours getting going
A little pond and waterfall
Moss can grow everywhere!
Japanese rain chain (an artistic way for rain to come down from the roof instead of a spout)
Some gold rods
Stopped for a pizza toast snack at a cafe
Apparently modern kendo got started here
Pretty foggy most of the day
5 level pagoda
Golden bunny!
We like snacks! These are bamboo charcoal and sesame, and Japanese mugwart mochi!
Mausoleum of Tokugawa Ieyasu, who unified feudal Japan

We walked around town for a while after that. Fun fact: Did you know Nikko is a hockey town?

The ice rink is a couple of kms from where we are and apparently they're playing a couple of games this weekend. But we're busy doing other things.

Finally a snack with more protein: yakitori! It was really satisfyingly good. Except the sauce dropped onto our pants.

Mmmm.. charcoal grill

There was also someone selling sushi rolls, with fish straight from the fish market...

We took the bus back to our hotel and relaxed a bit. We had a reservation for the private onsens we booked, so we used that when we got back. It was so nice after being cold in the mountains!

Dinner was elaborate again

We all reached a consensus that today's dinner was better than yesterday's. Today we were grilling steak and veggies, had tempura, sashimi, and a small fish with miso soup.

After dinner we watched a bit more Japanese TV and this time an old Kaiju movie was on, which we all thought was very entertaining. Gamera vs. Barugon (1966), if you're wondering.

But even with that, there's still time for one last bath before bed. Good night!

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