Onward to Takayama

We joined the morning rush hour, with our luggage, and squeezed on to the trains from Ryogoku station to Tokyo station to catch the Shinkansen (bullet train) to Toyama. We had reserved seats so we lined up, waited for the cleaning crew to finish and pay their respects to the waiting passengers, and then boarded. The trip took about 2 hours. We had lunch at Toyama but decided not to venture too far from the station so we wouldn't miss the Hida express train to Takayama. With larger windows and a window seat we enjoyed the picturesque journey which followed the river valley and passed some small towns, rice paddies, dams, and orchards. We arrived at about 3pm and walked to our hotel to check in. After making some bus and train reservations we wandered around Takayama which has some lovely old streets, buildings and interesting shops. We had a delicious dinner at a Nepalese restaurant we had discovered earlier.Read more