The sun was out today and it was a beautiful, brisk, spring morning in Inuyama, otherwise known as the Kiso-Gawa or, The Japanese Rhine. This town is home to 74,000 and is famous for the oldest castle in Japan and the ancient art of cormorant fishing, which is still flourishing and thriving in this town. Unfortunately our visit was outside of fishing season…so off to the castle we went.
The ancient castle Inuyama-jo looks down on the town from its lofty perch. It is a beautiful and commanding site to behold 40 metres above the river. Rosie and The Operator are getting used to these treks up to temples and castles which are only ever built on the high spots. This is Japans oldest standing castle and it dates from 1537. It has withstood war, earthquakes and resisted any major restoration to live on in its original state… which is pretty impressive.
There was quite a que of visitors when we arrived at the castle, most of the tourists seemed to be Japanese and Rosie only ever saw two other western tourists on this site. It is Golden Week in Japan….a cluster of National holidays occur at this time basically allowing all salary workers one week off work….they all travel and go on holiday during this time and this adds to the business we have encountered over the last couple of days.
We waited in line to enter the castle and then climbed four floors of treacherously steep stairs to get to the top viewing platform of the castle.
Wow, what a view! 360 degrees of the most beautiful town and surrounding countryside. You can see why they liken this river to the famous Rhine. Beautifully calm, wide and curvaceous.
I must say that the guard rail around the viewing platform was a little low and the feeling of vertigo Rosie was feeling a little high…not a good combination.
Walking back down the hill we passed some small but beautiful temples, including the Sanko-Inari Shrine, this shrine was dedicated to finding the perfect eternal love.
There were heaps of teenaged girls dedicating love hearts to the shrine and taking selfies…Rosie and The Operator bowled on up and took our own selfie….the girls were all giggling away….we have alot to be thankful for in our 20 odd years…Rosie hopes that all those young girls find there own awesome Operator one day xx
We walked along the banks of the Kiso Gawa to our lunch destination.
After a beautiful spot of lunch that hit the spot, Rosie thought she would have a wee desert….you cannot really call this dessert? It is certainly ‘wee’. Is this the secret to why Japanese girls are so slim? When Rosie orders cheese cake she kind of wants a piece half as big as the plate to devour…not just to inhale…this was the tiniest dessert ever! And the tastiest…so I suppose it all worked well in the end…and I didn’t really need anything much bigger. PS. We were at the Swans Cafe for said lunch and dessert….cool coco advertising on the dessert plate.
We drove to the petrol station to fill up the rental. OMG it was like making a formula one pitstop! Three people literally ran out of the office. A guy started pumping the gas for us, two people were washing and wiping the front and back windows, a lady came to the pump, took payment and gave change and we were off again….all in uder 2 mins. The Operator, so used to doing this all himself was like…left speechless. WOW.
On the outskirts of town we went to visit the Tagata-jinga temple. A shrine dedicated to the….male phallus.
Yes indeed, we were trying to be solomn and respectful in front of local worshippers but as soon as one person laughed, Rosie couldnt hold back. Especially when they rung the penis shaped bell of worship in front of the giant penis on the alter.
Now that there penis is two meters long and weighs 60 odd kgs, it comes out and is paraded the neighborhood on its special worship day once a year.
After you have worshiped at the alter, walk to the sub shrine at the side, say a prayer and rub the balls…I kid you not.
If you then want to go full monty, (forgive the expression), write a prayer on a prayer card and hang it in the garden for the gods to answer your penile wishes.
Rosie even got a stamp in her Commemorative Goshuin Temple Book to say she had visited…..
After parking the car at the hotel we walked up Inuyama Jokamachi, this is an atmospheric old town street full of dark wood, low rise traditional houses and storefronts. The whole street had a haze of yakitori charcoal smoke over it from all the streetside vendors grilling. There were a few traitional shops selling paper (washi) and beautifully painted fans plus sweets and lollies. It was just like a huge eat street and everyone was having an early dinner as it was pumping.
Walking around the town we noticed a lot of people eating these green things on a stick. The Operator saw a shop selling them, they are called yomagi and they were being heated through over charcoal, encircled in straw in a street of tinder dry ancient wooden houses….hmmmm.
Anyway, we bought a skewer, to be honest it tasted and was the texture of raw cookie dough, it kind of tasted abit nondescript as well…Rosie googled the delicacy and found out the green colouration is from Japanese Mugwort.
We ended up having a couple of beers with a young Japanese uni student and his girl friend, they were already pretty hammered and had come to town for the day from Nagoya. The ‘bar’ was a tarp slung off the side of a yakitori BBQ stand like a wee gazebo and we sat on little stools eating skewers and drinking beer watching the street march past. Was most excellent. Walking home we ran into them again, they were staggering off to the train station and we heard from behind us ‘hey kiwis!’, we laughed, and felt so local. LOL.
Tomorrow we are heading to Gujo Hachiman, only an hour up the road. Rosie is cashing in on all the sacred springs that are around there and looking to have some beautiful freshwater eel for dinner. See you tomorrow.
What’s that brown sausage? Looks kind of… suspicious 😒
Lol….Gary thought it was choc I thought it was caramel….guess it was some weird combo. Thanks for reading my blog.