We are on our own today and the plan is to go and visit the Hilda No Sato (folk village) so after breakfast we set off, it was a beautiful sunny day but actually quite chilly especially in the shade but I guess we are in the area they call the alps of Japan, because of this the cherry blossom season is only just starting as the main time for the blossom is May, the front of our hotel is covered in it, in the sunshine it looks wonderful. It was about a 30 minute walk to the folk village which was opened in 1971, this is basically the Japanese equivalent of Weald and Down museum. They have moved more than 30 buildings from different parts of the Hida region to preserve the heritage, they include examples of different types of houses although the main difference seems to be the type of roof they have, thatched, shingles or boards. Because of the amount of snow in the region they don’t have the exterior verandas as these would be useless during the winters but they still have something similar just on the inside rather than out. Most of the houses were used for both living and a trade, a number made mats, shoes, bags and coats out of reads, others produced silk by ‘farming’ silk worms. One of the houses had an explanation of the marriage ceremony which seemed to last four days and it would seem that the brides family had a ceremony which only the groom attended, then the bride went to the grooms house, taking all the wedding gifts and furniture provided by her family with her, then they had another ceremony with the grooms family. A list of all the ‘possessions and gifts’ was provided so the neighbours could see what had been provided! The ceremony was only attended by a few people, but apparently it was a source of pride to have holes poked in the paper walls so the neighbours could watch the proceedings. We went round all the houses which they said would take about an hour so three hours later when we had finished we decided to treat ourselves to an ice cream. We then walked back down to the town looking for somewhere to have lunch but it would seem that 1.30 is too late for lunch in Takayama, although we did eventually find a Raman restaurant that was open, we probably ordered too much food but we have at least tried the local Hida beef – to be honest not as great as they make out! But the Raman and the dumplings were really nice. After this we decided to go for a walk around one of the park areas to have a look at the cherry blossom. We walked toward the river and there were a number of trees in full bloom, it looked spectacular especially with the canal running below. We walked the length of the street and stopped a number of times to just look at the trees, we then decided we would go to the festival float museum, twice a year Takayama has a festival where 12 floats are paraded through the streets, it is a shame as this is actually this weekend coming (29th & 30th April) so we will miss it but looking at the photos I think the whole area would be totally overrun. The festival takes place twice a year, in April 12 floats take part and in October 11. It began about 350 years ago as a village ceremony, it would seem that Takayama is in the centre of the Hida region and as it became an important distribution centre large numbers of brewers, cloth merchants, woodworkers and other craftsmen occupied certain areas of the town and as a symbol or pride the floats for the various merchant areas became more elaborate and a spirit of competition developed. Many of the floats on display date from the 17th century and demonstrate the skill of the local craftsmen with detailed carvings and metalwork, four of the floats have marionettes but only one was on display these are operated by 8 puppet masters during the procession. Most of the floats have four wheels with two extra that fifth are dropped down when the floats needs to go round corners, there is also a ‘mobile shrine’ that used to be taken out into the procession but isn’t any more as it requires 40 people of the same height to carry it! After we finished walking round the museum we set off up the hill to look at more cherry blossom which was spectacular although most of the blossom seems to be white in this area, we couldn’t tell if it is just that the others haven’t come out yet or if that is just what they have in this region. After we finished this walk it was abut 5.30 and starting to get chilly again so we went back to the hotel for a bit of a relax and to get ready for our day out in the old town with the guide tomorrow.
