The Forest Bakery

We stopped in at @yakitatesconeforest where Naoko had a chat with the owner who’s eyes sparkled as she told about how she found out what she wanted to do for the rest of her life – to bake scones. The whole place was built from scratch by her carpenter husband who makes the most beautiful wooden chairs. Then we followed the road up into the mountain and finding it closed, followed Takasekawa (I think) until we eventually found a place to get down to it and rock hop and paddle our way across. The water was icy cold but perfectly clear and our cells woke up!

Miasa

We have arrived at our trial house in Miasa, Omachi yesterday in heavy snow. The snow built up really quickly and we put snow socks on the car for the first time just to get from the reception to our cabin. Today the snow eventually subsided and the sun came out and we explored the immediate area a little. Miasa feels both more remote and more wild comparing to Ikusaka. We have been told to be cautious of bears. Hana spotted a Kamoshika on the way here, an extraordinary animal named as a deer (‘shika’) but in fact (according to Wikipedia) a caprid or ‘goat antelope’, of which many species became extinct in the last ice age, so that it is considered a living fossil and also a living national treasure of the forest. Anyway a magical seeming animal. This will be our home for the next one month.

Oide Koen

Another trip up to Hakuba. This time we stopped at Oide park in the deep snow and wandered around the beautiful old kominka nearby, before meeting a family who have been living in Hakuba for more than 10 years and who were so kind to share their experiences with us. We were told about Kenji and Tomoko Usui whose home and guest house is in Ikeda, which happens to be the nearest town to us in Ikusaka (it’s where we go when we go to the nearest supermarket), and who are known as pioneers of permaculture. We learned a lot and more than that it was very fun to meet and chat with such a warm family.

Morph Bakery

We visited Morph Bakery in Ikusaka and had a chat with the owner Takuya Kiuchi and a regular customer there, such warm people and the cafe / bakery is a beautiful space and setting, a lovingly renovated Kominka (giving us ideas:)) with a view of the Northern Japanese Alps peeking over the mountains. We tried their Oyaki and other hand made baked goodies, all so yummy and we will be back soon to try their ginger chai (speciality of Kiuchi-san’s wife).

Hakuba

We headed up to Hakuba for the afternoon. Hakuba Valley is a famous ski destination – it was the site of the 18th Winter Olympic Games and apparently the powder is amazing (I won’t pretend to know what I’m talking about) but we just enjoyed an afternoon of snooping around the fancy chalets and getting a bit of a sense of the place. Hakuba has a unique ambience as there are so many foreigners – it feels like the main language is English and returning home to Ikusaka felt a bit like coming back from another country. We found a couple of nice cafes – Penguin Cafe and Sounds Like Cafe. We really want to explore Oide Park which looks so beautiful but it will have to wait for another day. We will be back to explore more and came back enthused to catch some of the internationalism of Hakuba in our life here and in our project.

Omachi

Today we headed over to Omachi, north of Azumino. Our first idea was to visit Ai Cafe but finding it closed we discovered 三俣山荘図書室 just around the corner, which I think you would say as ‘Mitsumata Sanso Library’, which is really a cafe bar / art space with a wall lined with books – mainly books on the Alps and Mountains and related things, but just a carefully and artfully curated selection of beautiful books, as well as hiking gear. Anyway a really cool place and the staff was super friendly and asked us about what we’re doing and so Nao got chatting with her, and she pointed us in the direction of a cidery a little way north of Omachi by Lake Kizaki called ‘Son of The Smith Hard Cider‘. They are growing and harvesting their own apples at their orchard and brewing their own cider which is really, really (really) good. Also we finally got to try Oyaki.

Snow

In the morning we woke to find Ikusaka transformed by a thick blanket of snow and shrouded in mist and looking just really otherworldly. With great care and attention I shovelled the road clear in front of the house – Nao thought it was (maybe, probably) the expected thing for every conscientious villager to do – which was actually super satisfying to do – I made nice crisp edges and was very well pleased with myself. It was totally unnecessary as it turns out. The snow on the road melted by the afternoon and all I achieved was to build two enormous heaps of snow which will now take much longer to melt.

Then we put on snow wear and ventured out. We thought we would go to the bakery as it seems there’s a really great bakery in Ikusaka called Morph Bakery (and we wanted to try their Oyaki). That didn’t work out though as the bakery wasn’t open (we later found out they had a power outage) so we will have to wait for another day to visit, but anyway it got us out and exploring.

Plan B was the road station where they sell local produce, but the electricity was down there too so that was a no go as well. By late afternoon the roads had cleared enough to head over to Azumino to appease hungry children with promised baked goods.

Ikusaka

Today we explored Ikusaka walking from the house down to the river and then up to Nonoka Grape Farm and on up a hiking trail into the mountains. Ikusaka is a grape growing region and Nonoka Grape Farm is located above the village with the snow capped mountains of the Northern Alps lining the horizon. We discovered they also have an apple orchard in Shiojiri city south of Matsumoto. It will be fun to talk with the owner if we have the chance. Although we couldn’t follow the hiking trail all the way to the peak this time we had a breathtaking view over Ikusaka and the Sai river valley.

On the way back to the house we passed a cooking lesson where they were learning to cook Oyaki which is a kind of stuffed dumpling and a local speciality. They had the windows open and everyone waved as we passed.

Day 1

‘Inconvenient and Fun’

We have arrived at our new (temporary) home in Ikusaka village in Nagano, Japan. This will be our base for the next one month. It is a slightly unreal feeling to really be here after picturing it for so long. Ikusaka village is in a curve of the river Sai which winds it’s way through the mountains – we arrived along a road that threaded in and out of the gorge through tunnels cut into the rock and was often too narrow to allow two cars to pass. We had driven about 4 hours with a stop off at a lake, through some light snow (we chose a day in between heavier snow fall) and some spectacular mountainous landscapes as we entered Nagano, down from Tochigi prefecture north of Tokyo. We arrived as the shadows were getting long and by the time we had unpacked and found the nearest supermarket (about 15 minutes drive) the sky was full of a fantastic array of stars.

Our idea is to make a new life for ourselves here or hereabouts, among the mountains in Nagano. It is something we have dreamt of for years and have actively been organising and preparing for over the past several months. What we are trying to do Naoko called ‘Inconvenient and fun’ which I really love – it is something we definitely found with Kotori, also for my part with drawing and animation, that the thing which is effortful and time consuming, what we tend to avoid with fast and convenient things, it is the effort and the care and attention and the doing which is the fun of it, and that is what we want to enjoy here.