On with the Onsens

 

We began the day with an early morning trek to Shin-Kobe station to stamp our books. Most Japanese stations (and some historical sites) have a unique stamp that can help you document your journey across this beautiful country. Clearly, after the Fragrance Museum, I was going to try and get stamps from every possible station—even the tiny ones we'll use for interchanges. 

the unplanned Hakata pitstop

Despite very careful planning, we missed our connecting train by a whisker at Hakata for our transfer to Yufuin. Which meant a couple of unplanned hours in a city we know nothing about. Just the perfect tie window to people-watch in  a public place So here are a few things I noticed about the Japanese irrespective of where we were: 

1. People are always polite, always friendly. They'll help you out whenever they can. 

2. Japanese systems are geared towards efficiency and almost always work like they're supposed to (you have no idea how rare that is) Everything from our immigration process to our hotel check-in to the cash transactions at stores-automated, and quick (another rare combination) 

3. While cities and public places are amazingly clean, you're hard-pressed to find a public trashcan anywhere. 

But these are early days into the trip, we'll see if these observations hold true at the end of our fortnight here. 

spectacular mountain views reflecting off the train station at Yufuin

As we arrived at Yufuin, we were treated by clear views of the twin peaks of Mount Yufu glistening in the sun.  We wanted the short distance to our ryokan - Yufuin Roykan Okaeri. We loved the fact that they have their private family onsens. It was our first stay at a traditional Japanese Onsen and it did not disappoint. Apart from helping us un the stairs with our (very) heavy baggage, and showing us around the place, we had access to other 24-hour coffee-and-snacks at the recreation area (which also had books, board games and video games)  not to mention used of the bicycles to trek across town, the beautiful Yukatas and Haoris. 

River Oita

Yufudake mountains

The traditional Japanese layout was beautifully crafted and featured clear views of the Yufudake mountains on the banks of the Oita River. Of course, all of this was just the watercress. We couldn't wait to experience the famed onsens. Now, in case you're unfamiliar with Japanese Onsens, they're a pretty novel experience. You're supposed to sink into this common hot spring pool completely naked, which is why public Onsens here are segregated by gender. The family version of the Onsens meant the naked rule still applied, but you could have the entire onsen to just the family. As you can guess, this concept didn't go down too well with Child 2, so we decided to let her have her soak in separate onsen, while the baa-lamb and I legged it to the largest of the onsens. While the Ryokan has 5 private onsens for the use of their guests, the one that's really special is the outdoor one, with naturally carved seats along the side. 

The largest of the family onsens. No, we're not sharing pictures of us soaking. Lucky you. 

If you know me at all, you know that I don't handle cold well. So trust me when I tell you, the feeling of soaking away in a hot spring pool when temperatures outside are close to freezing is pure heaven. You know the snow monkeys soaking in the bath you see on nature shows? The ones looking like they've attained Nirvana? That was me. I was the snow monkey. We turned in early since we'd decided to catch another Shinkansen (why do I have a feeling they're going to be our second homes for the duration of the trip) - besides, all that soaking had me well-rested and primed for a great night's sleep. 

Yukatas on loan

we loved the traditional ryokan with their superb hospitality

Breakfast at the Royokan Okaeri was, once again, a traditional Japanese affair and delicious -- fish broth soup & chicken rice, accompanied by omelette, meat, sweet potato and pickled cabbage. As we headed to the station, we witnessed the most orderly queue to exist going into the station platform. No pushing, shoving, jostling or yelling, yet all 300-odd passengers seemed to get on board in the five short minutes that the train halted here. We bid farewell to this beautiful little town, and headed back up north - next stop, Hiroshima.