Essay - Travels
- No.5
2003 Summer - Shinshu　No.1 "Familiar place" -
journeyAn usual Summer trip by my family - Tomi, Yasu and me, and my brother Deco and his partner Chie - Where are we going to go to this year? Rebun island? Kurokawa spa? the Maldives? Although there were some site proposed, we finally decided to go to neighbor and familiar Shinshu.
On the day before departure, Chie and Deco arrived at Takaoka from Kyoto on the train after their works. Welcome Welcome! Let's have Sushi an eve! We went to Isaka sushi. "Uzaku" which vinegared dynamic cut cucumber and eel was very nice. A hot egg roll using 10 eggs was also good. I was trembling and happy with joy before holiday.
We had plan that we get up early and go to soba(buckwheat) noodles restaurant "Fujioka" (Shinano-machi, Nagano) or "So-an" (Turuki-machi, Ishikawa), but we knew Fujioka was closed and it needed long way round to go to So-an, so we decided to get up late. We watched Kyogen(Noh farce) DVD of Mnsaku Nomura and held our sides with laughter late at night.
The three missing articlesThe departure morning had came. We had a light meal of fruit and cheese and now let's go to Shinshu... But the things go with no trouble at all every our trip. A cooler of car seemed to have trouble. Tomi harried to car shop. And it was already near noon when he was back. Well, shall we? What? Aren't you found your sunglasses? (Our car stayed in the garage yet) Have you found? Good. Well, let's go! (Our car started slowly) Huh? Is your purse missing? (Our car made a round the neighborhood and put back to a beginning) Have you found? OK?
In the meantime, we felt hungry. Let's have lunch! "Ichikawa" nearby Toyama city hospital serves smooth soba noodles made from only buckwheat flour. I can recommend "Soba Komachi": a bowl of soba noodles topped with a mixture of vegetables and other ingredients fried or "Oroshi soba": a bowl of soba noodles topped with grated pungent taste type radish. Tempura is quite crisp. Some kinds of pickles is in favor especially with Yasu. Tomi break into a smile by good sake and tidbit. And it is best to eat with seeing pleasantly chef more than anything else.
After satisfy our appetite, now, we drove under the fine weather to Shinshu. Although it had been cool Summer on account of unseasonable weather, it is fine thanks to wonder-working Yasu. We entered the Hokuriku Expressway at Toyama interchange, branched off Joetsu junction to Joshinetsu Expressway, and went out at Toyota-iiyama. We drove for a while along Chikuma river with seeing the cosmos were trembling in the breeze, and then we arrived our today's destination "Nozawa spa" It was quite Autumn air in Shinshu.