This article is based on a visit made on Friday, 18 May 2018.
Previously on Sekai Ichi, I introduced the city of Takayama, which is where I went on the tenth full day of my vacation. To get there from Toyama, I took the Wide View Hida express, which I have written about before in
a Know Your Trains article, for a 90-minute ride south into the heart of Honshu.
As I described in the above article, the Wide View trains live up to their name not only with extra-large windows along the sides, but also with a wrap-around front window on the end car. It is ordered at the front of the train when heading from Nagoya/to Toyama, and at the back in the other direction. We got seats in that car both ways, and since it is designated as a Green Car, we had it almost all to ourselves.
The Wide View Hida is officially my favourite train journey ever, in terms of scenery. Despite the cloudy weather, the hues of the brilliant green forests and clear blue streams shone through. Some of the best scenery can be found in the section between Inotani and Hida-Furukawa, which the Hida covers in over half an hour without any stops.
Occasionally a cloud of mist would hover over the swiftly-flowing streams, which I also found pleasantly atmospheric. Yet, all good things must come to an end, and we did have to leave the train eventually, but the best was yet to come.
From Takayama Station, we took a bus to Hida Folk Village (飛騨の里,
Hida no Sato), an open-air museum which has collected and preserved houses from farming towns across the region. As soon as you enter the park, you are greeted with a splendid viewpoint of some of those houses from across a lake. Many come from Shirakawa-go, which has become popular in its own right after becoming a
UNESCO World Heritage Site. Indeed, I had also planned a day trip there, since there are also direct buses that go there from Toyama, where I was staying, but ultimately I decided that it would be more convenient just to get the same experience here.
There are a few free small activities put out around here for visitors to try out. You can put on the coat, hat, and back-mounted basket of a farmer, or even try out an Edo-period water gun. It's one of those straight rod-like things where you push a plunger in and it shoots the water by pressure alone. It was surprisingly hard to hit the targets posted above the lake.
There are multiple styles of houses, all grouped under the term
minka (民家, lit. "house of the people"), on display at Hida-no-Sato. They date from the Edo or Meiji periods, and most of them are open for visitors to walk in. As you explore the houses, you'll be taking your shoes on and off a lot, and there are quite a few staircases, both inside and out. Visitors with mobility needs should be aware of that ahead of time.
Hida no Sato holds seasonal events throughout the year. They celebrate
festivals like Girls' Day (3 March) and Boys' Day (5 May), and also some agricultural activities. In these fields, rice is planted in the late Spring, and harvested in the following Autumn.
There were so many houses present that I didn't manage to visit nearly all of them, but the ones I did each presented different aspects of life in old rural Japan. Inside, you will find elements like
irori (囲炉裏), which are sunken fire pits used for cooking, located in the middle of the main room. Pots are hung above the fire pit by hooked steel rods called
jizaikagi (自在鉤).
When you climb up to the top levels, you will get a better look at how these homes are constructed. They are typically made without using any nails; instead, wooden beams are lashed together with rope. The roofs are thatched with straw; the thickness (up to a metre/3 feet) and the steeply-sloped shape (up to 60 degrees) of the roofs makes them strong enough to withstand the heavy snowfalls this region is infamous for, as well as slough off rain that would cause it to rot.
The families who used to own these homes were involved in various trades, and the methods of their labour are represented here. Exhibits within the houses show how products like silk, paper, or tofu were made back in the day, and include artifacts involved in those processes. You may also see volunteer artisans making these crafts first-hand.
While you're there, don't forget to check out the Hida-Takayama Crafts Experience Centre, just across the road from the main entrance. They hold paid courses, with instructions available in English, for making things like
sarubobo cloth dolls and
senbei rice crackers. These courses cost ¥600 to ¥1600, and you can get discount if you present a paid ticket for Hida no Sato itself.
We went for the
senbei baking experience, not only because it was the cheapest and quickest, but because I had developed a serious taste for the things in trips before. How it works is you hold the raw crackers by a pair of tongs and hold them in the kiln-like oven in front of you. The goal is to rotate them at regular intervals so that, as they bake and expand, they grow as flat and evenly as possible. You get to bake ten crackers in total, alternating between lighter ones flavoured with salt, and darker ones flavoured with soy sauce. Although it took us some time to get the routine down pat, they all came out delicious! So for my sign-off selfie, allow me to demonstrate the fruits of my labour. No time to bask, though, since I still have much more to cover from Takayama, including the Yatai Kaikan festival museum, next time on Sekai Ichi!
Hours: Open from 8:30 AM to 5:00 PM. No regular closing days. The Crafts Experience Centre is open from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM, and is closed on Thursdays.
Cost: ¥700.
Address: 1-1-590 Kamioka Motomachi, Takayama-shi, Gifu-ken 〒506-0031
Access: From the Takayama Bus Centre, take the Sarubobo loop bus to Hida no Sato (9 minutes, ¥210). The return trip takes about 15 minutes, but be aware that every third bus takes a detour out to the Festival Forest museum, adding 20 minutes onto the trip back to downtown Takayama.
Website:
(English) (Japanese)
