Hiked with my bro on the Nakasendo trail in Japan.
This was the old highway between Tokyo and Kyoto. We just did a small section of it on 1 day, between 2 historical villages. We were thrilled to escape the 36 degrees and 100% humidity of Kyoto- it was only in the high 20s here.
The hiking's not exactly bushwhacking, but the trail's very lush and tropical.
Parts of it have the original stone "paving"
We passed some really cool little villages, that haven't changed much since the Edo period (1700s)
Some pretty cool bamboo forest too.
My knee's still feeling it, after a week of tromping around on pavement, but nothing too debilitating.
We had to get good at reading Kanji symbols on signposts
Trekking snacks were a little different than race food we eat here:
These guys were surprisingly good, grilled in sweet shoyu sauce:
and the post-hiking meal wasn't too bad either:
Really roughing it as far as accommodation goes too
Bro was worried about the toilet facilities. There were washrooms every 2 km or so, including ones equipped with built-in butt-shower. Check out the control panel!
This one surprised Bro so much he felt it should at least buy him dinner afterwards. Fortuitously he found how to turn the power down from firehose level the next time.
Pretty cool village!
The next AM we left after breakfast at 9AM, and made it to Narita airport after a taxi and 4 trains, and were home by 9PM. (thanks to crossing the date line).