Rosses in Japan: Day three - Saturday means temples, silk, and barbeque

On a warm hazy morning Sena heads off on the bus for marching band practice. More about that on Sunday. Bill, Hannah, Emily and Cris head north to see hidden treasures off the beaten path. Perfect.

We are headed from Myoko to the north, and then across the mountains to the east towards Uonuma.

On the way we pass miles and miles and miles of rice paddies in the mountain valleys.

Along the way we stopped at a sake brewery that unfortunately was not open. A charming-looking building in a pretty location, no doubt filled with liquid treasures.

We drove about two and a half hours through absolutely gorgeous mountain valleys, up and through hairpin curves and along lush valleys. Im going yo count on Hannah to post some decent pictures later. Mine are mostly blurry green swirls shot from the car windows. I did manage to properly document one of the hundrrds of tunnels we passed through, some of them several kilometers long.

Stop one was the strange and beautiful Saifukuji Temple, completed recently in 1857. Master Ishikawa Uncho was a master carver painter poet and also apparently an aficionado of women and sake.

There will be many temple pictures to follow, I guarantee, but this is one of the most unique and idiosyncratic temples I've seen in a couple of trips to Japan, due to the intricate and fresh wood carvings showing various stories of Buddhism and of individual priests and their journeys as they encountered hardships, spirits and demons. Floating in and amongst all are animals - birds, fish, mammals.

Not one of our pictures - pinched from the internet

From the temple guide:
"This carved picture represents the scene of 'Dogen-zenji conquering a violent tiger'. Traveling to China, young Dogen happened to be attacked by a big tiger. Just then his stick changed itself into a dragon, the guardian diety of Dogen-zenji. You can find seven little animals on this carved picture. They are owed to Master Uncho's humor. ... The tight side (panel) is based on the episode of 'kechimyaku pond'. A woman ghost appeared every night sadly and regretfully over the pond. Dogen-zenji gave her a peace of mind, and she never appeared again. "

From there, we headed to a pretty nearby town for lunch and a visit to a silk museum. We saw silkworms munching on mulberry leaves, the process for extracting silk fibers, how yarns are dyed and laid out to make patterns, everything.

The best part was trying our hand at weaving silk fabric on looms. Mickey wins, Hannah places, and Pother shows.