On Sunday, we took the train to Shin-Matsuda Station on the Odakyu Line and hiked over the mountains to the Wintersweet Festival in Yadoriki.
We walked from the station, past the local sake brewery, then up the steep path to the Herb Garden on the mountainside, where there is a nice view looking over Odawara city to the sea and over the mountains to Mt. Fuji.
From the herb garden, we walked up through blueberry fields and orange groves to Saimyoji Shiseki Park. This park is nice in spring with many cherry blossoms around a small lake, but yesterday, the lake was completely frozen. At the top of the mountains looking down on the park, snow had fallen and it remained on the ground all the way until we got to the wintersweet festival.
There was a path which was washed out by a landslide, so we avoided that route, but somehow, we managed to end up back on that route and clambered over soft mud and snow to get round a riverhead and back onto a safe path again. It was only when we got back onto the safe path that we realized our mistake as there was a warning of the landslide on a barrier which we had climbed over.
Anyway, we finally got the the wintersweet festival. The blossoms were not quite at their fullest because its been a cold winter so far in Japan, but it was still pretty, with a lovely aroma in the air, and warm after the frozen route we had taken to get there.
Once we had wandered around the mountain side on which the wintersweet covered, we got the bus back to Matsuda and then went to the sake brewery, which had a sake drinks machine. You can buy tokens and try samples of the sake that you want. It was only a small place, but interesting. Needless to say, we bought some sake too.
It was a nice day in all. I like seeing the wintersweet. Its the first reminder that spring is on its way and every single time I've been to that particular festival, its been warm, must be something about the way the valley is situated.
I wonder how it is to go hiking on snow in the mountains!It seems it was a challenging walk but a a very wonderful experience getting to see the lovely view on top!
Nice shots!Take care
Thanks a lot! It was challenging when we had to walk over the side of a steep valley which had had a mud slide and was coated with snow and mud, hehehe. But, you are right, the view was great!
Beautiful place 😍
Congratulations @justinchicken! You received the biggest smile and some love from TravelFeed! Keep up the amazing blog. 😍 Your post was also chosen as top pick of the day and is now featured on the TravelFeed.io front page.
Thanks for using TravelFeed!
@for91days (TravelFeed team)
PS: Have you joined our Discord yet? This is where over 1000 members of the TravelFeed come together to chat. Join us!
Congratulations, your post has been added to Pinmapple! 🎉🥳🍍
Did you know you have your own profile map?
And every post has their own map too!
Want to have your post on the map too?
What a beautiful place to visit. Tranquil is relaxing and soothing. The surroundings are clean too.
Hiya, @LivingUKTaiwan here, just swinging by to let you know that this post made it into our Honorable Mentions in Daily Travel Digest #1775.
Your post has been manually curated by the @pinmapple team. If you like what we're doing, please drop by to check out all the rest of today's great posts and consider supporting other authors like yourself and us so we can keep the project going!
Become part of our travel community:
Congratulations @justinchicken! You have completed the following achievement on the Hive blockchain And have been rewarded with New badge(s)
Your next target is to reach 25000 upvotes.
You can view your badges on your board and compare yourself to others in the Ranking
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPCheck out our last posts:
Support the HiveBuzz project. Vote for our proposal!