Matsuyama

Well, after the horrid 13th, we, thankfully, had a nice relaxing slow paced day planned in Matsuyama. We got up not quite as early, took our time in the shower, which was nice. Then we gathered up our stuff and checked-out of the hostel. We stored our stuff in lockers and then looked for breakfast. Unfortunately, while we were looking at a restaurant this man came up to us and started speaking to us in English. Pretty good English, too. And he was telling us that the restaurant we were looking at was really good, especially their croquettes.

And then he started asking us all the usual questions, where were we from, where are we studying, blah blah blah. And then he wanted to show us around the little shopping street we were on. My friend, of course, was being polite and letting him lead us around, but then he started trying to give us gifts from a little souvenir store. Up to that point I'd only been mildly uncomfortable about being led around a place we're not familiar with by a complete stranger. But when he started telling us to pick something, that's when I decided it was time to ditch him.

I know that sounds mean, but, still. I'm a really cynical person, and I guess I just didn't like the fact that he was intruding on the schedule I'd so carefully made before actually leaving on this trip. At any rate, I was hungry and I was going to put an end to this. So I gave a dramatic gasp and widened my eyes and said that I'd left something at the hotel. So I grabbed my travel companion and ran.

So we ducked out of that street and hurried to the Dogo Onsen, where we KNEW he couldn't follow us. We payed our 1,200 yen and went inside. We were shown upstairs to a room where there were baskets with yukatas laying on the floor. We were told to change and then leave our clothes in the baskets. So we looked around, because there were also men in the room, and we saw this other older woman get up and go toward a door, so we followed her. We entered a long narrow room and she turned around and asked us if we spoke English. That was the second time that day that we met somebody who could speak perfect English.



We were SO happy that she spoke English because neither of us had been in an onsen (hotspring) before, and we weren't too sure about what to do. So she guided us through it. We were so lucky! So we changed into our yukatas and put our clothes back in the baskets. Then we followed the lady into the more private onsen (the one we payed 1,200 yen for). It was down stairs and we came into a locker room. We were supposed to take off our yukatas, put them in the lockers, and bring the little towels into the bath with us.

And that's really how it went. We took off our yukatas (a bit embarrassing) and went into the adjoining room that had the little showers and onsen. We showered, and slipped into the hot water. And it felt SOOO GOOD! We stayed in there for a couple of minutes, then got back out and showered again as the lady had instructed. Then we got back in and chatted with the lady and another college student who was in there with us. Of course we were in the lady's bath, so we didn't have to worry about that sort of thing.

Once we started feeling dizzy, though, we got out and toweled off, put our yukatas back on and went back up to that room to cool off a bit. The ladies that were waiting on the room gave us sweet senbei cookies and (for some odd reason) hot green tea. We waited for awhile and then went down to the cheaper onsen where the locals like to bathe. It was quite an experience, let me tell you. Most of the were really really old ladies who looked like they could barely walk by themselves, yet there they were hopping into this huge tub of really really hot water. After about 10 minutes we were dizzy again so we got back out and went back upstairs.

It was so amazing! I was wiping my arm dry when I noticed that it was still wet. So I wiped it again and sweat immediately beaded up! It was crazy, I don't think I've ever sweat that much before. Not to mention we both looked as if we had really bad sunburns.



And then we got to take a tour of the rooms and bath that are kept exclusively for the Imperial Family! Unfortunately I completely forgot that I had my camera with me, or I would have taken pictures. Sorry! But we also got to go into the private room where the man who wrote Botchan (Natsume Souseki) used to spend a lot of time.



And here's the Dogo Park. We stopped here to eat lunch since it was nearby.



Next is Nagoya.