Matsumoto 松本

21st - 22nd October

The bus ride from Takayama to Matsumoto took around two and a half hours so Pauline was very pleased that we had the front seats. Particularly satisfying as the Aussie couple that we had helped with navigation in Takayama were in row two. They looked underwhelmed.

The views had been hyped up in our guide we did indeed travel through some beautiful countryside. Mainly though the road cut into mountains and for a lot of the time a view of the inside of a concrete tunnel was as exciting as it got.

It feels like we are inching our way across the country whilst travelling by bus but after what felt like a long journey we arrived in Matsumoto.

As is so often the case we arrive at the modern edge of town where the transport hubs are and then walk towards the historic centre where our hotel is. We’ve therefore got used to the first impression of a plan not being too great. This place was no different at first but after around ten minutes of walking we were getting near to our hotel and the city was still looking like the urban sprawl outskirts and even a bit of river wasn’t really cheering it up.

We reached our hotel which was near the castle but still no sign of anything vaguely unique or interesting.

The first impression of the hotel Kagetsu was non too inspiring either but the building was certainly in keeping with the rest of the city that we had seen so far - dingy and run down. The summary in our brochure only suggests to us that it might be a hundred years since the furniture in the reception area was last refurbished.

There was a queue for check in and everyone was looking a bit glum. After fifteen minutes the complaining Aussies arrived. Unsurprisingly they had got lost trying to find their way from the bus station and were now complaining that they only had one night in Matsumoto before leaving early in the morning. Our sympathies were with them but we did agree that, on the face of it, they might not be missing much.

By the time we did get into our room it was time to go out again to search out a restaurant. Inevitably, the first place we looked for from our Google search was very much shut so we ambled about getting more and more tired, hungry and irritable. Turns out that because it is the Tuesday after the third Monday of the month which is a a public holiday (sometimes) most places are closed. Silly us for not realising something so obvious!

We did find plenty of portrayals of the food that we could have had on any other day of the week (apart from the third Monday of the month obviously). These rather sad displays of plastic food happen everywhere in Japan and we reckon that there must be one town somewhere here where all they have is plastic food factories. Sometimes they are so realistic that you find yourself thinking ‘what a waste of food’. Then you realise that it’s a public holiday so it must be fake.

The situation and our fatigue was contributing to this becoming a low point in our trip and without having to say anything, we were both feeling a bit homesick. Maybe inevitable when you’re travelling away for so long.

Eventually we found somewhere that was not only open but looked good and was full of locals. We grabbed the last two seats and watched our Hiroshima not pizza being cooked. It was really tasty and better than the one we’d had in the city where the dish was invented also with the added benefit of not upsetting our stomachs this time.

We turned in early determined to enjoy this place more tomorrow.

Breakfast at the hotel was a joke. There were plenty of tables free when we arrived but for some reason the staff seemed to be keeping these clear for as long as the guests’ patience would allow. We waited in the lobby for twenty minutes or so before we were allowed to sit at one. By then it was nearing the end of breakfast session and as a result the choice of food from the buffet was limited to some scabby looking scrambled egg, some nasty white bread and the inevitable rice with miso soup.

We went out in a bit of a huff to find the castle. Big queues for tickets and then a bigger queue for getting into the castle.

The castle is impressive and being completed in 1595, remains as the oldest timber construction of its kind in Japan. We had plenty of time to admire the outside of it as we queued for at least thirty minutes to get in all of the time wishing that we had booked a ticket online as this would have delivered us straight into the building via the e-ticket lane. The continual arrival of people there only delayed our entry. At least it wasn’t raining!

There were some exhibits on the lower floors but you had to be quick looking at them as the relentless flow of people pushed along in a one way narrow route to get to the staircases leading up.

The building was built for defence not comfort and as the floor plates became smaller and smaller through the height of the building so there was less space for exhibits and people.

I was beginning to wonder if we had paid money to be part of a human behavioural study as, like rats in a maze, we were all driven along for no purpose whatsoever other than to complete the circuit to the top and then back down again. There were some men in uniforms stationed at each of the narrow steep staircases but their role seemed to be one of making notes about human behaviour and smirking a bit rather than directing the traffic. Pauline missed out the fifth and sixth floors because by then the tread height was up to 450mm with hardly enough room to put your foot on each step. A glitch in the experiment!

The backdrop of mountains visible from the top floor show off the city’s beautiful setting but I was still struggling to match up what I was seeing with TLP’s description of the place: “The vibrant city of Matsumoto is an attractive, cosmopolitan place loved by both residents and admirers from around the globe, who come to enjoy the superb castle, pretty streets, galleries and endearing vistas”. Mmmm.

It was nice to get away from the crowds within the castle and enjoy the views of it across the moat surrounding it.

We found Frog Street which is the ‘pretty street’. It was closed.

Moving on, we reached the City Museum of Art. A fine piece of architecture designed by Tadanaga Miyamoto and completed in 2002, it houses permanent displays focusing on local artists including Yayoi Kusama whose work we had also seen on Naoshima Island.

Now in her nineties, she is still producing work that is extraordinary and mostly with a screen of dots that reflect the sight impairment that she was born with.

Internal spaces to the museum are split through a graceful atrium space.

Whilst externally a well proportioned courtyard is set out. You can see Pauline on the right hand side making her way to the cafe at the end whilst I bought a ticket for some of the galleries.

I was sceptical at first about the work of miss dotty but room after room of her clever work slowly persuaded me that there was more to it that just an acid trip world view and started to appreciate the skill involved in persuading the visitor to look at things differently.

The giant pumpkin room was the only one that I was allowed to take photos in.

We found a Nepalese restaurant open in the evening and enjoyed having something a bit different to eat.

Matsumoto had improved for us as we stayed longer but two nights was definitely enough and now we were looking forward to our next stop: Tokyo.