A place where beautiful natural landscape and historical world heritage site will bring you back in time.
I travelled to Toyama by taking Shinkansen from Ueno station with took me around hours to get to Toyama. Shinkansen Toyama station is a new addition to the Shinkansen Hokuriku sen with was added in 2015 when the lines expended to go all over to Kanazawa. This made Toyama station one of the newest Shinkansen where it had over been in operation for less than a year and this made the station still looked very brand new.
After I get off Shinkansen Toyama station, I went over to get on the bus with a special guide tour who would be taking me on a tour of Toyama today. The first place I went to was the photo spot where you could take a beautiful photo of the Tateyama Mountain Range standing behind the photogenic Toyama Bay. The day I went to was a sunny winter day where there are no single cloud in the sky which according to my bus guide was a very rare chance as in Toyama it rains so often that there is a saying, "You may forget a lunchbox but you can never forget an umbrella when you are here in Toyama. " So I guessed it was a lucky chance for me to be able to get such a nice picture taken there when the trip was not properly planned.
The next stop for my trip was one of the most memorable trip in my life and it was a trip to the Ainokura Village which is a world heritage site. Every house here in Ainokura Village has a very unigue roof which are made of a Japanese grass called Suzuki or Kaya where they will cut off the grass, dry them off before the member of the family who lived in the house will all help out in roof making which will be done in the traditional method which had been handed down generations to generations.
The minute I stepped inside Ainokura Village I felt as though my time had stopped. I could hear the sound of the wind that blew past, the sound of the running water in the water tunnels beneath my feet and also the tweeting of the birds that was nearby. The house here has a roof that was made out of layers of dry grass and yet in the garage stood the electric car. This is a scene you could never see anywhere else in the world where the past blended into the present in perfection. Some may say that two hours ride on the bus from the city of Toyama plus 30 minutes riding up the hill just to see this old village is a waste of time but to me it was really a village worth visiting and time worth spending. The village has taught me the importance of treasure the goodness of the past and how to make them coexist with the present and how we will preserve them for the future.
The only regret I had for this trip was that I did not plan my trip out very well so I did not get to go and see the famous ice wall. So I will definitely have to come back here in Toyama to get myself a picture with that great ice wall.
Ainokura Village
Address - Ainokura, Nanto city, Toyama prefecture 939-1915
Phone - 0763-66-2468 (Gokayama Tourism Association)
Remarks –
Enquiries: Nanto City Interactive Tourism Town-building Office 0763-23-2019
Volunteer guide： 1,500 yen
Commemorative photo: 1,000 yen
Reservations must be made 1 week in advance (visit our website for details)
Website –
English http://foreign.info-toyama.com/en/spot/?spot_id=27
Japanese http://www.city.nanto.toyama.jp/cms-sypher/www/section/detail.jsp?id=283
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