Typically JR passes are only available to tourists/short term visitors to Japan. Recently, JR has changed their guidelines to include anyone with a non-Japanese passport. With winter vacation fast approaching, we opted to purchase the JR Nagano Niigata 5-Day Pass. At a cost of ¥18,000/each, we would strive to get as much value as possible from them. Read below for Day #1 of our JR Nagano Niigata Pass.

With the JR pass we are able to book a Hitachi & Tokiwa Express Train from Mito Station to Ueno Station. Typically we take the local train at a cost of ¥2,310/person and it takes a little over 2 hours. With the JR pass we can book express trains at no additional cost, so we opted for the express train which costed ¥3,890/person and only took 1 hour and 15 minutes. Once at Ueno Station we took a Hokuriku-Shinkansen Kagayaki to Nagano Station. It was the first time we’d been on a shinkansen since coming back to Japan. It instantly reminded us of our time as tourists. The trip was a short hour and a half.

Nagano Stamp Rally & Sticker Campaign

Once at Nagano Station we headed to the Tourist Information Center and got some literature about Nagano and the required materials for the Zenkoji Temple Stamp Rally and the Walking & Eating Sticker Campaign. Fun Fact: Nagano hosted the 1998 Winter Olympic Games. We dropped our bags off in some lockers and headed out of Nagano Station’s Zenkoji Exit. Along the way to Zenkoji Temple we made our way to each of the other six temples. We stopped by a number of shops to try different snacks.

Vintage House Retro Shop

The entrance to Ojouin Temple was just inside a covered shopping street. On the corner was a vintage antique/collectables shop called Vintage House. Outside they had a gatcha machine with various prizes available. We saw one that had pins from the 1998 Nagano Olympics. Since we like to collect pins, this was a great opportunity. We ended up getting three.

Yawataya Isogoro

Along the main road leading to Zenkoji Temple was Yawataya Isogoro a local shop specializing in spices. They were known for their shichimi (blend of seven chili spices). A fixture at udon restaurants, shichimi was primarily sold at only three locations in Japan. Near Senso-ji in Asakusa, Tokyo, near Kiyomizu-dera in Kyoto, and near Zenkoji-ji in Nagano.

We looked around the shop and picked up a couple of small containers. They came in these really detailed metal shakers. We got a traditional blend as well as a yuzu (Japanese citrus) blend. Note: We finally tried it in our udon, and it was pretty spicy. We’ll definitely being using it sparingly in the future.

Isemachi Baos

In between Nishinomiya Shrine and Sesonin Shakadou Temple we stopped by Isemachi Baos which sold a variety of meat buns and gyoza. We got a niku-man (meat bun) and some shrimp gyoza. We didn’t realize until after the fact that the gyoza were not cooked (we were supposed to take them home and cook them ourselves). Retrospectively, we should have asked the shop owner to cook them for us, but we didn’t think of that at the time. The meat bun was very delicious, the meat was juicy and tender. It was a perfect snack for such a cold day. We picked up another one before heading out.

Zenkoji Temple

We made our way back to the main road which had turned into a pedestrian only walkway. There were countless souvenir and food shops on both sides. We stopped at Zenkoji pudding and bought a couple to try later. The temple had a couple of very impressive gates that were massive in size. The temple complex was quite large and temple itself was very detailed and ornate. We picked up the last of the stamps for our rally at the temple’s office.

Nozawa Onsen

After finishing up at the temple, we made our way back to Nagano Station. Along the way we stopped by and picked up another apple pie from Beni-Beni. When we got back to the station we had a late lunch at Nagano Meijitei. After lunch we picked up our bags and took the 11 minute shinkansen ride to Iiyama Station. When we got to Iiyama Station, we got our first taste of heavy snowfall as we made our way to the bus stop. We took the dedicated Nozawa Onsen bus for about 25 minutes. When we got off the bus we were glad to have brought our hiking backpacks. There was a couple of inches of fresh powder on the ground and some of the other visitors were having a difficult time with their rolling suitcases. It was lightly snowing, so we quickly made our way to our lodging for the next two days at Lodge Matsuya.

We got settled into our room and enjoyed the pudding that we had gotten earlier. Both the Matcha and original flavors were very good. They both had a light taste and smooth texture. We cleaned up and called it a night.

More to Come…

Transportation:

Mito Station to Ueno Station ¥3,890
Ueno Station to Nagano Station ¥8,130
Nagano Station to Iiyama Station ¥2,910

Total ¥14,930