Two weeks ago, one of my tutoring students and her husband took me to Karuizawa (Kimura san tachi, domo arigatou gozaimashita! Hontoni tanoshkatta!) It's a beautiful resort town in the mountains close to the town Nagano, where the 1998 winter Olympics were held. Karuizawa hosted the curling events. When the Olympics were held in Tokyo in 1964, Karuizawa hosted equestrian events, which makes it the only city in the world to host summer and winter Olympic events.
Ten kilometers from the town, there is a semi-active volcano called Mount Asama. We visited an amazing nature park near the mountain that reminded me of McKenzie Pass and the Dee Wright observatory in Oregon, except that Mount Asama has considerably more vegetation. In the park there is a Shinto shrine near the highest elevation at the site.
The resort town of Karuizawa is a popular spot for rich (and not so rich) people to go during the hot summer season. The Japanese royal family frequently visited there previously, and the current emperor met his wife there in 1957 while playing tennis. Yoko Ono's family also had a summer home there where she and John Lennon occasionally visited. Not that I'm that big of a John Lennon fan (wasn't he in some band?), but it was interesting to see pictures for sale in the local photography shop of him walking down the famous shopping street with his son. There were also pictures of the Emperor and Empress walking off the tennis court where they met. I bought the picture of the Emperor and Empress.
In the woods near the famous shopping street there is a beautiful church built by a Canadian missionary who popularized Karuizawa as a retreat in the late 1800s.
It was a wonderful trip; thanks again, Yoshihito and Mayumi!
Hopefully the pictures don't need any further explanation.
Also, here are links to two videos; the first is walking on the path through the park near Mount Asama and the second is a waterfall a little further down the mountain:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mytG_GrIR4Y
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKKZXPwkL4E
