Sendai Yamadera Hijiori onsen

1st day
Tokyo - Sendai(A) Tohoku Shinkansen (2hour)
Sendai - Yamadera Senzan line (1 train per 1 hour)
Stay at B&B

Yamadera.. yama means mountain, tera (dera) means temple.Exactly that place likes name.Amaging huge forests and complex.
You can see the beautiful big cypress tree little buddha statue.
That forest's atomosphere is mysterious and makes me feel I am innocent.
That area is not too touristic but there are some nice noodle shop.
I recommend special food "soba". (gray thin traditional noodle.)

2nd day
Yamadera 山寺 - Shinjo 新庄 Senzan Line 20min
Shinjo - Hijiori Onsen 肘折温泉 Ou u Line 50min
Bus 1hour (by hotel's bus)
Stay at Kangetsu (Onsen Ryokan 8550～19050yen/person）

We catch Senzan line to Shinjo.
Shinjo station has nice Information center, they reccommend a lots option to us.
We chose Onsen that name Kangetsu.
As they would come to pick us up at Shinjo station, we bought a nice local foods and ate them in a park near the station.

The bus through a beautiful country side.
Particular it was beautiful to look at view of Senmaida. Senmaida means terrace rice field.

Hijiori Onsen is village. It has beautiful river.Some people caught a fish.It also was nice walikng around with Yukata.(Cotton Kimono)

3rd day
Shinjo - Naruko Onsen Rikuu to sen line For Naruko
Naruko onsen - Furukawa Rikuu to sen line
Furukawa - Tokyo

Naruko Onsen is also Onsen villege.

It has beautiful walking course through a gorge.
When we were walking, Nobody are there.

Two days Onsen trip - Shibu Onsen-

If you want to have experience of tradittional Onsen, I recommend Shibu Onsen.

This place is still have atomosphere of Showa-era.
Many traditional timbered building, common bathes, little rainway, everything beautiful.
If you have a chance please walk aroud this little town wearing Yukata (casual cotton kimono) and Geta (Japanese wooden crog) - they are proper clothes for Onsen.

We stayed at ryokan, Ikari-ya. (I booked thourgh Rakuten travel).
This place was official inn of Nagano The 1998 Winter Olympics.
Atomosphere and people are excellent.
And also food were amazing.
Even I (as Japanese) have never had such a tasty Japanese food for a long time.

[How to get there]
We got Nagano Shinkansen from Tokyo to Nagano.
It will take about two hours.
And then transfer to Nagano Dentetsu from Nagano to Yudanaka.
It will take about 40 minutes.
From Yudanaka Stn to Shibu Onsen you can walk 30min and also catch a bus.

[Recommend place near there]
Snow monkey park.http://www.jigokudani-yaenkoen.co.jp/frameset.html
(They have Eglish pages)
We walked from Shibu Onsen to there (About 4Km).
We could see a traditional sake brewery building and enjoy lots of snow.
(You can take a bus from Shibu onsen to Kaminoyama Onsen, that was near the park.)

That park is belonged to Jigokudani Onsen.
That onsen is a very beautiful place.
The fontal and cold air made fantastic view.
Moisture vapor was cold down and sticked to branch.That formed like a ball so many ice balls were in ground, branch , fence and everywhere.

The way from fontal to Snow monkey park was also nice little trail.We can walk through a forest. One side of trail is steep slope and other side is canal.Everybody said hello (kon ni chi wa) to each other.

Snow monkey does not care about human at all.
They walked around near us but totally ignore us.
Some monkey had a bath.
Some monkey had a grooming.
Some monkey fight for food.
Young and baby monkeys are adoreble very much.
You can see wild monkeys and their life very close.