APR 21, Japan Visit: Takayama

A spectacular morning bus ride through the gorges of the Japanese Alps between the two small cities of Matsumoto and Takayama:

M

Takayama's extensive historic district

pagoda down the block from our ryokan
 (traditional hotel)

What luck (fortuitous good timing?)
Up here, at higher altitude
sakura (cherry blooming) is still at full tilt

modern 'scarecrow' in a small garden-plot above the town

at a sake tasting

breakfast for two at the ryokan
(rice, green tea and miso soup still to come )

TODAY'S POEM (senryu *) 

the defenceless hawk,

savagely harrassed by crows,

abandons its meal.

Giorgio Coniglio

* learn more HERE about senryu, a lesser-known Japanese short poem that shares the physical characteristics of haiku (nominally 17 'on' / syllables in three non-rhyming lines), but deals in a satiric or humorous way with human foibles rather than with Nature. 

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