Nikko

Nikko is a lovely little town in central Japan surrounded by lakes and waterfalls and mountains and rivers. The perfect place to be outside!

As soon as we arrived at Nikko we headed straight for Edo Wonderland. This is a theme park sort of like the Renaissance festival but for the Edo period (time of the Ninja!). It is actually a little village resembling Edo architecture and people walk around dressed as samurai.

The village was full of self entertaining ninja experiences like a trick maze, a ninja balance fun house, and a prison. You can learn how to throw shuriken (stars), darts, shoot a bow, and handle a katana. The best part was the Ninja shows! There were several performances of ninja on ninja action full of acrobatics, stealthiness, and just general awesomeness.

We also saw super fancy Oiran of the red-light district. *gasp*

And Jordan fought a samurai! And won!! His prize was a coin, used in the Edo period, of the smallest denomination of course. (I fought too but I lost :(

Sunday it rained/snowed all day but that did not deter us from our outdoor adventures away from people as we had planned! First we went to Urami Falls -a well kept local secret ;) The short trail took us along a gorge to this place that looked like Riverdale!

You could even get up and cross behind the waterfall. Here Jordan is standing in front of a statue which had a giant sword (seen next to him). It was beautiful! And we didn't see a single person :)

Next we took the bus further into the mountains to the way more popular but still uncrowded Kegon Falls. This falls is over 300ft high (3rd highest in Japan). Unfortunately the mountains were a bit too cloudy and snowy so while we could see the falls and all the icicles around the edges, my camera couldn't get past the snow very well...

To end our trip we took a walk through town along the main river/gorge that cut through it and found some curious little statues

Legend has it that the statues change place from time to time and you will never see them in the same order. Also if you count them going one way you will end up with a different number when you come back! We only walked in one direction so the mystery will have to wait for the next person!