We’re reaching the end and the conclusion of our Nagano adventures, told in drawings by Sophie Dreamy! If you missed the previous episodes, go and see Departure and Jigokudani. This last episode actually packs in 4 strips at once, along with a few photos of course. Alright, let’s go!
Manga Kissa
We didn’t take a single photo of the city of Nagano. Honestly, the city isn’t all that interesting and we were pretty wiped out!
Next we find ourselves in a manga-kissa (manga café). A night there is so cheap (under ¥1,800 each time) that it’s always worth it! There’s internet, unlimited drinks… I’ll write a whole article about all that one day. One warning though: there aren’t always showers. In short, it’s worth getting familiar with their websites 😉
Isn’t it a great shot, this photo taken by Alex? I love it, and on top of that it was a wonderful moment (naturally, and don’t be jealous, gnark gnark gnark!)
The Haikyo
When I travel, or when I head out to do haikyo (I make a distinction between the two, since haikyo has become a real job!), I always absolutely insist on being on site at dawn. The problem is that dawn in Japan comes very early (off the top of my head, I’d say between 4 and 7 depending on the season), so depending on the distance you really have to leave super early, sometimes even at midnight! I think I was relatively kind to Dreamy this time, though…
This haikyo is called the Seline Hotel, and I’ve never written anything about it, neither on my haikyo site nor on this one; that’s simply because I never really visited it! But I wanted to take Dreamy there because inside you find hideous drawings of pregnant women being murdered. It was probably a nasty surprise, but I absolutely wanted to show her somewhere scarier than the famous haunted house at Fuji-Q :-p
Snow wall or not, we didn’t miss the chance to take some photos. Before dashing off to our friends at Issekinicho, nearly 60 kilometres away!
Nakayoshi
A trip to Japan without an onsen isn’t a trip! So every evening, before heading back to the hotel, the ryokan or the manga-kissa, you absolutely have to visit one, just to end the day in style.
Bessho Onsen
I’d never been to Bessho Onsen, so this was the chance! One warning though: most onsen (as in many hot-spring towns) belong to hotels or ryokan, and you absolutely have to be a guest to get in. So we ended up in a small, fairly old onsen where we saw no one else. But it was really lovely ^^
To finish, here’s a little photo of the group! I think we’re easy enough to recognise, including my good old tripod making a small cameo 🙂
By the way, according to Dreamy (well, even if these drawings are really just “reports” in the end :-p), my favourite bands are Journey, Toto and Genesis. But do you really know which one is my favourite? Whoever guesses wins a karaoke session with me when they come to Japan!
And there you go, I hope you had a good laugh! This isn’t the end of the adventures with Dreamy, quite the opposite: we’re cooking up plenty of good things for later this year, so stay tuned.
