We moved

Mrs. Caveman and I moved to Saku City in Nagano Prefecture this past week.  

The cherry blossoms are peaking.  The mountains around Yatsugatake, Mt. Tateshina and Mt. Asama are gorgeous.

The people are really nice, too!  I loved living in Tokyo all those years but these people are special.

I haven't had time for any blog-worthy hikes yet but thought I would like to share some of this beautiful scenery; particularly since the cherry blossoms are so beautiful right now.

I can't wait to get my boots on again.

Yatsugatake

Fun-fact.  Yatsugatake-produced milk is prohibitively expensive in Tokyo. 

Around Yatsugatake it is still prohibitively expensive.

My new school

Various places

The Catholic Church in Saku.  The priest is a 91-year-old Franciscan.

Happy Easter!  He is risen.  He is risen indeed!

Heading toward my first "peak".  This is a little hill I ran up before my first day of work.

Priorities.

From Mt. Kokuzo

Another view of Yatsugatake.

Mt. Asama.  It erupted in 2019.  Can't go to the top because of the air now.

See you soon with a report, I hope!

Take care and Happy Easter!

Matsumoto City, Mt. Naka and Mt. Koubo Trailrun

Location: Mt. Koubo, Matsumoto-shi

Starting and stopping point:  Minami Matsumoto Station 〜 Matsumoto Station

Peaks bagged: Koubo  Naka 

Getting there/getting around:  The trailhead is about a 1.8 km walk from Minami Matsumoto Station or 3 km from Matsumoto.

Map:  I just used my iphone.  It's not really a mountain trail.

Total Time:  About 90 minutes. Break time:   About 30 minutes taking pictures.

Distance:  10.5 km.   About half of that was on pavement.

Elevation:  Lowest:   585m   Highest:  835   Total Ascent:  354m  Total Descent:  363m

Technical considerations/difficulty:  None

Facilities:  There is parking and a restroom on the way.

Thoughts/observations/recommendations: I was in Matsumoto for some training and wanted to get into the hills. This is a nice walk in the park for the locals.  It's not the type of place I'd set as a destination from far away but it was nice.  

I wanted to get to Mt. Naka and back to my hotel room early enough in the morning so that I could get cleaned up and go on to my training venue on time so I got on a train before 6 and ran instead of hiked.  It was a bit cold starting out as it was 1 degree Celsius and I was wearing just a t-shirt and shorts.  🥶  It was a great morning, though.  Beautiful skies and some of the sakura were peaking.

Here are some pictures.  

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Come again!

Matsumoto Castle

I've come to Matsumoto City in Nagano for some training. It's a beautiful city and Matsumoto Castle is a national treasure.  Even though it's a few days before the cherry blossoms will be in full bloom, it was really special to see.

Being in Nagano, of course I ☆had☆ to bag a few peaks.  I only had a short time to hike, though, and they were really just hills.  I won't blog about that.  (They were Mts. Koubo and Chikato near Minami Matsumoto Station if you're curious.)

I'm making this blog post on my iphone so I'll stop writing here and just put up some pics.

　

I don't know what this is.  I encountered it on the way to the Castle.

Hopefully I'll be blogging about mountains in a few weeks again after Mrs. Caveman and I move.

We're moving up here to Nagano.  Woohoo!