Day 29 Continued
(08/27/06)

Cycling along a small riverside path, visiting Ganshoin-ji, and wandering the Hokusai Museum would make for an excellent, full day on their own. But in our case, this all happened before lunch.

After the museum it was time for Chay and I to fumble through our presentation in rough but intelligible Japanese. It was a challenging question and answer session thanks to the language barrier and some questions about hydroponics, vegetarianism, and resource use. Fortunately the crowd was forgiving and friendly. At lunch, I ended up sitting at a table with the mayor and the head of an Obuse cycling promotion group. The town is trying to bill itself as a cycle friendly city, thus the big reception for BEE. The spread of food was incredible--they were expecting ten people, but half the team had split off a day early to start the Tokyo leg of the trip. Highlights of the lunch were the oyaki--steamed veggie filled dumplings, a local specialty--and a pizzaesque creation with a mesh of shredded eggplant instead of a crust on the bottom. Nearly everything was made from locally grown vegetables. The woman in charge of the feast kept prodding us to eat more then gave us a pile of oyaki to take with us.

Before heading off to Chikuma, our guides slipped back to the Hokusai Museum area with us and treated everyone to Chestnut Soft cream, one of the better flavors thus far.

A bit more river riding then we rolled into Chikuma, just a few minutes early apparently. As we pulled into the community center, we were greeted then promptly told to go back over the bridge and come in again since the NHK cameraman wasn't ready yet. We obligingly repeated our entrance, this time to a round of applause and a big TV camera. Nothing like a staged entrance to contrast with rolling into Obuse town that morning. Silly but fun.

Then it was time to present again, and feast on handmade udon, tempura, and a host of other tasty treats. Bellies full, we split up and went to our home stays for the night. Chay and I to chill out in James's supremely comfortable apartment, and the girls to Mary's house for slumber party fun.