August 9, 2012

Road Trip out West . Day 4

Kurobe Gorge and Kurobe train

This morning we headed up towards the coast of Japan to see Kurobe Gorge and ride the Kurobe train.  We literally went through 27 tunnels just to get there.  Since this part of Japan is really mountainous and the Japanese are stellar at building through them we found ourselves driving through lots and lots of tunnels.  The little town where the Kurobe train station was located was a pleasant little place.  There was a beautiful red bridge crossing over the Kurobe river which we actually crossed over as we started our trek on the train.  The train ride was so much fun.  We got to follow the river below and view the beautiful green mountains on both sides of the train.  We decided to ride the train all the way up to the last station which was Nakeyakidaira.  We walked down to the river and walked along the trail to view the Owl Tree and the Kurobe Gorge.  It was a fun little hike and everyone walked without any probelms--including Abby.  At the entrance of the trail was a little hot spring that people sat and put their feet in.  It felt so good.  It wouldn't have been a typical day near the water if the kids didn't try and build dams and throw rocks in the water.  It was a little different than we were used to as there were rope barriers preventing us from venturing out further along the river.  That is the Japanese way though.  I miss the freedom you have in the US to explore at your own risk. 


The owl tree


the crazy lady with the rainbow hair who wanted her picture taken with the kids
 

the $80 watermelons being sold at the station
 

one of 27 tunnels on our trek today


Traveling home was interetsting as we didn't necessarily fill up on gas before heading onto the expressway because we had "enough" to get us back to where we needed to go.  As we got closer to our exit Mike and I started to get a little nervous with how little gas we had so we decided to pull off at the next exit to fill up on gas.   No problem right...WRONG.  Since we were in a rather remote area we didn't realize that the only gas stations in that little town would be CLOSED.  Appartently they closed at 7pm.  Our only option was to head back onto the expressway and try and get to our exit where my GPS showed another gas station.  It was a good thing that the expressway from that point on had a 4% downgrade because we were in neutral the entire way.  Once off the exit we were once again annoyed that the gas station we were going to use was also CLOSED.  Running out of gas in this part of Japan would not have been good so we kept on going, praying along the way, hoping that we would find another gas station that was actually open.  Futher down the road as we headed into the heart of another little city we found an open gas station.  We had never been so happy to see a gas station before.  We should have been more prepared and this was another reminder to us to no let our tank go below the half way point.  I was so happy this day did not end bad.   

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