Day 16 - Hikone Castle and Yaotora, An Amazing Izakaya

Our start on Monday morning was fairly relaxed, as Inase serves breakfast at 8AM each day. Lauren got the Japanese style breakfast, which consists of a salmon steak, rice, miso soup, a small salad and a bowl of rice. My western breakfast was a thick slice of Japanese toast, yogurt, a small salad, and some scrambled eggs.

We hit the road and walked about 15 minutes to Otsu station, where we caught a local train to Hikone, a small town about 45 minutes away that is on the shores of Lake Biwa, just like Otsu. Lake Biwa is the largest lake in Japan, and is large even by international standards, measuring some 670 square kilometers.

We arrived in Hikone around 10AM, and though the day was sunny it was still quite cool, leaving Lauren in regret that she didn't bring her jacket. We both wandered through the town until we reached Hikone Castle, a small feudal Japanese castle that has survived from its original construction in the 1600's. The castle itself is rather small, but due to its unique architecture, and intact state is considered a national treasure in Japan.

Lauren and I paid the admittance fee of 1800 yen to access the Castle, Museum and Gardens, and began to explore. The walk up the hill towards the castle is very interesting, as you must pass the original moats, curtain wall and fortifications before you reach the gate. The grounds themselves were picturesque, with many sakura trees, moss covered rocks on the walls and a wooden bridge that leads into the castle's yard.

We walked inside and traversed two very steep staircases before we reached the top floor, with beautiful views of Hikone, Lake Biwa and the surrounding area. After taking some photos, we made our way back down to the ground floor, and walked the grounds of the castle to reach the gardens, which are extensive and contain many water features. The center of the garden contains an old teahouse which can be reached by crossing a wood bridge, while the periphery is surrounded by the moat and has beautiful old trees and shrubs.

After completing our tour of the gardens, we walked out of the castle grounds to a nearby street food vendor area, where we each got a skewer of meat to tide us over while we hunted for lunch. A search on Google found us a local ramen shop, which served a large variety of soups. Lauren opted for a curry miso ramen, while I got a Chashu ramen with a soy and dashi (fish stock) base. Lauren's was unfortunately much better than mine, but both were tasty and warmed us up.

After lunch, we ambled back to the train station to catch a one hour train back to Otsu, which got us home just before 4PM. Lauren and I relaxed for a while before deciding to heat out for dinner around 6:30. One of the other local restaurants on Lauren's list was an Izakaya (public house meets gastropub) called Yaotora. The restaurant was only about 700 meters from our accommodations, so we walked in that direction and soon found ourselves entering Yaotora. The restaurant is laid out like many traditional Japanese restaurants, and features raised seating areas surrounding the tables.

After taking off our shoes and sitting at a table, we found ourselves assailed by a very intimidating hand-written menu, entirely in Kanji. With no english menu in sight, I used Google translate to try to determine what was what, though often times this resulted in incomprehensible gibberish like "cut pork cutlet poon". Despite these struggles, we did manage to find their website and translate that - which gave us a much more legible menu. Lauren and I ordered some sweet and spicy chicken karaage, a pork katsu (breaded cutlet) and some sashimi. The food was delicious, and the presentation was superb for dishes that ranged from only 500 yen to 1200 yen.

Kai sashimi at Yaotora

Absolutely stuffed after an amazing meal that cost us only $45 US dollars including two drinks each, we ambled back to the hotel, another day complete.