Day 11 - Coffee break

The rain was going down fairly heavily at times and both Ian and I were commenting that we would like a cup of coffee and a chance to get indoors. As we came up a long hill in preparation for entering a dreaded tunnel (Tunnels were a problem because they seldom had sidewalks and we had to walk along with almost no space between the traffic and the wall.), we discovered this coffee shop and both decided that it was time for a rest, but most of all a cup of coffee.

Inside this smiling woman invited us to sit at the counter, rather than a table. Once she realized that we could speak Japanese, she started an almost continuous stream of dialog, or maybe I should say monolog. I have posted these pictures before, along with some comments which I will reproduce here.

The woman who ran the place was great. We order coffee and she said we had to have the 'Morning Set', coffee, 3 cm thick toast, fried egg, and salad for 500 yen. She gave us a large dish of homemade marmalade. When we finished, we asked for a second cup of coffee, and while we drank she told us that Donald Keene had been there twice. He is friends with the potter.

Then she said that the marmalade had been made from buntan, a citrus for which the area is famous. She then said that the area was also known for kintan, a fruit like a mikan. We indicated that we had never heard of it, so she each of us a large glass of juice made from it.

Then her husband,the cook, gave us large pieces of homemade rye bread.

Finally we had to leave and after a round of picture taking we paid our bill - 500 yen each, the rest was settai.

I really enjoyed seeing this sculpture in the yard beside the shop.

Luckily we did not have very far to go on Day 11 so we were able to say in the shop for a long way. We finally left and started walking again. However, the rain soon started coming down in earnest and the wind picked up to a point where I began to wonder if we were going to have a typhoon.