Nearing Mirikaroden

 My goal for this walk was the large buildings just to the right of the center of the picture. The road here is new and slopes gradually down from a hilltop to the flat area below. The building is called Mirikaroden and is what the Japanese term a culture center. There is a large auditorium when they have various presentations, both live and movies. There are classrooms where they offer many different subjects. This is where I go for my watercolor lessons and also for my exercise class. My wife also attends a music and rhythm class here. In addition to all this there is a small museum concerning a local intellectual and the town library. One of the three buildings contains a swimming pool and an exercise room. The fees are very low for both classes and general use. The final building is new and contains a children's center.

About half way down the slope, I turned to the right and took this picture of the rice paddies, many of which were flooded in anticipation of the nearing planting day.