Shirakawa-go 白川郷: winter wonderland in Japan UNESCO world heritage site

Declared a UNESCO world heritage site in 1995, Shirakawago and neighbouring Gokayama are famous for their traditional gassho-zukuri farmhouses, some of which are more than 250 years old.

What's "Gassho-zukuri"? Glad you asked. 

It is a kind of architecture style with its unique roof, designed to withstand the large amount of snow that falls during winter in Gifu region. In fact, the design is named after gassho which means "hands in prayer". Another special feature, it is constructed without any nails or metal materials. Everything is strung together using straw and wood i.e local materials sourced from the forest surrounding the village. 

Ogimachi

Ogimachi is Shirakawa-go's largest village and it poses as the main attraction. With the layer of snow, it was indeed a million-dollar postcard view! 

For those doing your research, I visited the place early Feb. I think the view could have been a lot more mesmerising with a bit more snow. 

But if I have to be completely honest, it felt almost like a mini theme park. Shops and "exhibits" all perfectly lined-up, ready to welcome its' tourists. Oh... how commercialised it has gotten. 

Don't get me wrong, I'd still give this place a visit but probably not worth a second time.  

Top 3 things to do in Ogimachi

1. Observation deck

You must not miss the observatory! There's a shuttle bus that takes you up to the lookout point from the village, departing every 20 minutes, ticket fare is 200 Yen one-way. It can get crowded, so you may not be able to board the bus and will have to wait for another 20 minutes till the next one arrives. 

I'd suggest to walk up there. Around the village, you'll find signboards that indicate "trek is closed during winter". However, there's actually a tar road that will lead you straight up and it's just right next to the bus stop. I suppose the trek referred in the signboard was more of the "hiking trail". 

It may look serene from the photos but in reality, to get this one shot, you'd have to wait, make your way in, squeeze through the crowd and find an angle that will be able to crop out all the other fellow visitors. 

I should really stop underselling this scenic place tho. IT'S REALLY PRETTY, I SWEAR.

2. Indulge in all the food 

Not just the view, chomp in all those street food. My favourite was Shirakawago's river fish served on a stick, left to grill, crunchy yet its juicy flesh reveals as you bite into it. 

Of course, hida beef skewer is commonly seen and I'm not surprised why it's so popular. The meat was so juicy and tender, I'm jealous that it's so easily accessible for them locals. Not super cheap tho. 1 skewer as such cost around 600 Yen, approx RM18 but worth every beef juice I can chew out of it. 

Because of the chilly weather, find yourself an eatery to get some warmth and comfort. If you're in a big group, split up for better chance. We were there on a Wednesday but it was still quite packed! 

Hida beef tsukune

Udon with raw egg. SO SIMPLE BUT SO SATISFYING. Definitely the weather. It felt so heartwarming to be having hot broth in subzero temperature.

Hamburg with rice. That patty was so moist, what is there not to love!

3. Visit one of the gassho house 

There's either Wada or Kanda house that you may opt to visit. When we were there, only Wada house was open, so the choice was quite simple! Entrance fee was 300 yen per adult, half-price for the kiddos. 

Strongly suggest you pay one of them gassho houses a visit. Being able to see the interior, especially the way they tied their knots to keep the roof strong and sturdy was eye-opening.   

How to get there? 

You can easily find bus/tour packages that offer day trips from Nagoya, Takayama or Kanazawa. In fact, it's pretty common for people to do a stop-over when they are travelling between Takayama and Kanazawa. And that's exactly what we did.

We did a stop-over as we drove from Takayama to Kanazawa.

I found this "cheat sheet" from Japan-guide extremely useful! 

Option 1: Bus

From Takayama to Shirakawago, you'll be able to find both reserved and unreserved buses. From what I gather online, Nohi Bus is quite experienced in catering for large crowds. So even with the unreserved buses, if it gets filled up, they'll just bring in another bus to fetch the remaining passengers waiting in line. 

BUT from Shirakawago to Kanazawa, there's ONLY reserved buses. Bus tickets get sold out quite quickly. So if you're stuck in the situation where you're unable to get direct bus tickets, you'll need to take the unreserved bus from Shirakawago to Shin-Takaoka, then train to Kanazawa. Your travel time at least double-up. From 1.5 hours to 3 hours. Not just that, Kaetsunou Bus isn't like Nohi! If it's full... well I don't want to risk being stranded! 

Option 2: Drive

Unable to get bus tickets (partially because of bad planning lol), we decided to rent a car. Due to different pick-up and drop-off locations, car rental was almost 30k Yen! We had 7 pax, so upon distributing it out evenly, it's almost as much as it would have cost with the bus tickets. 

Some other cost to take into account is..

Petrol 1340 Yen

Tol 3150 Yen (Takayama>Shirakawago>Kanazawa) 

Parking 1000 Yen (at Shirakawago) 

So here's a heads-up, only rent car if you have the headcount. OR don't do a stopover like us. Do a day trip from Takayama. If you're picking up and dropping off the vehicle in the same location, it will reduce the car rental cost drastically.  

Option 3: Tour 

Book a tour. Period. 

Summary 

ACTUALLY... There's a few other things Shirakawago is famous of:

1. Winter light-up (only 6 nights in a year) 

2. Spending a night at one of those Minshuku

Both of which we didn't manage to do, sadly. But I supposed it was still worth visiting, experiencing a winter road trip in Japan, visiting a traditional village covered in snow.

So here's Mr. Square Man saying bye!