Originally Posted by
MegatopLover
What would Nagano be like in December? Is there a pleasant village-like atmosphere, something those not necessarily into winter sports would like? Any remnants of the '98 Olympics? Good onsen worth visiting? Nice hotels or ryokan (welcoming foreigners)?
Mr. Megatop and I have done the big and noteworthy cities in Japan: Osaka, Kyoto, Nara, Tokyo. We're looking for new experiences, and seeing some snow, mountains, winter wonderland would be very nice. This visit would be close to Christmas.
I have a couple of days to spare in between Christmas and New Year which I will be spending in osaka and tokyo respectively. Hence, I was searching for a nice relaxing ryokan for a couple of days for R&R. After extensive search, I am currently booked into myojinkan. It seems to be highly recommended on various website and appeared to be a small ryokan with just several rooms. As to whether it is welcoming for foreigners, I have absolutely no idea, but I do presume it should not be a problem at all since I booked this via ryokan collection without any problem at all. This place is also affilated with Relais and Chateaux if it meant anything with regards to welcoming for foreigners.
In all honesty, I have absolutely no idea what is there to do at nagano. I am only going there due to the ryokan and all I know now is that I will get some snow and mountain and the castle.
I will look into more details on what is there to do closer to date, but given that this is purely for relaxation, I supposed it will be easy to find some activity/sight seeing to fill in the time for the 2 days. Otherwise, a good book in the private hot spring bath will suffice
