While traveling from Hiroshima to Hakuba, we were able to eat greatly with lunch boxes and surprisingly enough, a sweet lady at the Masumoto Train Station who made us warm soba noodles. Considering it was a very cold day, I was more grateful than that sweet lady will ever know.
On the Shinkansen to Nagoya, I had a beef rice lunch box that was not surprisingly a high quality meal. Most box lunches I've had in Japan didn't disappoint. The merchant didn't have a microwave because they said it was unhealthy and would make alter their lunch's flavor and healthiness. Even cold, my beef lunch box was excellent and helped me pleasantly make it to Masumoto Train Station.
At Masumoto Train Station on the Ōito Line, there's a small noodle shop that sells noodles, some beverages and ice cream. I went straight for the duck soba noodles and it warmed me up from the inside out.
We also tried the rest of the menu with different variations of my duck soba noodles, with mushrooms and/or vegetables called the mushroom soba noodles. One in particular was the soba noodles with wild edible plants.
We've seen this a few times now and most of the time when we've seen this, it's been in the mountain. After Hakuba, I'll get down to this wild edible plant business and find out the exact name of the plant or plants. The sweet lady was closing up since we were on the last local train heading to Hakuba, so lucky us we were her last customers.
It was a great day of traveling and if you ever have to make the same trip, Hiroshima to Hakuba, start early like 7am. Along your way, you'll find the most delicious lunches at every train station. If the stop has Shinkansen trains then those train stations have almost a full mall type setup, down to the souvenir shops. How awesome is that?
Thanks for joining us on your travels in Japan for Ate Great 18!
