Finally, we just returned from the trip to Noto! I'm exhausted but I'll try to recount all the things we did to the best of my ability.

This trip was to far more places than I anticipated--we took a roundabout route both going and coming, in order to visit a bunch of different notable places in Noto. We had been split up into groups of three or four, and each group had been assigned a different place to give a 発表(presentation) about. My presentation was about a place called キリコ会館、a lantern museum.

Here are some pictures I took of some of my favorite places where we stopped:

We got to stop on a long beach, one that cars were allowed on, unlike most beaches in the US.

We gave our presentations on the bus--this was Melia's group.

We also got to stop at a really beautiful shrine, where everyone walked around and took a lot of pictures together and got eaten alive by bugs.

 There were many graves, there, too.

 After we spent about an hour there, we went to lunch, which was spectacular, as usual. One thing I can say for certain is that I've never wanted for good food in this program. Love you too, Princeton in Ishikawa

Or maybe I'm just easily pleased?

We had lunch right next to a beach, so we all played in the sand and water for a while before getting back on the bus. The next place we stopped was another beach, but this one was rocky and mountainous with bridges and lots of interesting rock formations. One of the people in the program got injured on these rocks, though, when he tried to take a swim (I kid you not).

Then, at last we arrived at the hot spring! I'd been looking forward to this all month, especially after wanting to visit a hot spring for several years. This hot spring was actually one that was famous throughout Japan, and we understood why once we saw it. It was absolutely gorgeous.

Here's a picture of the lobby!

First, we sat down in our room for a while, which was a Japanese style room, with a table and cushions on the floor. We were served a little jelly snack, and green tea, but the hotel staff. Then, they dressed us all in yukata, and we went down to dinner, which was unreal. It was a several course meal, and we were even entertained! I'll probably never experience something so fancy ever again, so naturally I was ecstatic the whole time.

Here's a picture of the meal!

Here's a picture of the hotel staff dancing for us during dinner!

According to my host parents, when you go to a hot spring, you should bathe three times: once before you eat, once after you eat, and then once again in the morning. This is exactly what I did; I wanted to get the most out of my first hot spring experience. It was amazing. There were so many baths, and a sauna. It was also a great place to bond and talk with friends from the program.

The next day, we left the hot spring early after a wonderful breakfast, in order to visit a couple more places in Noto. My presentation was about a museum that displayed enormous lanterns carried in annual まつりin Noto. The lanterns were even bigger than I expected, though:

Everyone was a bit tired, though, so we moved a little more slowly that day. Some other great places we visited were a museum of lacquerware, an outdoor market, and a little museum that showed us how salt in the region was made. In all, I'm quite tired, but the weekend was incredibly fun and I had an amazing time!