One Life Japan Bike, Hike, Walking and Wandering tours in June 2014

We have been waiting all spring for the mulberries to ripen. Last week they started, just a few berries at a time – enough that Mona insists on walking to school each day past a tree where we find a handful that have darkened overnight.

The container is so we can have some with our breakfast yogurt the next morning, but we have yet to make it home with anything left in it.

The rice fields are planted, and its time to take a break from the rice fields (tayasumi). The locals from our little hamlet gather together with our guests to peel bamboo shoots, and enjoy a brief break before it is time for the neighbors to get back to their fields, and our guests to say farewell as they head onto their next adventure in Japan.