Nara Prefecture

Do
Ride a cable car train up a steep mountain
In Japan, a cable car is a small train pulled up a steep track by a cable, climbing in about 10 minutes a slope that would take an hour on foot. Watch a town or a lake open up below the window, then visit a mountain temple or rest at a lookout at the top. Each one here starts near a regular train station, so you do not need a car.
Do
Walk temple slopes full of June hydrangeas
In June, during tsuyu, Japan's early-summer rainy season, hydrangeas bloom blue and purple across the grounds of Buddhist temples. Walk the paths and stairs among the flowers, whose colors look deepest in the rain. Many temples charge an entry fee or take reservations only in the flower season, so check their websites before you go.
Town
Yamatokōriyama
A goldfish town where scooping is a sport
Yamatokoriyama, a former castle town near Nara, has bred goldfish for some 300 years, and farm ponds still dot the edges of town. Kingyo-sukui, scooping goldfish with a paper net that tears when wet, is a festival game in Japan, but here it is a sport, with a national championship every August. Try it yourself, then walk a shopping street where goldfish swim in tanks outside the shops.
Do
Eat mochi pounded right in front of you
Mochi is made by pounding steamed sticky rice with a heavy wooden mallet in a large mortar. Freshly pounded mochi is soft and stretchy in a way packaged mochi never is. At these shops you watch it being pounded and eat it while it is still warm.

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