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On the eastern edge of landlocked Nagano-ken, and lying on the slopes of Asama-yama (at 2568m Japan's highest triple-cratered active volcano), is the ever-fashionable summer resort of KARUIZAWA . From here you can visit nearby Onioshidashien , an incredible landscape of lava frozen in black clumps as it pursued a wide and destructive path down Asama-yama. The town itself is pleasant enough, though, with a low-key old district, Kyu-Karuizawa , where Crown Prince Akihito (now the emperor) met his future wife, Michiko, on the tennis courts in the 1950s. Things can get very hectic in summer, when a mass of clothes shops and giftshops open their doors to the temporary residents of the thousands of hillside villas, but there are still traces of the natural tranquillity that made Karuizawa so appealing to nineteenth-century visitors. Karuizawa's sights are widely scattered, so the best plan of attack is to pick up the good English map and guidebook of the area from the tourist information hut (daily 9am-5pm; tel 0267/42-2491) at the station. The most enjoyable way of exploring is by bicycle ; you can rent one from the many nearby outlets (Y500 an hour). Otherwise, hop on a bus from in front of Karuizawa Station for Kyu-Karuizawa and the Old Mikasa Hotel . Heading north from the station, past the row of shops, brings you to a pedestrianized street dubbed "little Ginza", but more resembling Tokyo's teen-scene Takeshita-dori . At the end of this street, you'll emerge into a forest; look out for the quaint wooden Nippon Seikokai (Anglican) Chapel with a bust of Archdeacon Shaw, who helped popularize the area as a retreat, standing in front. Services are held in the church every Sunday and in the priest's old house, behind the church, you can see photographs of the man and his family. If you have time, it's a nice two-kilometre cycle ride or hike up to the secluded Old Mikasa Hotel , an elegant wooden building dating from 105, which now houses a small missable museum. Follow the main road, Mikasa-dori, due north from the chapel. The fastest route to Karuizawa is by train on the Hokuriku Shinkansen between Tokyo and Nagano. Other services only go as far as Yokokawa Station, from where you have to travel up to Karuizawa by bus from the valley below. Karuizawa is the kind of place you would likely enjoy as the guest of a Japanese business associate, and better deals on accommodation can be had elsewhere, but if you are stuck for somewhere cheap, there's the Kokumin Shukusha Karuizawa Kogen-so (tel 0267/48-2111; Y5000-7000, including two meals) a publicly subsidized and rather basic holiday lodge, fifteen minutes southwest of Karuizawa Station by taxi. The three Prince hotels (tel 0267/42-1111; Y15,000-30,000), in their sprawling compound just to the south of the station, offer tennis, golf, ice skating, and even their own small ski area; opt for the comfortable cottages in the east complex. The Mampei Hotel (tel 0267/42-1234, fax 42-7766; Y20,000-40,000) established in 1894, has a quirky rambling elegance, and its food and service are first-rate - John Lennon spent several summers here. While good deals on accommodation are hard to find in Karuizawa, reasonable restaurants are plentiful, especially in Kyu-Karuizawa, where soba shops abound, and many fashionable Tokyo restaurants have branches: try the Ajanti Indian Restaurant , a good place for vegetarians, at Kyu-Karuizawa near the fire station.
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