Sunset Time is one of the new traditions that Matt and Nori established at Sen. Nearly every night, they head up to Sen’s roof with a beer or some plum wine to watch the sunset. The view from the top of Sen is truly spectacular. High above the modern city, you can see Matsuyama castle guarding and watching over the city on top of a mountain. The neighboring mountains around the city offer a beautiful green backdrop behind which the sun drops every night.
Matt promised me all week that he would take me out on his walking tour of some historic and important places around Matsuyama. So, we headed out on foot from Sen for a few hours to explore. The tour was one that Matt has been recommending to several of his guests. All have apparently loved it, and I did too.
About 2 weeks ago, the lady and I decided it was time to close up shop for 5 days, and embark on a bit of pilgrimage; her to do another leg of O-henro with her bud Yumi; me to walk the Kumano Kodo. I was well excited to camp for 3 nights in the beautiful mountains and forests of the Kii peninsula-I’ve heard such wonderful things about it while living in Osaka, and to pay my respects at the various shrines and oji I encountered along my pilgrimage.
Beating all of our expectations, the first month o’ Sen was actually busy most weekends and the weekdays were all steady. The guests were all amazing (really not a bad apple in the bunch). Most countries in Europe were represented, Africa, Asia, North America (sorry central/south America), Australia and even some folks living in Antarctica (granted they were American-damn those bastards are everywhere :). Everyone was happy and gave us great feedback and reviews (both in person and on-line). Both of us feel truly blessed to have such a wonderful month and we hope it’s a sort of omen for things to come.
Yes, we’ve made it through finding a place, moving-in, cleaning up, renovating, opening and dealing with our first walking O-Henro san!! It does feel like we have accomplished soooooooo much in these 2 1/2 months. And really, the 1st week and a half of opening has given us a good taste of what life is going to be like (but hopefully a lot busier).
Yes and yes, we are officially open, and to our great surprise, we actually had 6 guests the 1st night!! And…only 2 of them were friends or family. Really feels great that we are actually doing it, that all our planning and hard work has actually spawned something. For myself, I definitely sort of lost sight of the ultimate goal while we were renovating this place; I think you almost have to though. The only way for me to make sense of anything and get things accomplished on a daily basis, was to set small tasks and goals and not think about everything that needed to get done.
After much ado, and a ton of dirt, the major renovation is now finally done; looks like a totally different place. Interesting; after 6 weeks of mere inches of progress, 3 days of big renovation and the game is totally changed. We’re now walking on beautiful wood floors, sitting under our kototsu on our new raised tatami space and sliding open our new door. Of course we aren’t finished yet, but I guess you could say the end is in sight.
