Fall in(to) Cambridge

Cambridge is made for fall. From the university campuses to the tree-lined streets, fall in Cambridge means two months of bright blue skies and flaming leaves set off against the red bricks of school buildings and sidewalks. I first came to Cambridge fifteen years ago as a freshman in college, only to find that fall in New England was a fundamentally different concept than fall in Portland.

First, a New England fall is sunny. In Portland, on the other hand, the rain starts around October 1 and doesn't let up until sometime in May. 

Second, thanks to the clear skies, the leaves in Cambridge crunch. If you grew up outside the Pacific Northwest, I assure you - you underestimate the miracle of crunchy leaves. All through my childhood, fall just meant decomposing piles of sodden brown leaves beaten down by weeks of rain. You didn't rake leaves as much as push them into sad little piles that vaguely resembled something scatological. 

Third, because fall is a true shoulder season here - a distinct change from what came before, but not so sudden that you just want to hide indoors - there are super-special fall festivities, annual traditions keyed to the gradual shift in season. These traditions make the fall for me. After the difficulty of moving back across the country and starting a new job this summer, fall in Cambridge was like a warm and fuzzy welcome mat. Year after year, these are my favorite (free) fall traditions:

Koyasan: The Legendary Stuff of Legend

Before we left for our two-week trip to Japan, a friend gifted us David Mitchell's The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, a novel about Dutch people in Japan in the late 1700s (so basically, it was perfect for us). Half way through the book, the story takes a gothic turn when a main character is spirited away to a remote Shinto shrine hidden in the mountains, run by an evil abbot who hides his salacious and murderous plots behind a veneer of religious ritual. I was just reaching the dramatic climax the night we slept at a remote Buddhist temple high in the mountains, surrounded by towering cedars, a sprawling graveyard, and the nocturnal sounds of the forest.

Spending the night on Mt. Koya (Koyasan) was my favorite of favorite experiences in Japan precisely because it was the legendary stuff of legend - the stuff you read about in books but don't expect to experience for yourself. And in turn, every part of our 24 hours in Koyasan was my favorite part, which, when you think about it, is an exceedingly impressive return on travel investment.

Favorite Part #1: Getting to Koyasan.  Osaka, the closest major city to Koyasan, is huge, sprawling, and disorientating to newcomers - the Houston of Japan. Somewhere within the metropolis of Osaka, you switch to Koyasan's private rail line: just two diminutive cars on narrow gage track that winds through increasingly remote farmland (trees weighed down by bright orange persimmons) and then up into the mountains (verdant forests of bamboo and cedar green, filtering the sunlight to a gentle dimness).  In between isolated one-room stations losing their battle with the forest moss, there are sudden vistas of the rolling folds of the mountains, green fading to gray with distance.

Playing chicken on the funicular.

When the train can climb no higher, you switch to a funicular.  The mountainside is so steep here that the rows of seats inside the cable car are nearly vertical.  The short ride tests your faith in the reliability of Japanese engineering.

But that's not all.  After you safely disembark, there is still a bus ride into the heart of Koyasan, down a narrow curving road kept in perpetual darkness by the surrounding forest.  The road opens up into the central intersection of Koyasan, and suddenly everything is white walls and sunshine.