霧，又是霧。
輕井澤位於長野縣北佐久郡，坐落在淺間山南麓，海拔約一千公尺的高原地帶。夏季平均氣溫只有 19.4°C，比東京低了整整六七度。八月份，一個月裡平均有二十二天是霧天。所以說，霧並非輕井澤的意外，而是它的本色。
穿過別墅通，這才是輕井澤最核心的風景。霧氣在松樹和白樺之間流動，每隔一段，就有一棟低調藏在樹林深處的別墅，鐵門緊閉，石牆靜默。
這一切的起點，是 1886 年一位加拿大傳教士的到來。亞歷山大·克羅夫特·蕭被這裡的氣候所打動，1888 年在大塚山建起了一棟簡樸的別墅，傳教士、外交官、學者紛紛跟隨，日本的皇族與財界名流也相繼加入。至 1935 年，外國人別墅已超過三百戶。輕井澤的別墅文化，就在這外來啟蒙與本土詮釋的交織之中，慢慢長成了今天的樣子。
散步的終點是舊三笠旅館。在松林盡頭，這棟白色木造建築靜靜佇立，建成於 1905 年，翌年開業，採美國 Stick Style 設計，融合英式窗框與德式橫板壁，建材取自當地赤松，設計施工皆由日本工匠完成。曾被稱為「輕井澤的鹿鳴館」，政商文化界名流在此雲集。
太平洋戰爭期間成為外務省出張所，戰後被美軍接收，1970 年停業，1980 年獲指定為國家重要文化財，並在歷經五年半修繕後於 2025 年 10 月重新開放。我在它面前站了很久，霧氣在白色木板壁和八角塔屋之間流動，像是時間本身在呼吸。
從 1886 年蕭傳教士踏上這片高原，輕井澤已經用了將近一百四十年，慢慢長成了自己的樣子。它不炫耀，不張揚，深藏在樹林裡，等著你一次又一次地回來，才願意多說一點。
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Fog. Again, fog.
This is my third visit to Karuizawa. The first time, a typhoon pinned me inside the station — I could do nothing but watch the rain hammer the platform through the glass. The second time, the skies were generous, and I finally set foot properly on this highland. This time, the clouds have closed in again, and the drizzle arrived right on schedule. I stood at the station exit, drew in a breath of cool, damp air, and decided to stop resenting the weather — because I’ve already planned a fourth trip.
Karuizawa sits in Kitasaku District, Nagano Prefecture, on the southern slopes of Mt. Asama, at roughly a thousand meters above sea level. The average summer temperature is just 19.4°C — six or seven degrees cooler than Tokyo — and August alone brings an average of twenty-two foggy days. Fog, then, is not an inconvenience here. It is simply the place itself.
My first stop was Kumoba Pond, about twenty minutes north of the station through the hushed, villa-lined lanes. The water appeared between gaps in the pines. It is not a natural lake — during the Taishō era, trader Nozawa Genjirō dammed the Kumoba River to create it, fed by the Gozen-sui spring, a water source celebrated since the Edo period and offered to feudal lords and Emperor Meiji alike. Foreign summer residents called it Swan Lake.
In the rain, there were no mirror reflections — only fine, spreading ripples — and the surrounding forest felt denser and more present for it. Writers Hori Tatsuo and Kawabata Yasunari both walked this same kilometer of shoreline. Pacing it myself, I had the sudden sense that this particular silence might be exactly the kind of soil in which literature grows.
The villa lanes themselves are the true heart of Karuizawa’s scenery. Mist moved between the pines and white birches, and every so often a low gate and stone wall marked the presence of a residence set deep among the trees. It all traces back to 1886, when Canadian missionary Alexander Croft Shaw arrived here and was captivated by the climate.
In 1888 he built a modest villa on Otsukayama and enthusiastically promoted the area to the foreign community in Japan, describing it as a “hospital without a roof.” Missionaries, diplomats, and scholars followed. Japan’s own aristocracy and business elite arrived in their wake.
By 1935, there were over three hundred foreign-owned villas in the area. Karuizawa’s distinctive culture of retreats was born at the intersection of foreign inspiration and Japanese interpretation, and it has been taking its own shape ever since.
Walking into the old Karuizawa Ginza Dōri, the rain had quieted the street considerably. This was once a post town on the Nakasendo highway — one of the “Three Lodgings at the Foot of Asama” — its original function lost when the railways came, then revived by the very different demands of villa residents and summer visitors, until it earned the nickname “Karuizawa Ginza.” Jam, bread, local cheese: traces of the Western domestic life the missionaries brought with them. When the Hokuriku Shinkansen opened in October 1997, Tokyo to Karuizawa became a seventy-minute journey, and the town welcomed approximately 8.5 million visitors a year. Today, without the crowds, the street was easy to enjoy.
My walk ended at the Old Mikasa Hotel, standing white and quiet at the edge of the pine forest. Completed in 1905 and opened in 1906 by businessman Yamamoto Naoyoshi, it was designed in the American Stick Style, blending British window frames and German clapboarding, built from local red pine by Japanese craftsmen throughout. Called the “Rokumeikan of Karuizawa,” it drew politicians, industrialists, and cultural figures to its rooms.
It served as a Foreign Ministry outpost during the Pacific War, was requisitioned by American forces afterward, and operated until 1970. Designated a National Important Cultural Property in 1980, it reopened in October 2025 after five and a half years of conservation work. I stood before it for a long while, watching mist move across the white walls and the octagonal tower, and felt that time itself was breathing.
From the moment Missionary Shaw climbed this plateau in 1886 to the moment I stood before the Mikasa in the rain, Karuizawa has spent nearly a hundred and forty years quietly becoming itself — unhurried, unassuming, half-hidden in the trees, willing to tell you a little more each time you come back.
The rain kept falling. The mist kept drifting. I raised my umbrella and walked toward the station. The fourth time, I told myself, the weather will surely be fine.
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