00:06 John Daub: Oh my! Okay. For me to eat my lunch, I have to do this. So you're coming with me, and I've duct taped my gimbal to my hand, so I don't drop it in the river. The things we do. This is the Shimanto River, and this is a zipline that will take you across to the michi no eki (roadside station) on the other side where a hot unagi lunch is waiting.

01:06 John Daub: I feel like Edward Scissorhands. Safety first. So this is the thing that's going to zip across at high velocity in the rain and wind.

02:22 Staff: Please hold it so that the red side of your right hand is facing outwards. With this hand, yes. Keep the direction of the red line. The hollow part on top, here. This yellow part here. This part here, the wire part here. Make sure that this spot fits in. The wire fits in there, in this particular spot here. Like this. Please insert it.

02:52 Staff: The other person will go here. Which direction will you go this time? Which direction? If you want to shoot from the other side, this direction.

03:01 John Daub: Oh my gosh. I'm so scared. It's cold.

03:06 Staff: If you enter first, hold the pulley firmly and slowly go up. It's quite heavy. After that, you'll be on the other side in about 30 seconds. Enjoy the shooting. Have fun.

03:35 John Daub: Oh, so it might spin around because of the wind.

03:51 Staff: Put your foot on the wood chip. If you don't want to step on it, it's dangerous. If you don't want to step on it, you can step on it from the bottom. From the bottom, okay. You can put your foot on the wood chip, and then brake. And then you can step on it from the bottom. Alright, so you want to brake with your legs, and if you don't, it's dangerous.

04:08 John Daub: Oh my gosh. Are you okay?

04:09 Staff: Yes. Okay. Then, it's fine. Let's go up. Kids can do this, right? Yes, let's go up together. Please go up in order.

04:32 John Daub: What was that? It reminds me of that cable car scene in Moonraker with Jaws.

04:43 Staff: I see. The person in the middle of the village will come up to you, but I can't explain it in detail. I'll explain it in a little bit. If you go up to here, you'll be able to see the road. First, you need to put the carabiner off your back, and put it in front of the pulley. Put the pulley in front. In front of the pulley. Like this. Put the pulley in front. Put this carabiner here. Okay? If you're done, the staff over there and I will give you a warning with a transceiver. We'll say, ready, okay. There's no wind. When you're ready, put your weight on the bottom and go up in the middle.

05:47 Staff: Thank you, John.

05:51 John Daub: Oh my god! It's so windy! It's cold. What am I doing? It's cold! It's windy. I think the wind just got stronger. I hate bungee jumping and zip lining and all the other dumb things I do doing this kind of stuff. It's great. It's cold and it's raining. See why I'm in a way with strong. It's like a typhoon or something. This is a success could be over 30 seconds, but I don't believe them. That's our goal, the center's our goal I guess. Oh my god.

07:57 John Daub: I'm... oh so good. Oh yeah.

08:06 John Daub: Hi, so they did it. Don't look down. What is net? Okay, okay, we're okay here.

09:06 Staff: It's okay, the thread is here. Here we go! Really? 3, 2, 1. Go! Go go go go!

09:16 John Daub: Oh my god! Speed! Speed!

09:31 Staff: Are you going to take the rope? Slide it to the side. Then make it vertical and go down the stairs.

10:17 John Daub: Oh my god. I'm going to change it. It's cold. This way. This way? Oh, this way. Oh, this way. Oh, this way?

10:36 Staff: Yes. Yes. Then take this and go up the stairs. Okay, this one.

10:46 John Daub: Chad, I'm not doing that again. Bradania's here. I was scared. I don't want to do it again.

11:05 Staff: Bradania, don't say that.

11:27 John Daub: Lunch, coffee, hot chocolate. Today, I survived. Alright, now let's delete this from the internet. That didn't happen and I didn't scream. I did it with no emotion. Look! Look! That's where I was and now I'm here. That's where I was. Oh, there's other people doing it. They're doing it. The instructors. Look at them like pros. Wow. Next year. You don't understand. Like take a look at this. Hold on, can I show it to you? Like look at my hand. It's taped to the gimbal. It's like the end of the movie Breaking Away where he tapes his feet to the pedals of the bicycle. I did that with the gimbal. Oh my gosh. Alright, that was crazy. Now I'm settling down now and feel a sense of achievement. I achieved something today. I've gone where many men have gone before.

13:13 Staff: Thank you very much. Did you have fun?

13:20 John Daub: It's so cold. You have no idea. Oh my gosh. So do you want to do it? We'll do it at 12 o'clock again. They do it once every hour. This is the Shimanto River. Okay, now we can really do the live stream. Oh my gosh. Alright, I'm hungry for lunch now. So I earned my eel, right guys? How do I get this tape off? Oh my gosh. I'm losing some hair off of... oh. Oh my gosh. I don't think I can stop clutching the gimbal. Oh my gosh. That was exhilarating? Question mark. Why they make a zipline? I don't know. To scare people? Make them appreciate life? I did a bungee jump and it wasn't that was not pretty either. But this was almost scarier because I was going at like high velocity. You have no idea. Well, maybe you do if you've ziplined before. Alright, I'm gonna take you to this michi no eki and show you around first. Oh, look at the little Bambi. It's nice and peaceful. That's what I want for the rest of my life. Appreciate life. Bambi, we saw you at Miyajima last week. You can see that live stream. Oh. Oh, I used the force. Alright, so welcome to the michi no eki here.

15:10 John Daub: I think I came in the wrong direction. So this michi no eki, I put a map, a link in the description so you can come here if you're interested. I love Kochi Prefecture. Just look at the nature around us, right? Just look at it. It's amazing. This is Shimanto Toa. It says here, right there. Boom, there's the sign for it. And this rest stop has a zipline. So of course I had to try it, right? This is what it looks like here. We're gonna go inside and in the backside there's a cafe that has unagi that is fished out of this river, one of the cleanest rivers in Japan, if not the cleanest. That's the unagi. That's the last undammed river. I know because I've been here like so many times over the last couple of years. They sell vegetables here from locally grown vegetables, which is really cool. They have also eggs over there, which I might pick up a pack. I'll probably break it on the airplane back to Tokyo later today. But a lot of the stuff, everything is from Kochi Prefecture and a lot of it comes from regional areas. And you can buy things like bento, unigiri. Check it out here. It's pretty reasonable price. That's $2.25 for that entire thing here with the exchange rate. Here's some... is that donuts? Oh my gosh that looks so good now. Some other confection. Let me take you over in this direction. You can see they have some locally produced confections here.

16:39 John Daub: What is this here? Green tea flavored what? Oh this is aonori (green seaweed). This is just flavored seaweed that you can eat like potato chips. That's so healthy. This is green tea flavored and this is yuzu (citrus fruit) flavored and stock and soy sauce flavored seaweed that you can just eat like chips. That's a good idea. Healthy. The seaweed from the... called nori. This is the Shimanto River seaweed. It's so good to put on top of rice. It's really healthy. It's salty and a little mushy and does taste so flavorful and gives flavor to white rice, which is something that you definitely need to do. White rice is good in itself too.

17:26 John Daub: And then here, I was shown this when we first came in here. Miso is very big here in Japan. Everybody's had miso soup if you know anything about Japanese cuisine. It's such a staple of it. This is tofu made here in the area, but this tofu is special. It's like cheese, right? So you can cut this up and you can get probably eat it with a beer. It's really nice. All made right here and it's pretty cheap, 570 yen for that, which is about what, 4 bucks with the exchange rates the way they are these days. The miso is really inexpensive too. So I might take a pack. Can I send me a message if you want me to get you some? Should I buy some? Did you buy some? Not yet? Ah okay. Let's try this one then. I want to try this here. What do you guys think? Click the like button and I'll try this. How about that? Buy one of these. Hi. And then they have shoga (ginger). This is ginger which is also from Kochi prefecture. Has the best in Japan I think. So you'll see a lot of things like ginger pork, ginger also that we say it as well as other dishes with ginger here. Gives it a nice kick to it. What else? What should I try? Oh the ice cream here. They had some desserts here which looks out of sight. The rice was just harvested last month. So you have all of these brand new harvested rice which is great.

18:55 John Daub: Oh my gosh really? My diet is over. I tried... what? Look at this delicate looking mont blanc from chestnuts grown in this region. What? Alright, we should get two right? Do you want to eat? I want to eat. One more. One more? Let's get two. You've earned it. And they have other kinds of goods here. I'm just going to pan around and take a look at the inside of the shop here. Check it out here. It's nice. There's other things that are very famous from Kochi Prefecture like these cookies. I love these. If you've ever had these you'll know. These biscuits. They're made with bean oil so they have a really unique taste. And I heard they were invented by a mistake. The chef used the wrong oil and then he discovered that it was better. So sometimes the best gastronomical discovery is to use the wrong oil because the oil is made by big mistakes by chefs. It's true.

20:04 Staff: Are you alright? Yes. I'm Nagi. Yeah oh the sauna right.

20:16 John Daub: I want to introduce one last thing here. Check it out. This sauna. Do you guys remember about two years ago I did this live stream on the river where a dude, this guy made a sauna truck and then I heard about it and wanted to try it out and I tried in the middle of winter and it was crazy. He drove the truck out to the river over rocks and stuff and he had this on the back of his truck and he let me use it. And I sauna'd. Then I went outside and I jumped in the river. Do you remember this? Alright, I have a video for you just in case you don't. This is me in the sauna truck, sweating it out. Well, it's like a couple of years ago now. The temperature was so high. You have these hot rocks in there and you can make this high humidity situation. And then when I got out, you can see my body is steaming hot. Look at that. It's insane. And then they said, the staff says, John, go jump in the river. What? So I did. And I was not happy. Alright, I think this might have been worse than the zipline in terms of pain. Look at that. So if you want to see this experience, it's on this channel. It's a live stream. Oh my gosh. Oh, this is bad memory. You don't want to jump in the river in the winter. Okay, there you go. That's the end of it. Alright, no more of that. That's enough. I don't want to see that. Bad memories.

22:02 John Daub: But the sauna culture is strong in this area of Japan. You can actually buy this for 300,000 yen. The owner now is selling these. And 300,000 yen is about $2,000 bucks. It's all handmade. It takes two months to make. 120 kilograms. So the back of your truck, get a little K truck, put it in there. And you can see, I want to go inside and just take you, give you a look inside this one. I guess you can paint it any color you want. The wood is hinoki (Japanese cypress). Japanese cedar. It's got a really great smell to it. Let's go inside for a second. Oh wow, yeah, that's a... this takes me back to that live stream. It takes me back. Oh my. Alright, let's go. Okay. Yeah, I was sitting here putting water on the rocks. And now it's back. Alright, let's get out of here. Let's get out of here. Alright. I want to eat this unagi now. Is this an auto door? Oh, thank you sir. I thought this was an auto door. I was like, my powers, my Jedi powers have failed me.

23:35 John Daub: So today this cafe is closed and they've allowed us to eat it just the two of us. So, there you go. Again, this is where the zipline, where I screamed like, you know, a man. Because men scream sometimes. I jumped from here. It was all fake screaming. I don't know, maybe. Just delete that from the internet. Yeah. And please, pesa, don't make any memes out of this, okay? Just keep this between us. Konnichiwa. I think this nice seat right here will do the trick. What should I do? Okay. Oh my. Look at the view. They gave me the option to eat outside, but I figured with the high wind and how cold it is, I'm just gonna sit inside. Let me move the mic. I'm gonna take off this jacket because holy macaroni. You deserve a reward after the terror you put yourself through on our account. I did it for lunch. So the terror was for my stomach. But Andy, I did it for you guys too. I thought it would be fun. I don't like that stuff so much. I'm not an adventure junkie like I used to be. You know what? I think roller coasters, if you do it all the time, they're not that scary. But if you ever take like a five to ten year break from riding a roller coaster and you ride it after all that time, it's like you're doing it for the first time again. Seriously. And like I'm dreading the next roller coaster ride that I take, but I know I'll love it. I like roller coasters, but I feel like I'm not in control with this. So that's what makes it pretty challenging.

26:01 John Daub: Question one, what happened? Oh my gosh. Those joining us, if you didn't see it, I ziplined to the other side for my lunch. And I was going what seemed like Ferrari speed into a pile of wood chips. Wow! Oh my word. What is this? Somebody take a screenshot and send this to me. What? Thank you. This is Shimanto eel, right?

26:32 Staff: Yes, this is Shimanto's natural eel.

26:37 John Daub: Wow! That is a meal. I'm going to switch to the cameras here. You can see the sauces on there. I love these sauces for the eel. It's been sliced and placed on top of a bed of rice. Eel is absolutely one of the great delicacies. And what makes this eel in particular very delicious is because it comes from that river right there. It came from the Shimanto and it's straight to here. And I always like to travel for food because you want to eat from the source. It just tastes better. Oh man, look at that. We got some miso soup here. This is going to be great. Where should I eat? Here. No, no. Here. Because of the regulations from the Japanese government, we have to stay... when we're eating this eel. Sorry, somebody was trying to call me for some reason. I thought I had the phone just gave me. Alright, let's try this here. This is unagi from the Shimanto River. Check it out. Let's just go for it here. Oh my gosh, this is so amazing. Look at that hot soup. Oh Lord. How do you eat it? Just like this? You eat it like this? Really? Just pick it all up? Okay. Wow, okay. I thought maybe I would just like cut it, but why not just eat it the way that it was intended? Head first. Alright, itadakimasu.

28:36 Staff: You can eat the head, right? It's a little crunchy. It's good. Yeah. It's got bones. You can eat the head, but it's hard, so it's better to remove it. You're slow. Okay. He said you can eat the head, but it's very hard. It's best to spit it out.

29:06 John Daub: That's what I meant. One moment. So, please. That was delicious. Look, I ate it all. Alright, continuing along. I see Ruth is here. She's a big supporter of Kochi prefecture as well. And Ruth, I want to see you try that zipline. I think it would be even funnier maybe than me. Unless you can cry like a baby. No, you'd be pretty brave about it. Actually, yeah, you'd have fun. I think I did it worse. Mmm. Oh, man. Unagi is just such a delicate, tender, meaty, oily, good, delicious, wonderful seafood. But this is from the river food, I guess you'd call it. Anago, which is saltwater eel, and unagi is freshwater eel. So, that's good to eat. I guess you remember that. And, yeah. When you come to places like Kochi, to the Shimanto River, to rivers that are in particular quite clean, you're going to have good unagi. And it might be a little pricey, but it's so worth it. Look at my eyes. It's so worth it. Because when are you going to be back here, you know? Next month, maybe. Oh, man. That's so good. The sauce they use is slightly sweet, but not too sweet. It's more salty. It's savory. It's sort of soy-based, but it's different. Oh! This is so good. All right. Let's try the miso soup here. Oh, that hits the spot. It's just hot. My hands are starting to melt from being out in the cold. It is really chilly today. Yeah, actually, it was funny. It was like 20 degrees, 60, 65 degrees Fahrenheit or something like that.

31:44 John Daub: Here's the tofu that I was telling you about. This tofu, actually, it has a lot of flavor. It has a consistency of cheese on it. Cheese. So I'm going to try this right now. This is something you might want to get with beer or wine, a really good snack to eat along while you're watching a football game or something. Mmm. Wow. It's like a hard cheese, and it sort of crumbles and then starts to melt. It doesn't melt as fast as the cheese, but the more you chew it, the more it turns into a paste. Mmm. That doesn't taste like tofu. It doesn't taste like cheese either. It's sort of somewhere in between, which is very pleasant. And I think if you're drinking alcohol, it doesn't really ruin the taste of the wine or the beer even. It'll enhance it, I think, and that's really good. There's a slight saltiness to it. And it's been marinated in something. I'm not quite sure what it is, but it's something between cheese and tofu, but it's definitely not like a tofu taste. It's better. Mmm. I think it's better than tofu, which is hard. It's just different. I guess you could say it's just different. Oh, my God.

33:20 John Daub: Does anybody know what this is? You eat this with... so everything is flipped because of the camera. Sansho (Japanese pepper). And sansho is used on top of unagi. It's got like this bite to it. It's a special pepper that I almost exclusively eat with unagi.

33:45 Staff: Eh, sansho. Nani taberu? Unagi dake desho? Unagi ga oishii desu. Oishii desu kedo. Hoka niwa? Hoka niwa tsukau nai. Tsukau nai. Kawaii yo ne?

33:54 John Daub: Yeah, I don't eat it for anything except for unagi because it's got like this bite that really matches well with unagi. Anago mo tsukau desho ne? Yeah. You could possibly use it with anago as well, which is saltwater eel. Oh, man. This is the best reward. Mmm. Ah, unagi is so good. We have a dessert as well. We picked it out. It's a chestnut mont blanc, which is... so, yeah, first, I guess I have to eat all of this. So, while we're getting there, and I'll try to put a playlist here so you can skip around. Not everybody wants to see me scream. You just wanna get to the unagi or the dessert, you can put that there. I'm not gonna go for another serving. I have to do the zipline again to earn it, right? I got a whisker. I didn't know unagi had whiskers. You can eat the head. It's just really crunchy. I love unagi. You can't eat it every day, but it's a special day when you eat it.

35:43 John Daub: Oh yeah, can we turn up the music? Turn it back on. I'm like, copyright. Yeah, a little more. We actually have this place reserved for us for the entire afternoon. So that's kind of cool. I love doing these special livestreams where I can take you on a little adventure like this. I think this makes the channel pretty special because you can join me on an adventure. Actually, I'm with one of the engineers today. Oh, it's just so cold. I'm melting from the inside. Yesterday and the day before, we were using a robot that can translate, for those that don't speak Japanese, by using an operator on the other side. And the operator is a human operator. I guess it's a prototype, but it was really fun and useful to have. It's called Nin-Nin. It's a robot that I had on my shoulder. It can do gestures. It's controlled by an app. And the operators were all proficient in Japanese at another level than I am at and could speak to the guide. And I was able to get the same kind of knowledge that I would have gotten if I was bilingual. Although I probably could have managed it. I thought it was really good to highlight this particular robot because it has a lot more purposes than just translating. For people that are hearing impaired or have visual impairments or speech impairments, anything. You have a friend or a helper on your shoulder. But I'll be honest with you, more than the translation, I kind of like just having Paul and Judith on my shoulder to talk to. I can see me having a Nin-Nin on my shoulder hitchhiking and having a friend out there with me. But I usually was live streaming with that.

37:52 John Daub: In this chat, I want you guys to write in what are your top three or five foods in Japan. What are your top three or five? There are certain foods in Japan that will change the way you see food. The way you feel about food. One of them is not 100 yen sushi, but like a really middle of the line to high-end sushi. High-end sushi, I didn't have that for the first 20 years I lived in Japan. When I had it, it was like a $300 meal. It changed. It blows your mind away. And there are certain foods or moments in your life where food just has that big of an impact. High-end sushi was one of them. Another one was ramen. That's another one. It's so much cheaper than high-end sushi. But you try ramen sometimes, and if they're good at it, the flavors just change the way you feel about food. And you can't go back from these moments either because you think about it. It's so good. Unagi is one of those. It's one of those foods for me. I'd never had unagi before I came to Japan. And when I first tried it, it was like years in. Because I was an English teacher. Nobody introduced unagi to me. People don't normally eat this every day, right? It's a special cuisine. And when I had it, the sauce, the taste, the flavors, I'd never had anything like it. The meatiness of it is just so good. And it made me stop, and I started to eat unagi more. From the supermarket. Once I had it, I started to buy it. And, um, you know, it's not the same. In Japan, they have unagi from China, imported in, usually farmed. A totally different flavor and consistency. And I actually got an allergy because I think they were using antibiotics in the water or something. So I stopped eating any imported unagi. And I particularly just eat local unagi that is from a particular region, or domestic unagi inside of Japan. Of all the unagi I've tried, and I've had a lot, Kagoshima, down in Kyushu they have some great unagi. In the Nagoya area, some really good unagi, especially in Gifu. But the one in Kochi, and maybe it's because of the water, it's just so much umami, you know? You can see it, this is the river that they fish it from. So just down there. I don't think there's any unagi in the... are there any unagi now? Now? Wow, really? Kanae, I'm bringing you some unagi home. Mmm, wow.

40:43 John Daub: I notice nobody's doing the zipline again. They do the zipline every hour. I think it was about 2,500 yen, and it's a little bit cheaper for students, I believe. Which is like 20 bucks or something. There's a 10 minute introduction video, I didn't want to show that to you because it goes kind of slow. But it's really useful to see because you have to know what happens in case you get flipped around or something. And I thought I was going to get flipped around in the wind or something, but I held on with dear life. I was clutching the gimbal, even though it was taped on there, like this. I thought I was going to crush it. And I had my hand on this one. It was... that's hardcore, man. Alright, let me try the dessert here. Moving along. This is from the Shimanto region here, and if Ruth is here... Ruth, you gotta try this when you come here too. Check it out. This is the kuri (chestnut) mont blanc. Mont blanc. Which is a French dessert, I suppose. It's got Shimanto written on it because it's from a local area. And you all know that I'm really big on supporting local businesses, and I think that's something, you know, when you come to Japan it's okay to go to 7-Eleven and the convenience stores and all that, but whenever you see a local restaurant or something, stop in and try some of the products. I'm bringing back a lot of memories. I'm bringing back some of the mikan (mandarins), and probably bring some gifts back home as well. Omiyage (souvenirs). Omiyage, we call it. Alright, let's try this here. Itadakimasu. No, don't eat McDonald's when you're here. What? You have so many options. Who wrote that? Leo? Really? I should time you out for that comment. Don't encourage people. Maybe once you can eat it, but I mean, with all the other options? Really? I have to be honest, though. It is intimidating the first time you come to Japan. You go into a restaurant. And, you know, you don't speak the language. It can be a little bit much. Oh, it's frozen, so this is going to be really interesting. Mmm. Mmm. Oh, my gosh. I didn't taste anything the first couple of seconds because it's still frozen. And then it just melts. Right? Wait. Now, if McDonald's did have a meku-unagi, I probably would try that once. I don't think that they will. Price point would be really high. Or a meku-wagyu. I don't think they're going to. It's basically like ice cream, but it melts in your mouth and breaks. It doesn't break. It just all comes together. I think frozen is better because if it's not frozen, it's so soft. I probably would be done with this if it wasn't frozen. I've got sensitive teeth, so I have to, you know, like, eat it like this. Because it's frozen, I eat it slower and probably enjoy it more. But if it wasn't frozen, I probably would scarf it.

44:19 John Daub: There you go, everybody. I hope this was a fun livestream for you. It was for me. Thank you for showing us Nin-Nin yesterday and the day before that. And definitely check out the last two livestreams. Yesterday's livestream was beautiful. I took you to an area with a really unique toilet where they had this rock wall in it. And the first thing I said was, what the heck is this and why is this here? And they showed me by showing me the Tatsukushi Coast coastline of the Ashizuri region, the end of Kochi Prefecture and Shikoku. It's just a stunning experience and Toshishimizu in general is so off of, it's like the end of the world. It's so off of the beaten path that I think if you're making your first trip, but if you're coming to Japan for your second or your third time and you just want to see like what is Japan like out in the rural areas, Kochi is one of those places. There's no Shinkansen line. You have to, it's probably best to fly here from Haneda. You can get cheap flights that are cheaper than taking the train, but you can also take the train, you change at Okayama and board on a local train that takes you across a bridge and through some beautiful countryside. It's a great local train ride and Kochi is just a place that's really close to my heart. I've been coming here maybe like twice a year for the last three, four years now and I probably will be back again, probably to make an unagi episode. I think. Fingers crossed that the pandemic ends and yeah, thanks guys. If you have any questions about anything that I've done today, just leave them below or encourage me to do something crazy and adventurous once again, because I might. I burned a lot of calories screaming. It's normal. Hope you have a good day and a good night everybody. Thanks for watching. You can enjoy the last minute or two looking at the beautiful scenic Shimanto River, which is a highlight of any trip. The Kochi Prefecture just I hope it doesn't rain because we've had such nice weather up until now.