Our Mountain Lodge
We made a very pretty, scenic journey towards the coast, to the mountains of the Fuji-Hakone-Izu national park area. We had booked a hotel for the night and it was humid when we got there. You see, the heat we can deal with, when it's dry heat. You sweat, sure, but at least it doesn't feel close. But all those god-damn trees and ferns and green plants made it sticky and damp! Blasted nature.
Hubbo said we were early and that we should kill time by walking up the very very steep mountain side to our hotel. There was a train that would take us there with our passes, but he thought nah, it'd be too quick.
When we got to our hotel, so did the people who had been waiting for the train. Turns out, we could have killed time with less sweaty exersion. Also a shuttle bus pulled up with other guests.
Wifey was not impressed. Wifey's fringe was pasted to her forehead and her t-shirt was drenched where her hiking bag was covering any drying sunshine.
We went into the hotel to check in, a process made longer by their desire to find someone who speaks English for us.The lobby was lovely - they had a little open-room shop, with complimentary sorbets, little cans of soft drink and beers, yakutas to choose from based on height, size and colour. They also had a popcorn machine you could help yourself from - it was a really chilled out little area. For a posher hotel it had a relaxed vibe which meant we were comfortable donning and walking about in our yakutas and everybody was super chill.
On the 2nd floor (first floor in the West, the Japanese don't have "ground floor") they had massage chairs that were hard core. At times a little painful. Hubbo did NOT enjoy it, whereas I felt better afterwards.
On the first floor there were public baths and showers (segregated) and some private huts - our room came with one free private bath entry, which we used at 6.30pm, before dinner at 8.
It was sooooooooooooo good and sooooooooooooo hot. Fortunately it was really windy and raining, so we had that to help with the heat. It was semi-covered, so we weren't IN the rain, but we could put our feet out into the rain to help cool off a bit.
When your town smells of egg, sell egg.
We hopped onto the trainline through the mountain town to go right to the top, where the rope car was to the mountain. The cable car took 8 minutes, which is quite a long time if you've been on a few. The view was amazing. The mountain is still volcanic, with large hot air shafts billowing smoke and steam the entire time. The ground is suphurous yellow and it was the source of the eggy smell that pervaded everywhere outdoors.
The most recently created vent was made in 2015, when the volcano had a minor eruption.
At the top of that station, you can change to another cable car to get to the lake behind the mountain, on the next mountain, but unfortunately we didn't have time - everything shut at 5 and we had to be off by then, or else get a taxi.
The wind and thick smoke and cloud that was coming with it made the entire area seem as though we'd stepped off into a different country. It was cold and damp and the wind was really strong. It was a buzz with activity, and the huts sold various things next to a geology museum.
One of the big souvenirs you can get is a bag of 5 black eggs. These are eggs whose shells have turned black from the way they have been cooked. The inside is just regular hardboiled egg. They were still warm when we ate them in our room about 40 minutes later.
You could also buy egg flavoured soft-serve ice cream, but the shop had just switched off the machines.
We agreed that we would get up early the next morning and have the ice cream and explore the lake properly before going back to Tokyo, while admonistrating ourselves (well, Hubbo, cause I was awake at 6 while he only got up after 9) for not getting a move on earlier in the day.
On our way back down the cable car - I swear, we were only up there 20 minutes, tops - it was impossible to see through the cloud that had moved in. I took a photo, to illustrate how far ahead we could see.
When it rains, it ruins everything
It started raining that night, as I mentioned, when we decided to have our bath. Then it kept raining all night and into the next day. It wasn't heavy rain, more a driven drizzle with the occasional heavy shower breaking through.
We optimistically took ourselves (and our things) to the mountain shuttle to get up to the cable car. Better to see the lake from the cable car loop route than not at all, we thought.
Well, the cable car wasn't running because of the winds. There was a bus we could use but when we were waiting the rain kept getting heavier and it was cold and we weren't dressed for it and in the end, we glumly turned back and headed for the train station.
We decided to stop at Yokohama, the second largest city, on our way as it was just one stop along on the shinkensen.
It's ok - I can see why a lot of people would go there for a shopping day out, or to just see the harbour and walk about a bit. It's rather big and spread out, but the central part is just the shopping area and cinemas. They had a few of those - more than we saw in areas of Tokyo. It was very nice and I got some lovely photos, but it was a bit... empty.
They were doing the giant pikachu parade that evening, but that would mean hanging around for another 4 or 5 hours waiting for it with all our stuff, so Hubbo made the executive decision to go back to the flat.
We'll try to go back to Hakone for the day after our trip to Sapporo, which we're leaving for tomorrow.
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