Saturday, May 26--Luck on a Stick

Today is Asakusa exploration day! 

We also wanted to check out the Tokyo National Museum which is located in the Ueno area, right next to Ueno Park. A fabulous breakfast later, we headed out to Nakamise Shopping Street, a straight pedestrian street leading to Sensoji Temple, lined with shops and booths. Our ryokan is located in a side street of Nakamise, so everything is very close by. We were pretty early and not all of the shops had opened yet, but we wanted to dodge the crowds. 

Ryokan breakfast

Nakamise Shopping Street, leading to Sensoji Temple

Of course we had to stop and shop, but we figured we're on vacation and who cares when we get to the museum! Lynda had developed a condition where she was convinced nobody she knows has enough purses--coin purses, tote bags, bottle purses, etc. As a result we stopped in every shop which had items even closely resembling a purse and I ended up with 2 purses I didn't know I needed until I had them. 

At the end of the street and after passing the temple gate, we saw people standing in front of a bunch of wooden drawers, shaking cylinders and pulling out metal sticks. Upon further inspection, we saw that there were instructions in English and these were fortune sticks. I tried it first (you throw 100 yen, about $0.92 into the coin box, shake the cylinder until you can fish a stick out, compare the sign on the stick to a corresponding drawer and pull out a sheet with your fortune) and it looks like I have a great future ahead of me. Lynda on the other hand was not so lucky .Her fortune pretty much stunk, but not to worry, there are provisions for that--you just tie the paper on a rack and let the universe take care of the rest! Lynda is demonstrating the whole procedure below. I did shorten the first part of the video depicting the shaking process, because it's not an easy task to get one of those sticks to come out and it takes forever!

Lynda and the fortune sticks

Sensoji Temple, honoring Kannon

Pagoda next to the temple

Booths at the temple

Inside the Sansoji Temple; it was not allowed to take a picture/film the Kannon statue.

Wandering around the temple area:

At that point we had gathered so much loot that we headed back to the ryokan to deposit our items before going to the museum. On the way we passed one more shop we had to investigate; the owner was able to tell us a lot of the meanings of the patterns on the--you guessed it--bags, purses and handkerchiefs. This is the shop:

Now to the museum--for real! We got off the subway at Ueno Station and walked past the Science Museum and Ueno Park.

Baseball is a big deal in Japan

Science Museum--Tim, is this correctly restored?

The Tokyo National Museum is huge, but admission is so cheap (about $5.50)! It consists of several buildings, of which we visited the 2 main ones. I only took a few pictures and they are Samurai-heavy, but here's a short video:

That was tiring! We were going to take one short walk through Ueno Park, then try to be at a tofu restaurant we had read about around 5, so we would get a table. Alas, that didn't quite happen as planned since there was a market at the park--people watching! With beer and sake! There were two rows of vendor booths and I acquired two new ceramic tea cups. Lynda checked out the--do I even have to write it?--purse booths, but she was a good sport, hanging out at the ceramics place with me. 

Ueno Park market

There was also a whole row of food and drink booths--something you can't just pretend like it's not there! We thought a little snack and a drink before dinner couldn't hurt and got ourselves delicious okonomiyaki (a type of pancake to which you can add all kinds of things--this is an after-war invention) and beer and sake at the drinks booth. I couldn't believe the sake actually came in a water glass with a pop-tab lid on it! 

Market sake

Tables for eating at the market

After the market experience it was time to head towards the restaurant. Sasa-no-yuki was mentioned in both our travel guides and it specializes in tofu dishes. They make their tofu fresh daily and it's run by a bunch of older ladies. What have I said before about Japanese grannies? Can't go wrong with their cooking! Only no cats this time. 

We walked there and actually found it right away, thanks to our rented WiFi box, Google Maps and pictures of the restaurant on Google Maps. Most of these restaurants don't have their name written out in romanji (English alphabet letters), but only in kanji. So not only did Google help us find the way, it also helped us identify the correct building by providing pictures. I should mention that many restaurants aren't only located on the ground floor of a particular address, but they can be on any (or sometimes there's one on every) floor of a tall building. So finding just the address is only half of the game. 

Sasa-no-yuki occupied its own large building and it was traditional, meaning you have to take your shoes off before entering and walk with your socks on the carpeted floor to the dining room. We chose eight courses of tofu so we could try everything and it was good, right down to the tofu ice cream! 

8 courses of tofu deliciousness

By this time we were sufficiently tired and headed back to visit Sensoji Temple one last time, hopefully without the crowds, and see it in its illuminated glory. 

Tomorrow is our last full day in Japan!

Friday, May 25--Obama and the Hollow Buddha

Our time in Hakone was up; we packed our bags, had one last go at the breakfast buffet and hit the train again for Kamakura. The trip there was included in our train pass, but a visit at the tourist information revealed that we could get a faster train for an additional ticket. We decided to go for that since we'd spent a lot of time in trains these past few days and the less we had to do so in the future, the better. We also needed to be back in Tokyo in time to purchase another 2-day subway pass. Since this type of ticket is only available to foreign visitors, the places of sales are limited and many close around 5. We've become quite accomplished at seeing a lot of things in little time and we were sure we could make this happen. First World problems again! 

Goal of this side-excursion was to see the Daibutsu, or Great Buddha, the 2nd largest Buddha statue in Japan. Sometimes, you do have to settle for second best, but this Buddha made up for it by being hollow and accessible. 

In order to get to Kamakura (or more specific, the town of Hase, a part of Kamakura), we changed in Fujisawa to the Enoden (Enoshima Electric Railway) which took us along the coastline where we could see the peninsula Enoshima and the ocean. Quite the scenic route, when the other tourists packing the train moved their heads enough so we could see out. Before going to Hakone, Lynda had her large pieces of luggage sent directly from our Tokyo hotel to the ryokan (guesthouse) we were going to stay in during our last days in Tokyo, so she didn't have to lug those around. We put the remaining pieces into a locker in Fujisawa so we could be footloose and fancy free in Hase. 

Hase is lined with shrines and temples and accordingly popular with visitors. Having already seen so many shrines and temples on our previous visits, we only stopped at one minor one and then made a beeline to Kotokuin Temple to see the main attraction. The Daibutsu is around 13 m (44 ft) tall, made of bronze and dates back to the 1200's. For a measly $0.18 admission fee, we got in line behind a bunch of elementary school kids to see what all the fuss is about. As is usual in Japan with historical sights, there was a very narrow staircase leading inside with 2-way traffic. Squeezing in sideways while staying with the flow and not tripping on the stairs is an art form one has to quickly master when visiting castles or hollow statues. Being envious of people twice my age accomplishing the task without batting an eye or even being out of breath is a side effect. 

Temple gate

Temple yard

Daibutsu, Great Buddha

There was an explanation on how the statue was constructed, but I gave up understanding the technical part after two sentences and took some pictures instead. 

Inside the statue; you're looking up, into the head

Yeah, I was there!

Outside of the temple we finally found what we really came here for--a souvenir shop! I was going to do all of my souvenir shopping back in Tokyo so I wouldn't have to carry around stuff, but this was too tempting. And we had to get the story of all of the Obama pictures hanging in the shop. Turns out the old lady who ran the shop had shaken Obama's hand after he had visited the temple. I wonder if he bought a Samurai-sword shaped letter opener. 

Lynda grabs any brochure she can possibly find, which I try to avoid because more brochures = more stuff to carry around, but that's why we travel well together. I do the navigating and she reads brochures and tells me where to navigate to. She had seen something about a hydrangea temple and since it was on our way back to the train station, we wanted to stop there. We did get hungry along the way and found a food truck with some interesting street food: jakoyaki or baby anchovy dumplings, only to be found in that area. 
They were so good, we went glutton and ordered a second portion. The food truck operator was only to happy to comply, feeling very honored that we liked his food so much. 

Food truck

Waiting for the prize

Jakoyaki

The chef in action

On to the hydrangea temple, officially known as Hasedera, site of the 11-headed Kannon (if you do not know who that is, 1. shame on you for not reading my previous posts; 2. go back and read my previous posts). I'll give you the short form of the legend, just because it's a good story: in 721 C.E. a monk discovered a sacred large camphor tree near Hase. How he knew it was sacred, I don't know. This is all according to a brochure Lynda picked up. 
The monk had two 11-headed Kannon statues carved; one was enshrined in the Hasedera Temple in Nara (aka somewhere else), the other thrown into the sea with the prayer to reappear to save the people (I don't know from what--that wasn't in the brochure).

15 years later, the statue washed ashore near Kamakura, sending out rays of light. It was brought to its current location and the second Hasedera Temple constructed for it. However this temple came to be, it is beautiful!

Unfortunately, it was not allowed to take pictures of the 11-headed Kannon, but here are some impressions of the rest of the place. 

After our visit, we got back onto the trains and arrived in Tokyo in time to get our subway pass. A final subway ride brought us to our final destination: our ryokan in Asakusa, an older part of Tokyo, right by the Sensoji Temple. Sound familiar? It does! The parade and the carrying around of the mikoshi last Friday and Saturday all took place here. 

Since it was a little bit late already, we used the time for some more shopping. I bought some clothing and we found a 100 yen shop (something like our Dollar Tree) where I got some souvenirs for school. We then wandered around a bit and stumbled onto Hoppy Dori, a street lined with eateries, tables outside and lots of people. It's hard to get a table at 8:30 on a Friday night. Dori, BTW, means street and Hoppy is a popular drink, which we didn't try, but the logo was everywhere in that street. We did finally find an open table and enjoyed some food as well as people-watching. 

Hoppy Dori--not my photo! I got this off of the internet, because for some unexplainable reason, I don't have a picture. 

Time to crash!

Thursday, May 24--The Steep and Paved Road

We had some serious sight-seeing planned for today, but first--breakfast buffet! 

There are lots of things to see in Hakone and we planned to do a circle route to see as many of the main sights as possible. This entailed taking the Hakone Tozan Cable Car and then the Hakone Ropeway to a place called Owakudani.

 Owakudani is the area around a crater created during the last eruption of Mount Hakone some 3000 years ago. Today, much of the area is an active volcanic zone where sulfurous fumes, hot springs and hot rivers can be experienced. Yeah, this was straight from Wikipedia--I didn't pay much attention in geology class and needed a little help from my best friend, the internet. 

One used to be able to walk on trails around there, but they had to be closed due to the volcanic gases. There is an observation platform at Owakudani Station and even that far away from the vents, the smell is quite overpowering, but it is a sight to see!

 This place is also famous for its black eggs, which are eggs boiled in the hot, sulfuric water after which the shell turns black. The inside is not affected and stays white. Eating one is supposed to add 7 years to your life. At this point in time, I didn't know if I wanted to risk eating one and adding more years in this crazy world drama, but curiosity overwhelmed me. Tasted like egg with bit of sulfur on the side. 

Usually, the ropeway takes you all the way down to Lake Ashi, also known as Lake Ashinoko, but of course today was the first day that part was closed for the annual maintenance and a bus took over. No worries though--we saw what we wanted to see. 

Once at Lake Ashi, we boarded one of the ships modeled after historical ships. Ours supposedly looked like the Vasa, a war ship built by King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden in the 1600's. Bet that one didn't smell like gas fumes. On the other hand, we didn't have to row so I guess that was OK. 

We got off at Hakonemachi with the intent of visiting the old checkpoint, then walking along the Ancient Cedar Highway to Motohakone, where we would continue on the old Tokaido Highway to the Amazake-chaya Teahouse. Explanations follow as we move along. 

First stop: Hakone Checkpoint, a reconstruction. It used to be an important checkpoint to control traffic along the Tokaido Highway from Tokyo to Kyoto during the feudal Edo Period (1603-1867). Sorry, I just had to throw in a history lesson! After all, you should know what you're looking at. 

The Tokugawa Shogunate erected 53 checkpoints throughout Japan to inspect travelers, weapons and make sure hostages weren't smuggled out. If you want to know more about that, watch "Shogun"! 

Here it is, the Hakone Checkpoint; the figures have been kept gray deliberately. The description said that the reconstructers didn't know what color the horses and the clothes were, so they kept it neutral. 

Finally some Janglish!

Part of this little expedition involved climbing some steep stairs, but that was only a preview of what was yet to come. We have already had plenty of practice walking the extended ways through the subway stations and climbing the stairs there, so we were somewhat prepared. 

A so-called Ancient Cedar Avenue led from Hakonemachi to Moto-Hakone. Some of these cedars are 300-400 years old. That is ancient in American terms, but just yesterday in European terms. 

Ancient Cedar Avenue

After only about 15 minutes we reached Moto-Hakone. 

Then came the highlight of the day--walking on the old Tokaido Highway. This is an original part of the highway from the Edo period, paved with stones, except missing the dirt in between the stones that somewhat leveled it out. I had read somewhere that it was going to be steep, but had disregarded that as hate speech. Turns out, I was wrong and that path was steep, but the allure of the Amazake-Chaya Teahouse at the end of it kept us going. All those hours at the gym did pay off! 

We even encountered a snake on the way and just like Kansans during a tornado, we wipped out our cellphones and got as close as we could to take a good picture, not knowing if this snake was poisonous or not. It was a beautiful copper color and blended in well with the fallen leaves; it slithered away quickly so we didn't get our photos. 

At some point, the crest of the highway was reached and the road went downhill, which was almost worse, because the stones were wet and uneven and extreme focusing was in order. That is extremely hard when at the same time you try to gossip with your friend; the result was a prolonged silence since healthy limbs take precedence over idle talk.

There was a little marker at the end of this stretch, where wanderers had left coins. Typical Japan--there were lots of coins, yet nobody stole them. We too left some, being grateful we had finally made it. I'm sure the contributors of the other coins had felt the same!

I can't even imagine how the people in the old days rode horses, walked on and carried palanquins on this road, even with the dirt between the stones evening them out a bit more than they are today! 

Another hike, this time over more exposed roots than stones, brought us to the Amazake-Chaya Teahouse. The amazake was a special treat--it's a naturally sweet, thick, hot, fermented rice drink and was delicious! 

Amazake

Teahouse entrance

Inside the teahouse--it was much darker in there; I lightened up the picture so details could be viewed

We were lucky there was a bus stop right in front of the teahouse so we opted for a ride home instead of walking some more. The road was steep and narrow and the bus driver practicing for the Rally Monte Carlo, or it seemed, but this wasn't his first race to the bottom and he brought us safely down to the valley. 

Another sweitchback train ride back up the mountain, and we were just in time for a soak in the hot tub (onsen) and the dinner buffet. For those of you who haven't read about the onsen yet--there is a certain etiquette you have to follow, if you don't want to be kicked out of the country by the Seven Samurai--you have to get butt naked and soap yourself down in front of other onsen guests (the baths are segregated by gender) before you get into the tub with them. Yep, you get clean before the tub--the bath is for relaxation only. 

After the bath, we put on our yukatas (light robes provided in every hotel/guest house) and went to dinner. It is common to see guests wearing yukatas to dinner or breakfast and in some resort towns it is customary to take an evening stroll in the yukata and geta (traditional shoes), also provided by the hotels/guest houses. The pattern of the yukata is unique to the hotel, so you can tell who is staying in which hotel. 

Tomorrow, we're going on another train ride to visit Kamakura and then back to Tokyo where we will stay at a ryokan (traditional guest house) in Asakusa. 

Wednesday, May 23--The Long and Winding Road

Time to get out of the bustle of the city for a bit and head toward the countryside. According to Google, Hakone looked really good and we also wanted to visit Kamakura, site of the giant Buddha statue Daibutsu and lots of temples. It helped with the decision that Odakyu Railway offers a 3-day Hakone Kamakura pass, which lets you use all modes of transportation to and within the areas. Worry free transport, that's how we like it!

Final destination today is Gora, way up in the mountains. We got on the subway to Shinjuku, then onto the train to Odawara, then onto the train to Hakone-Yumoto, then onto the train to Gora. This last part was very interesting, because the terrain is so sloped, the tracks zig-zag quite a bit. I haven't figured out the system yet, but on certain stops, the driver moves to the other end of the train and the train goes backwards. This switchback happens three times until Gora is reached.

Gora Station

                                On the train

Little shrine on the side of the tracks

Our hotel was right next to the train station, always a plus, especially since it started raining. It was just a light rain, so we decided to go to Gora Park and the Hakone Open Air Museum today. The hotel was just as interesting as the train ride--reception in the basement and all signs in Japanese only. That was surprising, considering the guests were pretty international, but mostly Chinese. 

We had booked half board, because this hotel offers a Japanese breakfast and dinner buffet--food heaven! And you know by now that that's a priority. The Hakone area is known for its hot springs and this hotel also features an onsen. The place was old-school, meaning no modern key cards and anything of that sort, but the rooms were large, the beds comfy, the staff friendly and the location perfect. We were told to be back at 6 for the buffet and you best believe we'd make that on time!

It was lunch time now so we went wandering around town, meaning climbing a steep hill. We passed a string of small restaurants, one of them having large windows through which we saw some simple tables, a very old lady getting the tables ready, 2 platforms with pillows for Japanese-style sitting (kneeling) and on one of those pillows, a big, fluffy cat crashed out. Grannies and nekkos--you can't go wrong! That was the place we chose for lunch after exploring; we had no idea what they were serving, but granny and a nekko--it's all good!

We made our way to Gora Park, which was beautiful and featured some art studios.

Back to the restaurant! We decided to sit Japanese-style to make the experience real. Nobody spoke English and the cat had booked, but grandma told us they serve ramen. Lynda went through the hand-written menu with her and communication was spotty, just like our WiFi box in that area, but when she said miso ramen, I was sold. Believe it or not, I've never had ramen in all the times I've visited Japan! It was simple, but delicious. In fact, the place was so simple, that they didn't serve any drinks besides water and no napkins. That is very unusual--you usually get tea and a wet towelette everywhere. We noticed that the gaijin all sat at the Japanese-style tables, the Japanese lunchers all preferred the more comfortable tables.

The Hakone Open Air Museum is just one train stop away from Gora. The hotel had given us umbrellas and we were ready to see some open air art! This was such a cool place and is highly recommended to anyone who's visiting the area, and I'm not such an artsy person. They even had a building full of Picasso's art.

                             Bit of a foggy day

                          Some of the artwork

There were fish too.

We stopped at the cafe which had interesting Italian food, including gelato on a sweet bun. I think Lynda got that one just to make fun of it. But what a genius idea for the U.S! Surprised nobody is selling that yet--a real ice cream sandwich. And don't go starting a business--we saw it first! I grabbed a small bottle of San Pellegrino, not realizing that it cost about $4.50; oh well, we were paying for the scenery, which was worth every yen.

                          The sandwich of scorn

The scenery

Notice the gray cylinder in front of the cafe? This is what it looks like inside!

At closing time, we were kicked out; time to go back and hit the buffet!