It was a short week: only three days, so it hardly felt like I'd worked at all before it was the weekend again. On Friday, in the warmth and the sun I donned on a dress and we went for a nice little walk around the Oshino Village in Yamanakako. The stream was really pretty with hints of sakura in the trees and at the eight little ponds we fed fish and ate peach ice cream. It was kinda crowded with tourists flocking the country side from Tokyo for the weekend.
Not yet even noon we headed south and down out of the mountains to Gotenba famous for only two things really: beer and the premium outlet mall. SInce it wasn't the beer I was after we went shopping. The mall has a Nikon store and I was hoping to find a cheap camera to replace mine but they weren't any better priced and I can find one online for cheaper. But still it's an outdoor mall and set up like a European shopping centre so it was nice just to stroll about and fancy I was actually preparing to purchase that $1500 top at Dolce and Gabanna. In the end I did splurge on a really nice knew purse and a couple of shirts. Nikki got a beautiful purple Anna Sui wallet that I want to steal! With our treasures we sat down for lunch and then headed home.
Saturday was rather uneventful. A sleep in then off to Otsuki for iaido practice. Nikki says I look like I know what I'm doing but I think it's just cause seeing anyone do iaido for the first time is super cool lol. Practised really hard for my test next weekend. Hope it goes well... and then we went out for curry.
Sunday we headed for the beach! The weather was fabulous and the traffic not as bad as it could have been. Along the way we stopped so I could show Nikki the magic of strawberry daifuku and then we headed down the peninsula to Shirahama. I've been to some nice beaches in Japan but this is by far the best with its white sand, blue waters, cliffs to climb on, brilliant torii over looking the sea and the cute little shrine with a red bridge. We explored for well over two hours, frolicking in the surf, collecting shells and watching the surfers.
Having been no further than Shirahama in Shimoda ever, I decided to see what the rest of the town had to offer. There was an aquarium for Nikki where we saw some cool and terrifying fish, very majestic emperor penguins that can't help but perpetually look like they're holding some sort of court and a girl surfing on a dolphin. That was awesome! She was very talented and the dolphins were super lucky as the aquarium floated on the ocean and their tank was actually the harbour.
After the aquarium we walked back to where I'd seen this pretty little canal lined with old fashion brick buildings and willow trees. It turns out it was Perry Road. As in Commodore Matthew Perry from America who in the mid 1800s forced Japan to end it's policy of isolation. At the end of the road, which was also lined with bridges and cobblestoned, there was a temple talked into the hillside where he and companions stayed while awaiting news from the shogun about their alliance.
Pretty much the rest of the day was spent driving the coastline up to our ryokan to the east in Ito City. The ryokan was a lovely historic building on the river with a newly renovated interior so it was clean and comfortable. Our room overlooked the water with this awesome window sill that you could sit on and watch the river. It had a nostalgic atmosphere and I loved it. The room smelled of fresh tatami and the bath was marble and hot. The only problem was the noise but somehow I managed to get a good night sleep. In the morning we went to McDonalds to grab breakfast to eat on the beach!
We began the trek home after breakfast along the coast. We stopped at a pretty lame castle overlooking the ocean which I had seen from the shinkansen in February, but it didn't live up to my expectations which rarely happens in Japan. So we poked around there a bit and then turned north and quite abruptly began to climb from sea level and up into the mountains to Hakone. After getting lost several times, as I was approaching it from the south rather than the north like last time, we made it. When last I was here with Rhee it was the first of the chilly days and we had the most magnificent view of Mt. Fuji, the lake and the famous floating torii gate. With Nikki and I we could see Fuji but the heat made it hazy so we settled for a walk along the lake, a visit to the shrine and went to the old check point from the Tokaido road in the Edo era. Between the 17th and 19th centuries when one wanted to travel, he or she had to have permission from the shogunate, if not that they would never make it through checkpoints like this one set up to keep track of the coming and going of samurai, merchants and pilgrims. Because wives and children were held hostage, the official were particularly suspicious of women travelers but we got through okay lol.
And then we went home, traversing the mountains roads, combating bad drivers and finally finding some food along the way until we settled in on a Monday evening to rest from the busy yet awesome weekend!
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