The Elusive Mountain

Sunday morning we were off bright and early to head to the Mt. Fuji area. First we were to take a boat ride across the beautiful Lake Ashi, then a ride on the Hakone Ropeway, which is like giant ski lift-type thing. All of this was designed to give us "stunning views" of Mt. Fuji. 

So off we went on our long bus ride. We arrived at Lake Ashi to find it was about 40 degrees out, cloudy and blowing a hurricane, which made 40 degrees seem much, much colder. We were looking for the stunning views of Mt. Fuji. This is what we saw:

Then we rode a pirate ship across the lake. Not exactly an expected mode of transportation in Japan, but hey, how many people can say that getting in touch with their inner Captain Jack Sparrow was part of their Japanese experience?

While cruising on Lake Ashi, we continued looking for the stunning views of Mt. Fuji. This is what we saw:

Next up was the Hakone Ropeway.  If a mini van and a ski lift had a baby, this would be it. 

By now it was not only cold, cloudy and windy, but the fog was rolling in thick and fast.  Still yearning for those stunning views of the fabled mountain, we peered through the fog. This is what we saw:

It's a good thing that we actually saw Mt. Fuji in the distance from the expressway on our journey to all these amazing viewing sites or we would have thought that the elusive Mt. Fuji was just a myth, kind of like Bigfoot.  

We had one last crack at a Mt. Fuji experience. Our last stop was to be on Mt. Fuji at the fifth station, about half way up the mountain. Sounds exciting, right? Gonna be a cool experience, right?  If we can't see the mountain, we can at least experience the mountain up close and personal, right? We were excited to salvage something from the freezing cold, cloudy, windy, foggy day. And then the rain started. Which meant it was snowing on Mt. Fuji. Which meant the roads on Mt. Fuji were closed. Which meant we went to the base of the mountain, the visitor center and no farther.  It seemed that Mt. Fuji was not meant to be ours. We would have to content ourselves with the distant view we had seen from the expressway and no more. 

Until we awoke the next morning at our hotel at Lake Kawaguchi and the day was saved.

"There's a building there?"

By the end of our first day in Tokyo, we were tired.  Bone tired.  We were just coming off a 26-hour travel day, had just put in a 12-plus-hour touring and shopping day and we were pushing through the 16-hour time difference, but we still had one more must-do on our list of sights to see - Tokyo Tower.  It's kind of Tokyo's answer to Paris' Eiffel Tower except it's red and white.  And in Tokyo, not Paris.  We'd read in the guide books that nighttime is a good time to visit because you get to see the entire city of Tokyo twinkling in the night.  Plus, the entire tower lights up, and who doesn't love a lit-up Eiffel Tower knock-off?  So off we went, hopping on subway trains and changing from one line to another like we knew what we were doing.  We finally reached our destination and when we exited the station and stepped out onto the street, this is what we saw.

Jill's immediate reaction was, "Oh, there's the tower!"  Now, can you all tell from the picture what she was looking at?  It's the reflection of the tower in a glass office building.  That's what we all thought she meant when she said, "Oh, there's the tower!"  Until she started walking towards the reflection.  And the rest of us started looking at each other kind of funny, because we all knew that the actual tower was behind us.  When we asked her where she was going, she looked at us as if we were crazy and said, "I'm going to the tower." We all started cracking up and told her that that wasn't the tower, it was the reflection of the tower in a building.  Her  response?  "There's a building there?"  We've been cracking up over that one ever since.  I've promised to take her to the eye doctor as soon as we get back to California.  Like I said, we were bone tired.  

Fortunately, the trek to the Tokyo Tower was worth the long haul across Tokyo and the confusion at the end.  The sight of the tower and the view from the top were spectacular!

Harajuku Girls

"Come together all over the world, from the hoods of Japan, Harajuku girls...."

Somehow, I can't seem to get Gwen Stefani's voice out of my head.  I can see why she is so fascinated with the Harajuku district of Tokyo.  It is internationally known as the center forJapanese youth culture and fashion and it is the capital of "kawaii," or cute, and it is truly like no other place we've ever been.  It is the scene to see and be seen, and clearly all of Tokyo agrees.  The place is absolutely wall-to-wall accessories, clothing, sweet shops and toys (yes, toys!) all geared towards girls in their late teens and early twenties.  Hello Kitty? Check!  Candies of every imaginable color and flavor? Check!  Flower wreaths for your hair and tons and tons of sparly costume jewelry?  Double check!  But the real story here is the fashion.  Yes, there are plenty of cute clothing stores catering to juniors - Ashley made out like a bandit.  Finally, clothes that fit! - but there are plenty of stores that cater strictly to "Harajuku style."  Harajuku style - how to describe it?  The girls all dress up in over-the-top cutsie dresses, complete with outlandishly colored crazy hair and often stuffed animal companions.  Think less hoochie-mama and more babydoll gone wild.  Let's just say that since a picture is worth a thousand words, I'll save my fingers and show you what I'm talking about.

She was super cute and happy to have her picture taken.

Sorry I ambush photographed you!

This was our favorite of the night.  She was having dinner in the same restaurant as we were and very sweetly allowed us to take her picture.

Another fun thing that goes on in Harajuku is that there are these huge trucks that just drive up and down the street blaring music.  They are plastered on all sides with lit-up picutes of what I can only guess are Japan's version of boy bands.  I'm guessing that these trucks are some kind of continuous rolling advertising scheme to get the bands' music out there.  Interesting and fun, and it just added to the super cool chaos that is Harajuku.

So after six hours of getting our Harajuku on, we were ready to move on to our next adventure, Tokyo Tower.   More about that in my next post.

From Eggrolls to Sushi Rolls

So we made it to Tokyo safe and sound.  We had a fabulous flight on Singapore Airlines.  Smooth as silk.  And with 290 movies and 460 television shows to choose from, plus two full meals and a snack, there was plenty to do and the flight never seemed like it was dragging on and on.  We arrived here at 6:20 p.m. local time on Friday and two hours later arrived at our hotel.  After a good night's rest courtesy of Lunesta, we were ready to hit the ground running.

We had a guided tour Saturday morning.  We were first taken to the grounds of the Imperial Palace where the emperor of Japan and his family live.  You couldn't see the palace, but there was a very pretty bridge called the Nijubashi Bridge.  That white building in the center of the photo way in the distance?  It's one of the guard houses that guards the actual palace.  So much for our brush with Japanese royalty.  

From there we were off to the Senso-Ji Temple, the most famous Buddhist temple in Japan.  As the guide was detailing the ritual purification process required for entry to the temple, I think we all started to get a little uncomfortable.  Awkward situation, party of four!  Fortunately, when we got to the temple complex, our guide just told us that we had an hour to look around and where to meet back and then she cut us loose to explore on our own.  After taking a couple of pictures, we made our way to the Nakamise shopping street and spent our time wading through the sea of humanity that apparently accompanies any shopping area on a Saturday in Tokyo.  

    Senso-Ji Temple

    Pagoda at Senso-Ji.

    Nakamise shopping street.  Wall-to-wall people.  And this isn't even the most crowded shopping area we were in today!

Sooooo, after getting up-close-and-personal with some new friends in Tokyo, we were off to the Ginza district, a super-duper high-end shopping district (read  Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Bulgari, etc.) where we were left to explore.  Not exactly in our shopping budgets, we bagged Ginza quickly and headed off via the subway to the Harajuku district where we spent the next six hours in the hugest, most tightly-packed group of shoppers I've ever seen in my life.  For real.  Take a look....

I don't know if you can tell from this picture, but the people down this street are packed tighter than sardines in a can and the crowd just fills the street from end to end.  Harajuku makes the crowds in China look sparse!  There are 13 million residents of Tokyo, and we shopped with every last one of them yesterday.  In Harajuku.  I'm not even kidding.

Despite the overwhelming amount of people and being jostled and pushed and bumped and being unable to even move sometimes, we had an absolute blast.  I'll write more about Harajuku this evening and share some more pictures.  Suffice it to say for now that it was fun, funky and fabulous!  

We're heading out in just a few minutes to see Mt. Fuji and will be spending the night tonight in Hakone before moving on to Kyoto tomorrow.  If I have wi-fi in our Hakone hotel, I will post more tonight about our adventures in Tokyo.  I've got a few stored up for you.