I got souvenirs at Mt FUji! Baby crabs! To eat!
So this is the first thing I do after climbing Mt Fuji.
When I arrived, they were about to show me into their rooma when they realised it was already in use so at the last minute they happened to put me in.... the Ninjya room.
And here is my Ninjya roommate, this jumping spider.
And here is an army of green soots (mamidori midorisuke?) that are pretending to be chestnuts outside my window.
The view out my back window down to a river.
The view out towards the outdoor hotspring. There were also a few indoor ones, and you had to reserve all of them. No, that's not the actual hotspring area, it's like the maintanence shed behind it, so you can't really look in through the cracks.
Me trying to figure out if Mt FUji gave me pinkeye or if they're just really red from all the volcanic dust and whatnot getting blown into them.
MY ninjya roommate checking out the light fixtures.
It's a spider.
This is a very important thing to think about.
He didi t!
Just letting you know how clumsy construction workers are.
The river behind the house, which I quickly left because of mosquitoes.
They found me! And they are very pointy!
This time, it really WAS this foggy, not my camera.
SInce everything in Japan shuts down at sunset pretty much, and all the restaurants arund here close at 8, I'm just going to check out a few things in the area, then grab some dinner before a very very early sleep. I did just climb down a mountain this morning.
This guy's big house deserves to be seen.
DOn't make him angry!
CHecking out the local shrine before eating.
ANd here's the beautiful pond! I think this is a combination of the clear water and all the mist in the air.
Of course, the water dragon.
For when you're hungry and you don't wanna work anymore.
SOme more stuff I forgot to use on Mt Fuji.... Although it worked out because the owners of the guest house were really interested in the Bahamas so I gave them some stickers.
....Well, I AM staying in the Ninjya room.... I'm holding my room key in my right hand. Yeah, it looks like half a nunchaku.
I thought this was just great.
Calpis GRAPE! MMMMmmmm.....
When I asked for foodening reccomendations the night before from the guest house people, there were actual only a couple restaurants open, because for some reason lots of things in Hakone close on Thursdays. SO I went to 'China House,' which specialises in many different flavours of gyouza (pot stickers). SO I got some squid gyouza and some ramen, and ended up talking to the owner a bit in Japanese about The Bahamas and Yokohama, and to the waitress in ENglish. But yeah he then gave me a free ticket to this Ventian GLass Museum/FOrest right near the guest house, so this is the first thing I did this morning (After getting some breakfast and grape Calpis.)
They're made of glass!
Kinda... really familiar... like inside the casino at Atlantis... Except with more ducks.
ANd these are the grounds.
Rediscover the charm of Venice!
Slimes!
Also made of glass!
The clouds meant no view of Mt Fuji, but that was fine by me.
What are they made of?
Glass!
I couldn't take any photos inside the museum proper, but there were some cool wineglasses with ridiculously thin stems athat were also all zigg zaggy, and they had a video of one resting on a table outside and it just started wobbling all around because it wsa way too thin.
This SUNDAY! Sunday sunday....
SHe had some neat wings.
It's three bubbles.
Read this...
And look at this....
I like how the artist in this picture has an EYEPATCH.
This is what Ariel's room would look like I think.... I think this eyepatch guy might've worked at Atlantis....
There was a lot of neato stuff here.
Which flowers are REAL?
It's me!
They also had a fancy glass river.
ANd some glass... these things.
See?
And a “Flash Tree“”
ANd then I think I left there... and I saw this caterpillar.
And went by this giant museum for the Little Prince ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Prince ) which, upon reading about it, maybe I should have gone to...
The bubbles were neat though.
And my stick was very good for popping them.
Mountains!
A nice, awkward group hot spring visit.
They were building an addition for Mount Fuji, including a slide and a casino to make it even more superly awesome.
Now we got where I was headed... the Samurai museum! Once again, I couldn't get any photos of the actual exhibits......
I WOULD like to be a “Samurai!”
SO I just have these instead.
So cool...
Yeah...
Not dorky at all...
Yup I'm a Samurai.
A strange beast approacheth! Now I'm an ancient ENglish Samurai!
GO for the tyres!
Well that thing has been totally vanquished.
Old habits die hard...
SO do trees...
Holdin' ma flag.
Oh no! A samurai from a rival clan!
There is only one thing to do!
It was a fierce, long battle.
But in the end, I was unable to defend my clan's honour.
Now my transformation is complete!
That's supposed to be a menacing grin. Be menaced!
The daughter of the owner forgot how to attach the faceplate properly, so I had to think of ingeniuos reasons for my hands to be on my face. Oh no, I'm a Samurai home alone!
(I'm thinking.)
Well, being defeated, I need to remove my helmut. DOesn't that armor fit a big tall guy like me so well?
Close up!
Talking to the helmut!
um.... Star wars kid?
And now, off to ride some cablecars, ropeway gondala thingies and pirate ships!
My first sighting of blue sky in Hakone.
Riding the cable car up another mountain!
You... can't really see it, but there is a big 'Dai' symbol on the mountain there (It looks like a headless stickman doing a jumping jack)
This must be a pretty big event. It advertises “Bug battles!” and a guy in mexican wrestling mask. I asked around, but I think it closed in 15 minutes from when I asked.... my one regret of this trip...
They even had these advertising guys at a lot of the transpotation stations. I actually wanted a picture of this guy because when I got there he was under that log and it looked like he was being crushed and couldn't get out, but the friendly staff took him out so I could get a better photo.... darn....
Now for the next leg of my journey.
I could see these things from out of my .... thing...
They had complinetary fans inside the things in case it got too hot! And magic eye patterns in case it got too boring! Wow!
We're going thataway.
TIny cars.
There's a cloud behind me!
Going inside some clouds, again!
We're definatley going over this here mountain.
This is what happened as soon as we topped the peak of the first mountain.
And this is all we could see for a while. I sure hope those are connected to something.
Most people waved back.
I think the phrasing here is nice and odd.
So we did make it to our destination, Owakudani mountain. THis is where the water for my hotspring bath I took came from! Luckily, no gasses got dense vitally while I was there.
Enjoy the view!
This is the station I came to, for black eggs!
With clouds...
Without clouds!
There's a mountain there!
I guess those viewfinders are there for a reason.
And here's the girl who took my pictures for me! And then gave me a 50 yen discount on some Fuji apples! She was awesome.
And that might be what the view would be like without the clouds. And with more chairs and reflections.
Now THAT is a cloud. Or, a picture of a cloud.
HEading down the other side to Lake Ashii.
There's my Pirate ship!
But it's closed! Stupid anti-piracy legislation...
I woulda taken a swan boat instead if they let me...
SO I will take a bus on the next part then! although it's coming up on 5pm, when everything everywhere closes...
Even the Pirate ship is going away... into the mists...
It's captain Jack!
SO now bussing around to try and get to the last 2 spots I wanted to see in Hakone this trip.
Gasp! Blue sky again!
A sign warning of the three major dangers in this area; Mountain droppings, car tyres suddenly switching sides from left to right, and curvy arrows shot by warriors with poor craftsmanship.
American Oldies Bar?!? Allright!
Here's half a sunset as I wait for a connecting bus.
Here's a bit more.
TIme to try one of those black eggs I went to the mountain to get! The blackness lets you know it was boiled in volcano water. I thought it was just a hardboiled egg, so I just slammed my had into it, but apparently it's a SOFTboiled egg so I got egg on my hand. But I still able to eat pretty much all of it.
This is what Japan looks like.
SO walking down to Hakone Jinja, to see the shrine torii (Big red gates like this one) in the water.
Things look neat at night.
I put the camera on top of my cane, and I slipped while taking this picture, but I like it better this way.
So this is the torii standing at the edge of lake ashii!
And this is me standing under it!
And this is the right side of it!
The trees leading up to it look cool too.
Well since I came all this way I decide to talk the walk up to the actual shrine.
The stairway up the hill was lit by thee cool lanterns. I think I'm glad I came here at night.
Here's a side little shrine at the very top.
Since I didn't want to use flash on these ladies who were very into their prayers at the big shrine.
This is bacl down at the base, at a pond I don't think I was supposed to be up at.
It's hard to tell what a path and what's not at night. That was what I was gonna tell anyone who saw me at least. I don't know why this big chunk of tree was in it's own little hut, but it was cool.
Now heading out a different exit to get back to the bus-stop.
No camera, YOU'RE underexposed! To being cool!
This is a shot of the lake torii from the shore a little ways away... yeah...
Now, the final stop I had to make! The guest house owner made a point of saying how famous this was in Japan.
So I had to get proof I was there, even if it's all shut down.
There I am!
But since it's night and everything is closed, I can't even see what's there! How will I get around? Also, I look like Quasimodo here!
Idea! My mountain climbing light! Hooray!
I found a map of the area.
But everything was dark so it was hard to see what to do. But then a light up ahead! Is it an office window that's still open? SOme kind of amusement? A vending machine! Yay!
So I took a picture of these guys, since there wasn't a whole lot I could see and I needed to take pictures of something.
ALso this bush. I thought it had flowers on it... ANyway I was rushed for time as the final bus of the night was sonn coming.
See? this has all the information you need to tell I was very short on time. I got to the bus stop at 8:05, and the last bus to Odawara station was at 8:20. After that I woulda gotten to know the Hakone Checkpoint a lot more, through sleeping there.
Now eventually at Owadara station, where they have Crawfish! In mural form.
Had to get a nice bento dinner for the ride home,
And also some nice drink. Yup this has potato and yam juice in it.
And finally, here's a familiar train ad on the way home. That lady like 80kcal so much, she always divides her meals into 80kcal portions before eating. If the meal doesn't divide perfectly into 80kcal portions, she throws the remainder away. At this point my camera would sometimes load up to a white or black screen, or the lens would remain.. telescoped.. since I forgot to bring chargers for my camera or my DS and my camera had a bit too much cloud in it. That's also why I overslept past my second scheduled hot spring bath, since my DS is my alarm clock.
