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| Streets of Shinjuku |
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| Long Queue for Donuts |
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| Nearing the summit |
Took a Keiyo bus from Shinjuku to Mt Fuji 5th station to begin an overnight climb up Mt Fuji. Weather was bad. Rain and strong winds. (Photo: Still a long way to the summit. Almost there）
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| Waiting to board train at Shinjuku |
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| Hakone Yumoto Train Station |
Went to visit the Hakone Begonia Gardens. Just beside the Yumoto train station. Free shuttle service. (photo: some nice flowers)
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| Pirate ship at lake Ashi |
A woodcraft shop by Lake Ashi. Just opposite the Moto Hakone bus station.
Ships Ahoy! mate. One day being on a pirate ship. We took the 30mins cruise from Moto-Hakone to Togendai. No pirates gold at the end of the ride.
The famous red shrine arch at Lake Ashi. It was said that ladies come here to pray for a good husband. (photo: taken from the pirate ship)
At Togendai, we took the Hakone Ropeway to Owakudani. The boiling sulphur pit where local sell medicinal eggs (black egss) that was said to increase longevity and good health. (photo: In the cablecar, lake Ashi in the background)
Owakudani , also known as the valley of hell. This place is where the mainstream package tours congregate. Bus loads of local tourists poured in to have a taste of the black egg and sulphur fumes. (photo: boiling mud pool)
Accessible by the Hakone Tozan Train. A short walk from the small village station with residential houses dotted along the way. This is the Hakone Open-Air Museum, which offers many interesting scuplture that has a "twist" in its meaning.
A mosaic lady with a handbag?
Graffiti for all. Took a chalk and made our mark on the wall of comics characters, well wishes and alien symbols.
From Owakudani, we took the Hakone Tozan Cable Car downhill to Gora. Gora has some of Hakone's well known attractions like the Gora Park. This is also the end point for the Tozan Train that starts from Yumoto station. From here, you can take the buses to other parts of Hakone like the the Venetian Glass Museum and the Wetlands. Most tourists taken the Tozan train from Yumoto to Gora to transfer to the Cable Car to go up to Owakudani. (photo: Gora Station)
This is our hotel for the day. The Setsugetsuka ryokan at Gora. The location is conveniently located just beside the train station. Everything looks new. It was really an unforgetable experience.
Our room has a small onsen(hotspring) bath. The room combines both western style and japanese traditions. Bath slippers as above, as well as kimono sets and wooden clogs were available for us to walk around the hotel.
The hotels also offers public onsen pools and private pools. The picture show 2 of them in use as the lamp boxes are lit. Grab your towels and robes and go for a dip in the private anytime when it is unoccupied.
There is a crafthouse at Gora Park where you can see a demostration of glass blowing, or attend a lesson at it as well. Entrance to the Gora Park is included in our Hakone FreePass. Just show it to the attendance for free entrance.
The size of Gora Park is not large, the size of one football field, located on a hillslope. There are 2 entrances here. You can reach Gora Park from the Gora train station with 10min walk. Take a look if you have the freepass.
From Gora, we took the bus to the Venetian Glass Museum. Once again, using the Hakone FreePass. Transportation in Hakone can be slightly expensive. So the FreePass at hand is the best option to move around in Hakone. (photo: a tree of glass crystals)
The entire museum is more like a garden cum little venice with shops selling accessories made from crystals as well as Swarovski crystals.
Back in Tokyo. We took the subway to one of the nearby stations and walk our way to Tokyo Tower. You need to buy tickets to take the lift up to the 1st and 2nd observation level. (photo: taken from the 2nd stage, a shot from the ground)
On a busy street near the JR Ueno station, we chance upon a sushi shop and had our lunch there. The prices are resonable and the quality ws not bad. Except the regular "earth-shaking" sounds of the overhead train tracks. All these shops are built beneath the JR rail tracks.
From Shinjuku, it takes about 50 mins of train ride to get to Sanrio Land. Home of the Hello Kitty. We took longer that that as we alight at a few wrong stations. As we just want to shop, we bought the after 4pm entrance tickets with no rides.
Looks like some altar setup with all the Sanrio family characters.
The next morning, we took a combination of Trains and subway to get to Tokyo DisneySea. There are many ways to get to disneyland; disneyland shuttle buses from Shinjuku, as well JR Line trains. To save on cost and to use our subway unlimited ride pass, we took a combi of subway and JR train. (photo: The iconic M-mouse inside DisneySea)
One of the newer attractions at DisneySea. The Tower of Terror. It is just a free-fall elevator drop experience. The special effects are good but the ride is short. The rooms under the 3 arch will open for the thrill seeks to have a glimpse of the outside scenary before closing up and fall a few storeys down.
On our last day before our next morning flight back home. We spend the entire day at the Gotemba Premium Factory Outlet. The location is somewhere near Hakone. We bought 2-way coach tickets from Shinjuku to Gotemba. The journey took about 1.5 hours. The area is like an open air shopping town. There are may branded boutique shops selling clothing, shoes, LEGO, watches.
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