Winter Break Part 5: Hakone

(continued from part 4)

I arrived in Tokyo early in the morning and waited for my mom and sister to arrive on their bullet train. Afterwards, we went straight onto the next train to Hakone, about 2 hours southwest of Tokyo in Kanagawa prefecture. We decided to buy the Hakone Freepass offered by Odakyuu Railway. They offer 2 or 3 day passes for fairly reasonable prices, which cover nearly all the public transportation in the rural Hakone as well as the trip to and from Tokyo. It cost us 5000 yen each, but it paid for itself twofold by the time we were done with it.

On the trip into the mountains surrounding Hakone, the first checkpoint is at a small town called Gora. I had desperately wanted to try several shops and restaurants that sold the local specialty, 銀豆腐 (gindoufu) "silver tofu". To my dismay, both the tofu shop and the restaurant that uses 銀豆腐 in their dishes were closed for three days, enveloping the days that we'd be there.

Depressed, we continued to our hotel by taking the steep uphill cable-car, followed by the Hakone Ropeway into Togendai. The Ropeway is famous for the amazing views of Mt. Fuji, which is about 20 km away. Unfortunately, it stayed cloudy and hazy while we were there, so we never had a good look at Mt. Fuji. Such a disappointment...

What we were hoping it would look like...

The Hakone area is popular for day-trippers, so most of the attractions and restaurants close before sun-down. With little other choice for dinner, we headed further north into a town called Sengokuhara, and found a quaint traditional-style restaurant called 大地 (daichi) with wooden walls, an open kitchen, and indoor fire pit. We enjoyed the delicious local favorite, ginger pork, while the shop-owner's kids played in the empty spacious dining area and local regulars drifted in and out. Without much else to do for the rest of the night, we headed straight back to the hotel, took a bath in the onsen, and went to bed.

Family portrait in the traditional-style wood and tatami room.

The next day, we first went back on the Ropeway to visit 大涌谷 (Oowakudani), which is a valley filled with volcanic activity. Steam bubbles out from crevices in the earth, and the air smells distinctly of sulfur. The view from above while riding the Ropeway makes it seem like dwarves have begun mining the remnants of a meteorite crater.

Picture taken from someone else's blog

If you walk up the short trail, you'll get to a teahouse next to a murky pool of bubbling water. Here, they cook eggs in the hot springs and sell them. When the eggs are removed from the water, their shells are already black from the chemical reactions. They tasted similar to normal eggs, but with a distinctly sulfuric smell.

Murky sulfuric hot spring

Owakudani's famous black eggs, with salt pack in hand.

Still white on the inside...

Next, we went back down to Togendai to take the Hakone Sightseeing Boat, or what I like to call "the fake pirate ship". It's nothing special, since it's just a decorated ferry driven by engines instead of the fake sails. They even had some Japanese chumps dressed up as sea captains trying to take pictures with you for money.

The fake pirate ship.

Mom and sister messing with the props on deck.

We rode across Lake Ashi and alighted at Moto-Hakone to do some souvenir shopping. We got to take a look at some cool Japanese puzzle boxes and swig some 甘酒 (amazake: sweet, warm sake with very low alcohol content). We then walked down the ancient cedar tree-lined path to Hakone-machi to visit Hakone Shrine.

Entrance to Hakone-machi. Holy mother that's big...

Hakone Shrine is like any other shrine, but bigger and with a bunch of smaller shrines to other gods scattered throughout the grounds. We didn't do much here other than marvel at the amazing power of religion to suck money out of people's pockets. Visitors were paying 100-200 yen to draw fortunes out of a box, and up to 2000 yen to buy a decorative arrow shaft, all this while chucking money into the collection boxes in front of the various shrines. Cha-ching!

The iconic lakeside torii gate.

The shrine itself

On the other side of the lakeside torii.

We took a break in a cafe next to the shrine's parking lot. Here, they served a delicious 五色糯セット (goshoku mochi set: a 5 variation set of pounded sticky rice), which I had seen on TV before. It was indeed a fabulous food experience.

Picture taken from someone's blog: (from left to right) grated daikon (radish) w/ sauce, shouyu & nori (soy sauce and dried seaweed), goma (black sesame powder), kinako (soybean powder), and anko (read bean paste).

Finally, with the day coming to an end, we gathered our luggage from the hotel and took the train back to Tokyo. Before the ticket machine gobbled it up, I managed to take a picture of the Freepass that worked so hard to get us around everywhere. お疲れ様!

Milkin' the Freepass. Milkin' it hard.

Next time, we go to the swanky part of Tokyo! See you then!