Fugi-san, Lake Ashi, and Mt. Komagatake

Today was our scheduled free day. This is the only day we are totally in control of our schedule for the entire day. I decided to go to Fugi-san. It was very difficult to decide what to do. I thought and thought about it for days. People were planning all kinds of trips and emailing for the group to come along. There were trips planned to Hiroshima, 4 hours on the bullet train and around 400 yen, Kyoto, two hours on bullet train and around 260 yen, Kamakura, very close and high on my list, stay in Tokyo to explore, not an option I need to see more of Japan.

When the trip to Fugi-san was mentioned I knew right away this was the trip. I really wanted to see Fugi-san and I wanted to travel through the Japanese countryside. I would get to do both.

The bus picked us up at the hotel at 8 a.m. There were about 20 of us that had chosen this trip. This bus was filled with JFMF teachers and other tourists with the same objective. Very interesting because not everyone was from the United States, but we all had the same objective. We got stuck in a traffic jam trying to leave Tokyo. This put us behind schedule and we were unable to stop at the Mt. Fugi visitors center. We did stop at a restaurant where we could see Mt. Fugi and eat our Japanese style box lunch. Then we were off again to head up the mountain.

We were able to travel to the 5th station. It is closed above the 5th station until July and then closes again in October. After hours of driving we finally reached our destination. We had 25 minutes to look at Fugi-san and visit the gift shop. Not much time and I had to go to the restroom. I decided this was the place to finally attemp to us the Japanese style trough toilets. I was surprised it was not that difficult.

On our way back down the mountain the clouds started to clear. We convinced the guide to pull over the bus so we could get out and take pictures. By the time we stopped the clouds had returned. We stood on the side of the road for a while trying to talk the clouds into leaving. Finally it was possible to take a few quick photos of the summit before the clouds covered the snowcapped peaks.

Our next stop was a boat ride across Lake Ashi. This was a refreshing ride with the wind blowing through our hair and a wonderful view of the mountains around us.

Then we went for an aerial tramway ride up the side of Mt. Komagatake. This is the central volcanic cone of the Hakone range and rise 1,327 meters above sea level. The tramway is 1,800 meter long ride that take 7 minutes. The view from the top was unbelievable. We did not get a good view of Mr. Fugi because of the clouds.


The last part of our journey was riding back to Tokyo on the Shinkansen bullet train. The ride was a gentle sway back and forth. When you looked out the window it did not seem like you were traveling at almost 200 km/hr.

Back to the hotel to pack. Tomorrow we leave for Chiba City and Monday we continue on to Katori City. I am leaving 1 bag in Tokyo full of items I have purchased and dirty laundry. I also found out that an earthquake hit 2 hours away from Tokyo that measured 7.1 on the richtor scale at 8:30 this morning. At the time we were on a bus stuck in traffic. I didn't feel a thing.