April 1

Today we will leave Tokyo and head for Hakone. The weather is supposed to be awful and we are praying it will be ok. We got up and had some coffee and breakfast at the little cafe close to our room. After breakfast, we headed to the train station.

Getting to Hakone is an event. We started on the Romance Car Train and went from the Shinjuku station to the Hakone-Yumoto station. From there, we transferring to the Hakone Tozan Railway. This was a very interesting mountain train that had to switch tracks a couple of times and went through quite a few tunnels. The countryside is beautiful but it is literally pouring. We transferred from the mountain train to a cable car which took us the rest of the way. This cable is the second steepest in the world, only outdone of course by the Swiss. I’ve been on that one I think! Mt. Pilatus. 

We finally arrived at the area of Gora called Sounzan where our room is. We took a taxi to our room and dropped off our luggage since it was not time to check in yet. Back to the station in the pouring rain. We walked this time as we could not get an Uber to pick us up from the remote spot where our Air BnB is. We took the train back to Gora where we will have lunch. While we were waiting for our reservation time, we went to the local museum. Not much to see here inside but some pottery. I’m sure someone who loves museums more than me might have seen it differently. The grounds were beautiful though with some very interesting moss which covers the ground like lawn. 

We headed to the special restaurant where we will have lunch. This was recommended by Gemini and Daniel had originally made a dinner reservation. We changed it to lunch when we discovered that dinner was provided for us at our Air BnB. Lunch did not disappoint!! Oh my. So so good and we are all starving by now. It is 3 pm and we haven’t eaten since our 8 am breakfast in Tokyo. And of course, we have eaten so much in the way of carbs and sugar that our appetites are in top working order. We had so many different foods at this restaurant, sharing everything family style - fried chicken, fish and chips, caprese salad, some amazing raw salmon dish, lamb chops and steak and some matcha ice cream balls for dessert. Absolutely fabulous. 

After lunch, we caught another Uber and headed back to our room. We got checked in and were given all the rules for how to be Japanese in our very authentic room. We were given clothing to wear at the meals and told where to wear sandals and where to have bare feet and how to use the onsen - mineral pool. I’m glad I don’t live by all these rules but it is really special to do it here. We got settled in to our room and rested a bit before dinner at 6.

Dressed in our yutakas, we headed to dinner. There is no way to describe this meal. But I do have pictures! The food was so good and the experience extraordinary in every way. After dinner, I was so tired that I felt like I could just fall into bed. But we sat around the Japanese table with the seats on the floor. The area under the table was heated and it was so cozy. Mohan bought a Taboo game that we could play online. We played for a while and laughed a bunch. What fun. Finally went to bed. This is our first night without Ativan and we both did well.