Japan for the 10th time (Finally!) - October and November 2023 - Page 2

This is the Musashi-Itsukaichi station which really needs a shorter name. It is a pretty large town at the base of the mountains at the end of the train line. Quite a few school kids rode the train out to here to go to school.

Station as seen from the outside. I found a convenience store to buy my supply of muesli bars and pocari sweat for the day.

Pedestrian ok!

The first part of the hike is steep, but on a concrete path to this semi manicured garden area. I remembered it from last time.

Good view, better than the actual lookout in the photo below this one.

The lookout is still pretty good. Sun was still out at this point. That would change.

Obviously there is a shrine. Last time I got a bit lost here looking for the path behind it to take me to the mountains beyond. I think they have improved the signage since then.

There are even public toilets in the garden area. No one at all around, so I just urinated in the open like a filthy animal.

I tried not to take too many path shots today! The paths were often smooth like this, and generally in tall cedars, many areas are due to be logged, or have been logged, and have probably been planted specifically to be logged in the future.

Signs of logging, and wires. I also remembered this from last time, the new trees have grown a lot since then.

OK, a bit more path.

This is the summit of Mount Aso. Getting grey now. Tokyo in the distance. There are paths to bypass both Aso and Hinode if you just want to get to Mitake without going up and down, but obviously, I like to go up and down.

There are quite a lot of paths through this area, 5 of them meet here.

Getting close to Hinodesan now, steps appear...

Lots and lots of steps.

Here is the summit of Hinodesan, not a great view really.

I stopped for a muesli bar.

And took the required sweaty selfy. I put the same still sweaty clothes back on from 2 days ago, I will probably grow a new species of fungus eventually.

The summit area of Mount Mitake is actually a little village below a shrine, with shops and restaurants. Quiet today, horrific on weekends.

Time to start the ascent to the shrine. The priests were growling through a P.A. system to warn all those who approach.

Main shrine.

Not a lot of spots for a view from the summit, this is the best I could do.

A sign says this is the most sacred part of the complex, no dogs allowed. Also no drone.

Time to start my descent, avoiding all forms of transport that you have to pay for.

I actually got a photo of it this time, a blurry photo. Parts of the line are on the top of poles as per the previous photo, parts are on the ground.

Once you are at the bottom, its still a couple more km back to Mitake station. There is a bus waiting for the cable train thing, but of course, no bus for me!

Official symbol to alert tourists that there is an opportunity ahead to spend money.

OK, I take this shot on every trip. It is Mitake gorge. My previous shots on sunny days are better than today's, but it is still a nice photo.

Same location, looking off the other side of the bridge. A few kayakers today. Apparently kayakers is not a word. I beg to differ.

I had to wait 20 minutes for a train at Mitake station, which means it is time for 'the stance'. Should have gone lower. Why do I look fat?
Due to excess exertion in the day, tonight will be a smaller outing, do not expect too many pics.

I did not catch the train here. I walked, along and under the train track. It is not far at all from Kanda, there is a little pedestrian bridge over a river just before you hit Akihabara.

Both Yodobashi and Bic camera are fully sold out of Ricoh GR III cameras. Given that I have broken 2 of them beyond repair after taking about 1000 photos on each, I should be in no rush to buy a third. I wish they would hurry up and release a new version that is more dust and water proof!

The spot. A guy parked his Toyota BRZ covered in ridiculous stickers in front of me illegally hoping I would take his photo. He seemed annoyed when I moved closer to the train bridge so that his car was not in my photo. He had a giant teddy bear in the passenger seat, so I did not want to anger him.

Hmm, not a very sharp photo. It is hard to take a sharp shot while walking across the road at full zoom at night at 1/25 hand held.

The sign says it all really.

And here it is, Go Go Curry, pork sausage variety. This is the healthiest looking thing on their menu, everything else is combos of deep fried stuff on top of the curry. It is no Coco. It is however cheap and they take credit card. And on that note, everywhere I have been so far has taken credit card, I am yet to use cash even once other than to recharge my train card when I first landed.

Before heading to the park I wandered the local area waiting for the rush hour to pass so I could have a less sneeze and cough filled train journey. This is the area around Ochanomizu, at rush hour they now close the streets around the station to cars to make room for pedestrians exiting the station.

Ochanomizu is where the guitar street is. Obviously nothing open at 8am, and most windows had roller shutters preventing me from window shopping.

Tashikawa is a huge place. This is a monorail going overhead. In addition to the Isetan seen here there is also a Takashimaya. The streets all have elevated walkways to keep shoppers away from the store entrances.

Time to go into the garden. I really hate my camera today, it struggles with yellow a lot. It hates any scene with contrast, I will no doubt rant about this a lot.

A wide vista of garden area.

It is important to know the date when entering the garden.

I think these are also ginkgo trees, but it is not the main ginkgo lit up avenue of wonder, which I show below. It is a bit early for peak ginkgo.

This guy has brought his doll to the ginkgo so he take upskirt photos of her holding a broom. He had a $5000 camera, lights, external flash rigs, a whole trolley full of gear.

You can rent a boat and go out on the lake, and drown your doll if she misbehaves.

This is ginkgo avenue, with lights, lasers and smoke machines, to honour Emperor Showa.

And as per today's title, here are the bird cock golf courts. A variation on croquet golf, for this version you hit a shuttlecock with a golf club into a basket. It seems popular. They also had a full frolf course (frisbee golf). So basically every form of golf that is not actual golf.

Because phone cameras do not exist in Japan, they have installed this camera. To use it, you download an app on your phone, pay money, then control it from your phone. While I was waiting to take a photo of it, 2 people used it as a tripod for their phone to take a phone pic.

Time for some shots from inside the Japanese garden, no dogs allowed.

Nice lake.

Shot of the day I guess, but I wish I had a better camera.

Sea of flowers, 1 of 3, yellow. A bit past their best.

The next sea of flowers features a railroad crossing signal, no idea why.

This is a good idea. People buy all kinds of picnic equipment and use it once in their lives. Now you can avoid that mistake and rent all of it. The guy who runs the place seemed annoyed I was taking a photo praising his business.

Sea of flowers 3 of 3. Every colour of flower.

On my return journey I stopped at the Tashikawa station complex for a sit down lunch from Andersons bakery. The apple cake thing is a cake with apples on top and in the middle of it. Apparently it is apple festival week. It was delicious. Also, 'salad drink', presumably made from blending up the bits of salad that fall out of peoples sandwiches. That's all for now.

Shibuya. Some of these buildings and walkways are newly completed since my last visit.

You can line up to have your photo taken with the worlds saddest dog. For Halloween they covered him in white plastic to discourage foreigners.

The scramble. One of the new buildings is actually called Shibuya scramble.

Random street.

Burger King. Great. Not too busy tonight though.

The sign says it all.

Somehow a failed brand still has a giant store in Tokyo.

Here is one of the streets in Omotesando. The stores here pay me to not go in their store.

If you squint you can see Guzman y Gomez, which has somehow lasted many years in this location. The Australian fake mexican food brand now has multiple stores in Tokyo.

Harajuku Takeshita street, which I am sure is familar to most people.

Better view of same street in opposite direction.

And finally, here is my late dinner. Oil ramen. It is a thicker style of ramen, floating in a layer of flavoured oil. Delicious.
WARNING: tomorrow is a boring hiking day.

The view from Yamakita station. This is past Yokohama, near Hakone. A rural station, but there is a convenience store nearby.

The first part of the hike is up a road, which goes under a lot of roads.

The view was pretty good early on.

Although I had walked along a trail for a while, it came to a road with a farming village, and these painted figures. Big deal you may think?

Well apparently they think it is a big deal because they installed a vending machine selling nothing but miniature versions of the same figures for you to take home and paint yourself.

This little farming village was built here for the view. The is the last view spot of Fuji until you get to the summit of Mount Ono, sometimes written as Oono or Ohno (I saw all three).

Obligatory trail pic.

Still no real coloured leaves. I think Hiroshima where I am going tomorrow is a bit cooler, so might be more colourful there already.

The trail is in woods for an hour or so, then comes out at this spot, with fields of wheat or similar.

And a giant staircase. I bounded up because I could hear furious mooing.

My hike had cows on it. They are fenced in by a piece of string only.

Nice view down to the ocean from amongst the cows.

I have climbed most of those mountains, this is looking back to the north east. At least one of them is Tanzawa from where I got the best Fuji shots ever.

Bonus hazy view.

There is a dam and a lake down there with hotels around it.

And then you come up around and over the summit, and its all Fuji views for the rest of the hike. Wide view first.

Zoom view.

Head shot.

The path down had much better views all the way down than the path on the way up.

More wheat.

And Fuji plus wheat.

OK, last Fuji shot.

I reentered the forest. Very well maintained path on the way down.

Almost back.

I came out of the forest in a very picturesque area. A small man waving a red baton by some roadworks was very excited to see me. I suspect no cars came past him all day, just a few hikers.

A really nice area.

It was not too late at this point, the hike was 12km and only 4 hours, but I did not yet know it would be 3 hours on the train to get back to my hotel.

One last shot as I head up the hill to Yaga station.

And finally, the tiny unmanned station at Yaga.

It is traditional when the head Samurai of a family dies, that he be scalped, and his scalp is transplanted onto the head of the next born male heir. Here are a few fresh scalps.

Moss ball plant. I purchased 3 to bring back to Australia and not declare to BORDER FORCE.

Here is Takashimaya. Actually it is 3 buildings on this side of the road and one on the other side, linked by a tunnel.

And... double curry. It appeared to be made by a subcontinental gentleman. You could choose from a few, I got spicy beef on the right and aged butter tomato on the left, whatever that is. It was delicious. Nearly as good as Go go.

Under the bridge where it kinks around the corner, at full zoom. I have taken a shot from here on many a previous trip.

Snowman shop. I really do not know what they were selling.

Here is the main corner, with the fancy Nissan shop. The 2 corners behind me are full construction zones currently.

After getting to the end of the flash part of Ginza I turned right and ended up at the very busy Shimbashi.

Lots of good eating spots along here, but none of them had double curry on offer.

However there was another chance for a beneath the tracks photo, so here it is.
Tomorrow, I take the Shinkansen to Hiroshima. 3.5 hours or thereabouts.