Day 8 - Shinjuku Gyoen Park

On our last day in Japan, we visited the Shinkuju Gyoen Park at 9 am. We had visited earlier in the week which we saw some sakura tress beginning to blossom. By this time, we were expecting the trees to blossom more. We were right. The white cherry blossom tree near the Shinjuku gate has turned totally white. As usual, many visitors were busily taking close up pictures of the white cherry blossom tree.

Nearby, a pink cherry blossom tree was blooming. Just five days earlier, you could see the red buds on the tree. I spent a considerable amount of time taking the close up pictures of the pink cherry blossoms.

Day 7 - Ginza Lights

We headed to see the bright lights of the Ginza shopping belt. Most of luxury brands such as LV, Dunhill and Dior have their flagship store. It was was not just a store but a building with their brands brightly displayed. Apple has a store in Ginza which was packed with people. We went to take a look and there some nice speaker systems for the iPod that we have not seen in Singapore.

The Ginza has more upmarket brands but it was not as crowded as the Shinjuku area. Natalie made a new pair of glasses at Zoff. It took them 30 minutes to have the glasses ready. Talk about efficiency.

We came this shop which was selling layered cakes which looked meat kebabs on a skewers. There was a long queue of people waiting to receive their orders. We were told they the customers had pre-ordered the cakes. So we could not even buy to try it.

Day 7 - Panasonic Centre

We headed towards to Panasonic Centre in the afternoon as it rained in the morning. The Panasonic Centre has a showcase of the latest technologies such as HD LCD TVs, communication devices, ecological friendly systems and the Nintendo showcase. I am not sure if Panasonic owns Nintendo but it seems they have an alliance. Natalie do not want to leave the place as she moved from different Nintendo DS consoles to play the games. It is funny that so matter the language the game are played kids just seem to know what buttons to play. We met our neighbours Bala, Sameer and Gautam in the Panasonic Centre. Gautam waited more than half hour to play Mario Kart on the Wii. The Panasonic Centre is located on a reclaimed island in Tokyo Bay called Obadai. Another famous landmark called the Tokyo Big Sight which is designed by Tenzo Kange is nearby.

Day 6 - Shinjuku Lights

We headed to Shinjuku for dinner after coming back from Hakone. The place was packed with people even though it was late in the evening.

Day 6 - Hakone

I woke up early and headed to the onsen again. It is nice that the hotel room is above the onsen. Some guest need to walk over to the onsen in the cold morning weather. As I waited for Pei Ling and Nat to wake up I took a morning walk along the lake. As we checked in late in the evening, we did not have a chance to see the lake beside the hotel. Pei Ling and Nat went to the onsen after they woke up. I decided to go for another round. This time there was less people in the onsen and I had the place more to myself. The hotel has an open onsen which looks out to the lake. Wonderful.

Views from Hakone Prince Hotel

We left the hotel at 12 pm and made our way to the Togendai to board the ferry. Before boarding, we had coffee in a cafe beside the lake. We just took our time to relax even though we missed the ferry.

The view from the cafe at Togendai as we waited to board the ferry

We took the ferry to Motohakone and a bus to a small Japanese village called Miyanoshita to board the Hakone Torzan line train. This train will bring us to Hakone-Yumoto to catch the "bullet" train to Shinjuku.

The view from the ferry as we approached Motohakone

Passengers walking up the slope towards the Miyanoshita train station
The bullet train as it pulls in the Hakone-Yumoto station to Shinjuku

Travelling in the Hakone entails lots of travelling on the buses and trains. We need to catch the schedule and know which particular bus or train to catch. A missed bus or train can set us back an hour or so.

Day 5 - Hakone

After Kawaguchi, we headed towards Hakone. We had to take a 130 bust ride fom Kawaguchi to Gotemba. From Gotemba we heade to Togendai to catch the ferry. When we reached Togendai the fairy had already left. We had to take the sky train and catch a cable car, train and texi to the hotel.

By the time we reached the hotel is was close to 730 pm. After dinner, we tried the Onsen in the hotel. It had separate bus facitiies.

(After re-reading this particular blog entry and comments from Milk, I had such a good laugh in the hotel when I showed it to Natalie. I have decided to keep it as it was written. I did not know what I was writing and even had an unrelated picture posted. The lesson is never blog when you are tired.)

Day 5 - Mt Fuji

We started early for our trip to Mt Fuji this morning. We woke extra early and executed everything we planned to reach the bus station by 910 am. To our horrors, we realised that date stamped on our ticket was 17th March 2009 instead 18th March 2009. We were supposed to leave yesterday. So we booked the earliest available seats to Mt Fuji which was 1110am. In addition, we had to pay 4250 yen to get another set of tickets. We paid up. In between the bus departure, we headed to the Odakyu customer service and found that our train tickets were wrongly booked as well. We asked them to change the train schedule to the 19th March from 18th March. They refunded the amount we paid to top up the tickets. We had told the person we wanted to leave on Wednesday and return on Thursday. They stamped the wrong dates. We should have checked but after an overnight flight I minds were to tired to notice the dates. I am glad we got a refund.

Mt Fuji seen from Kawaguchi

Actually, we went to a town called Kawaguchi which is near the base of the Mt Fuji. The volcanic mountain is still covered with snow. The sight of the mountain is magnificent. I thought about the people who lived there that it nice to have Mount Fuji in your backyard but when it becomes active. There is is not much to see in the Kawaguchi except you can get a clear view of Mt Fuji. The tourist centre suggested for us to go to Lake Kawaguchi which is about 15 minutes walk from the station. On the way, it seems we were the only tourists around. We were disappointed when we got to the lake, the shops around the lake seems to look old and there were not many people. Perhaps it is not the Japanese vacation time yet. To see Mt Fuji, we need to walk to another end of the lake which is quite far. So, we decided to head back to the station to catch the bus to Gotemba. Natalie bought a soft ice-cream on the way back.

Lake Kawaguchi