Overview of today:
The new airport, lunch, and a sake brewery. Can it get better than this?
Then, in who knows what condition, I’m forced to walk the plank over the world’s longest wooden footbridge, the Horai Bridge. If I survive, I can be revived at the World Tea Museum.

(2515KB)

Overview of today:
The sleek Shinkansen Hikari #463 zips me from Tokyo station to Shizuoka City, where I take the JR for Tokaido post station Yui, to soak in the ambience of the old Tokaido road. I take a walk in the Yui Honjin Park and visit the Tokaido Hiroshige Art Museum, which houses ukiyo-e by Utagawa Hiroshige. You have seen the woodblock prints, but from the same place as he sketched them in? Lunch should have been the famed local sakuraebi, the cherry shrimp. Taking the train back to Shizuoka City, I take the bus at terminal 4 to Utsunoya-iriguchi, where I review a valley of old houses and cannot find a tunnel remaining from Meiji times. Another short bus ride and I am walking through Togeppo Saiokuji, a Japanese garden. Dinner features a yam soup mentioned in the classic tale of travel, “Tokaidochu Hizakurige”, or “Shank’s Mare”. I return for the evening to downtown Shizuoka and the Hotel Prezio.

(1418KB)

Overview of today:
After a morning onsen soak in the hotel next to Hotel Brush Up, and a great hotel breakfast, I am off on a long mountain drive to the small town of Fujinomiya, site of two spectacular waterfalls: Otodome, a single waterfall, and Shiraito, a multiple veil of falls. I chance upon one man’s personal musuem, the Mt. Fuji Museum upstairs in his gift shop, the Dan no Ie. Next, a visit to the Fujisan Hongu Sengentaisha shinto complex, a major site for the worshipers of the spirits of Mt. Fuji. These people are serious about their spiritual kami manifestations! Lunch is a huge plate of “Class B” yakisoba, the local fried noodles. Another drive over the mountains to the home of a retired politician known as “Former Prime Minister Kishi”. Nice house, and what a garden! As the sun sets, I visit the renown Gotemba Premium Outlets. Shoppers, set your wallet to “stun”.

(1808KB)

Overview of today:
The sleek Shinkansen Kodama #637 zips me from Tokyo station to Odawara. I switch trains to the local train to Shin-Matsuda, a small station, and then take a spectacular ride to Gotemba. First stop: a taxi ride to a quiet tour of the Kirin Distillery Fuji Gotemba and a polite 20-minutes at their free whiskey bar. Second stop: a short train ride and a thirty-minute walk to the Mt. Fuji Komakado Cave. Sounds tedious? Far from it! Back to Gotemba station for the long wait for the free shuttle bus to my hotel. Boring? Not so! The bus is full of people in a really good mood. What’s this? Ice skaters? Acres of free parking? Hordes of people milling around outdoors? It’s the huge Gotemba Kogen Resort. So this is what local people do for fun! Ah, and my hotel is called Hotel Brush Up, which is encouraging. It’s Merry X’mas lights, big time!

(1430KB)

Overview of today:
After a fine breakfast at Hotel Associa Shizuoka, I meet my Volunteer guide for the morning. We take a bus into the hills to Nihondaira with views over the Suruga Bay. Mt. Fuji dominates our attention. We walk around a bit, then go up the road to the Nihondaira Ropeway, a tram with a Shinto shrine tucked in the corner launches us out over a steep valley to the bamboo forests surrounding yet another resting place of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the Kunozan Toshogu Shrine, another Nikko Toshogu Shrine I would say. The chill winter sun brings out the astonishing color and detailed wall carvings. The Kunozan Toshogu Museum next to it is a real surprise. We hitch a ride back into town and my volunteer guide departs. I take a short train and bus ride to the “S-PULSE DREAM PLAZA (where do they get these names?) and enjoy the Shimizu Sushi Museum and finally a late lunch of…sushi of locally caught fresh fishes. Before returning to Tokyo I finish off with a little JR Shizuoka shopping at the Sumpu Rakuichi for traditional crafts and Issa for green tea. ♨

(1650KB)