Spring in the Kanto Plain

Mt. Mitake
On Tuesday, March 26th, we jumped into the car and went looking for spring blossoms.  It turns out we were still a little early but did succeed in finding a cable car that took us near the top of Mt. Mitake.

From the top of the cable car we had a beautiful view of the Kanto plain all the way into Tokyo.

We then followed the walking trail through the small, mountain-top town of Mitake on our way to the Musashimitake Shrine.  It was mostly uphill since the shrine is built at the top of the mountain (929 meters--3048 ft).  

A view down the stairs leading up to the shrine.

Takasaki

Our next venture took us about an hour and half drive from Yokota to the town of Takasaki.  There we saw Byakui Dai-Kannon, the Goddess of Mercy with a height of 41.8 meters weighing 6,000 tons.

On the way home from Takasaki, we saw a sign for the Tomioka Silk Mills and detoured through Tomioka to visit this historic site.  It was a silk mill which was established in 1872 based on French silk mills and operated until 1987.  The mill is now a museum and National Historic site but most of the machinery is still on site.

Yokosuka

We took the weekend of March 28/29 off from tourist activities due to a brief, but painful bout Doug had with a kidney stone.  We picked up where we left off on Tuesday, March 31 for a quick trip to Yokosuka accompanying one of the UMUC faculty to that base.  Although Doug had made numerous trips to that Naval port, he had little time to look around since he was always teaching on his trips. While Doug's colleague was teaching her class, we drove to the tip of the peninsula and viewed the area surrounding Yokosuka.  It was evening so we weren't able to take many pictures but did appreciate the coastal atmosphere.

Ueno Park, Tokyo
With cherry blossoms coming out everywhere, it was a challenge to decide where to go view them.  We decided to see how the parks in Tokyo looked and experience the spring seasonal events.  It was quite a cultural event to see thousands and thousands of people enjoying the trees on a Thursday evening after work.

A few days as tourists between sessions.

With a week free between spring sessions, once grades were posted by midweek, we spent a few days seeing some sights around the Kanto Plain.

Kamakura

Our first venture was to hop in the car on Wednesday and drive to the coastal town of Kamakura where a giant Buddha is the biggest draw.  After driving several hours, we found a parking place and located an interesting cafe with an Hawaiian/Beach theme.  Ellen chose the Okinawaan Taco Rice and I picked White Tail Tempura Don.  We were excited by the beautiful presentation of the food and equally enjoyed the fine taste.

After noticing that the tempura in my dish was actually all shredded vegetables, I began looking for the fish that I assumed was part of the dish (White Tail).  After closer inspection, I noticed the little pairs of eyes which seemed to be staring up at me.

Enough on food!  As we walked up the street to the main attraction of the city, Ellen paused to take a snapshot of these unique flip-flops.

The main attraction of Kamakura is the giant Buddha including his flip-flops on display!

Kawagoe

Having enjoyed that brief adventure, on Thursday we jumped back into the pink Fit and drove a few dozen kilometers north of the air base we call home and went to a city called Kawagoe.  This city has a number of sites with historical and religious significance.  The first stopping point for us was the Honmaru Goten which was built in the mid-1800's as part of the Kawagoe Castle, originally built in the Edo period as an important trade and defensive point north of the city which later became known as Tokyo.

We enjoyed walking the historic main street of Kawagoe lined with Kurazukuri which are clay-walled, warehouse-style buildings that were reminiscent of an old town of the Edo period including an old bell-tower that is still used today to sound off the time at certain hours.

One of the attractions in the city is to rent kimonos and view the historic sites in "style".  I found this blend of old and new interesting.

Hints of spring were found tucked among the buildings.

We visited the Kawagoe Festival museum and learned about the annual festival of ornately carved and decorated two-story "floats" representing over two-dozen towns in the area.  

A link for more about the festival and the floats.

Kawagoe is also known for its sweet potatoes.  We saw many small shops offering variations of this vegetable.  Many of the small restaurants have one set meal rather than a menu of selections.  Our choice of a restaurant, on the second floor above street vendors selling sweet potato treats, provided a delightful dish of steamed vegetables over rice along with a delicious clear broth soup, pickled vegetables and sweet beans.

Tokyo Temple

Having seen a number of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples, we thought it would be nice to visit the Tokyo temple and do a session there.  Of course, parking is a challenge so for this adventure on Friday, we climbed aboard the train at the Fussa Station to head into Tokyo.  It took about an hour land a half and two trains and one subway to arrive at the Hiroo Station where we grabbed a sandwich from our favorite corner bakery and ate while we hurried up the street to catch a 2 pm session.  We both used earphones for the English translation, but halfway through the session, I decided to switch to channel 4 on the device and listen to the rest in Portuguese--to help keep me focused.

Ajinomoto Stadium and J1 Professional Soccer

Since the MLS (Major League Soccer) season kicked off in the U.S. this week, it was only appropriate that we celebrated the beginning of summer soccer season with a week 2 match between two of the regions big teams in the top-level of the Japan Soccer League.  Once again, we chose to use the trains/subway to get to the game since every notice of the game we could find said that there was NO parking at the stadium during major events.  We were impressed by how efficiently the subway could deliver 40,000 fans to a game and not have any congested traffic surrounding the stadium.  The efficiency of the event staff was equally appreciated, even though we did have a minor delay in displaying our electronic tickets on my iphone6 using the Tixee app. The real problem was that I was using the English version of the app so the tickets looked a little different for the gate staff--but we quickly proved that our tickets had been officially and electronically stamped and were admitted into the stadium.  The match was interesting as was the "international" feel at the beginning with the FC Tokyo fans singing "You'll Never Walk Alone" as if we were in Hillsborough.

Our seats in the upper tier.

Japanese BBQ at the beach!

We decided that spring is in the air (even though it was rainy and cool all week).  Therefore, seeing that the sun was shining on Saturday we decided to drive towards the coast and see if any plum blossoms were out.  We set our googlemaps navigation to Uminokoen Park in Yokohama. After arriving and parking our car we realized that it was mid-afternoon and we hadn't had any lunch yet.  We peeked into a small temporary structure that had the smell of charcoal smoke and saw what appeared to be a fresh market specializing in clams and shellfish.

On closer inspection it was obvious that all of the food was raw so we thought it was simply a fresh fish market.  However, when we went around the edge of the temporary structure, we realized that the structure extended for a a great length with more temporary structures and tents and that inside all of these were small tables surrounding makeshift charcoal grills.

We quickly figured out that people purchased the raw food and then were led to a grill and table where they could cook their food and eat it.  So we went back and got in the line to try it out.  We purchased a variety of things we could recognize, paid for the food, and waited to be taken to a grill and table.  The seats were made out of plastic crates and the grills were simple contraptions that were supplied with fresh, hot charcoal bricks when we were seated.  A nice young man gave us explicit instructions in perfect English and seeing that we didn't have any clams or oysters or other forms of shelled creatures, realized we didn't need any specific cooking instructions and wished us well and left.  We watched our neighbors cooking a variety of delicacies.

After feeling confident that we could do this, we donned the white gloves and placed our selections on the grill.  We had purchased some shrimp with heads attached, small sausages, bacon, and a small aluminum pan with salmon, mushrooms and butter sauce.  We also bought cooked brown rice wrapped in foil to go with the grilled items.

After a few minutes things were sizzling and smoking and we were getting ready to eat.  The shrimp was tasty but rather messy to shell.  The sausages and bacon were nice and hot.  The salmon and mushrooms were the last to be eaten since they cooked more slowly in the small aluminum pan covered with foil.  But in reality, the food was cooked and consumed in an amazingly short period of time.

After lunch we walked the wide stone pathway between the large beach and the grassy areas where many people were playing beach volleyball, soccer, kickball, jogging, strolling with their dogs, and generally enjoying the beautiful Saturday afternoon.

After we finished our park stroll, we returned to the car and decided to drop in on Doug's brother, Gary, since we were in Yokohama.  He obligingly gave up his afternoon shopping trip to host us.  We had a nice visit with him after which he took us to a wonderful Indian restaurant and gave us an evening tour of cosmopolitan Yokohama city.

Happy Valentine's Day

Occasionally our apartment is transformed into a lab prep area.  Since both of my labs are taught at high schools on two different bases, I am not able to get into the facilities until school is out and the students are gone.  Therefore, I have to put supplies together prior to leaving for the lab activity.  Most of one class has been condensed into six plastic bins with all but the perishable or disposable items ready to go.  Hopefully that will save time and frustration in the future.

What's the best way to spend a Saturday following a fairly normal week of commuting, teaching, and quilting?  A quiet Valentine's Day was planned for the weekend.  Of course, Ellen managed to find the kind of Valentine's surprise that Doug really appreciated, a Mexican restaurant.  So without anything else scheduled for the day (besides grading exams, writing quizzes, etc.) having a leisurely Mexican lunch sounded like a perfect way to spend Saturday.  (Sorry, no pictures of the food--it was devoured before pictures could be taken!)

After lunch, we decided to see what kind of afternoon drive we could find.  Rather than looking up a destination that sounded fun and interesting but then getting frustrated trying to follow directions to get there, we thought we would just drive and find something interesting and later look up where our adventures took us.  So we headed for the neighboring mountains.  After awhile we were out of the city traffic and found ourselves driving up a fairly narrow canyon with a small river.  It turned out to be the Tama River.  After about an hour of driving we arrived at a peaceful lake behind a large dam.  Lake Okutama is a major water reservoir for the Tokyo area and also a popular destination for those wanting to get closer to nature.

After enjoying the beautiful scenery we studied a map posted near the parking area and decided to try driving partially around the lake and taking a southern route over the mountains.  It proved to be a good decision.  Most of the snow from previous weeks was gone except in some patches on the northern slopes covered with trees.  We saw a few monkeys along the side of the road but Sara wasn't there to yell STOP (something she learned at Denali Park in Alaska), so we didn't get any pictures! After about an hour of hairpin curves and long tunnels, it was with mixed emotions that we found ourselves back in the city.  Mixed emotions because we were always wondering if we would meet an oncoming vehicle on a road that clearly wasn't designed for two passing cars along many of the hillside passages but enjoying the beauty of the peaceful mountains.  Here's a GoogleMap picture of our drive.