All our hosts

One of the best parts of the trip was meeting our Japanese hosts. All of them were contracted by the travel agency to share their traditions and customs.

Our sushi host.

The woman who assisted with the ferry between Uno and Naoshima, and who taught us origami on the ferry ride.

An intern at Obubu Tea Farm, who made us tea.

Our food tour guide in Osaka.

Our tea ceremony instructor.

Another intern who hosted us at Obubu Tea Farm.

Hakone

Konnichiwa from Hakone! We’re at our last stop before returning to Tokyo and the US, but nowhere near thinking about home yet. Well, maybe thinking about it, but not yet ready to stop exploring. 

This morning we spent several hours at the Hakone Open Air Museum, which has a wonderful collection of sculptures from around the world, including several Henry Moore, Ferdinand Leger, and Niki de Saint Phalle, whom we know well from works in Balboa Park in San Diego. There is also a building dedicated to Picasso - mostly ceramics and sculpture that I’ve never seen displayed at any other museum.

The sakura here are still in full bloom.

Look closely to see one of many moving sculptures that were “dancing” in today’s windy weather.

Hakone is a mountainous area very close to Tokyo that has many, many natural spring and mineral water onsen, so it attracts tourists from all over to its many hotels and resorts. We have a a private onsen in our room with calcium sulfate waters. (Side note to Pa: This ryokan is called Susukinohara Ichinoyu, which reminds me that Grandma Rose used to always say the Yiddish phrase “kinehora” to ward off the evil spirits.)

The reason that there are mineral springs here is that Mount Hakone is a volcano! Although it last erupted in 2015, steam and sulfur still can be seen from above the crater. To see it for ourselves, we took a bus, a cable car and a gondola to the top.

Here you can see the steam from the crater.

Mountain view from the cable car.

This is kuro tomago or black eggs. They’re actually just regular chicken eggs but are boiled in mineral waters (sulfur and iron) that turn the shell black. Eating them (which we did, naturally) is supposed to prolong one’s life.

When the gondola closed because of high winds, we ended up walking down the road from the top of the volcano to Lake Ashi, formed on one of the volcano’s craters. It was a long walk, but all downhill, and at the lakeside, we stopped for a late lunch of soba noodles and tempura.

 Then it was back to the onsen for a soak before dinner. Another great day!