We started the day at 8:30 to get breakfast in the hotel. From there we walked to Hamamatsucho Station and picked up tickets for Hikone for Saturday morning. We had a bit of a problem getting the tickets because the girl at the counter thought I wanted Hakone. Hikone has one of the national treasure castles and is on Lake Biwa in between Tokyo and Kyoto. Hakone is a resort area in the region of Mount Fuji. We visited Hakone as part of our Fuji tour on the last trip. When eventually I got across we wanted Hikone instead we were able to get our tickets and get on our way.
Because our morning was going to be moderately timekiller until we met with Marina in Harajuku Station we decided to go out to Shinjuku and visit Shinjuku Gyoen Park which cost us 200 yen to get in. The park was absolutely splendid and even though the sakura is past peak in Tokyo there was still plenty out there and a lot of nice landscape garden. We spent a bit under an hour hour just wandering and taking pictures before we started to make our way out to meet Marina.
At almost the exact moment we got in the train to Harajuku she called me and we found out that she was going to have to run behind due to a forgotten appointment. With that we decided to get out at Harajuku anyway and we revisited the Meiji Temple. At the temple I tried a horseradish (read as wasabi) ice cream at the gift shop there. It was certainly an interesting flavor and to me not at all unpleasant. From there we weren't certain what to do as we had not yet heard from Marina. I was going to have us walk to Shibuya Station but I spotted the park that we had visited on the last trip by way of recognizing the surroundings. It was Yoyogi Park (which I didn't know the name of from the last trip). It was the park that had the hula hoop girl (though alas she was not there this time). We walked through Yoyogi again taking in the sights and taking pictures. I showed Ronni what I remembered of the park which turned out to be more than I expected. During our wanderings we found a snack shop and Ronni bought a candy bar as she was getting hungry. At that moment I found that Marina tried to reach me. I called her back and we agreed to meet at Meguro Station as she wanted to take us to high tea at Megura Gajoen. On the way out of the park we found the dog walking stalls I remembered from my last visit.
We got back on the train at Harajuku and made our way to Meguro a tad ahead of Marina. From there we walked to Meguro Gajoen which is basically a large banquet hall building set up mainly for celebrations and weddings that also ha a few restaurants and a fair amount of artwork inside. Unfortunately the restaurant that serves high tea was not doing it today so we had to settle for a standard buffet which was still very enjoyable. I took a sampling of a lot of things then had dessert for a couple rounds. Marina had a few rounds of regular food, though less than I took, and the dessert, so we were in the place for a while. After eating we toured all the floors of the building up to the the two Christain chapels and the waterfall on the outside. It is certainl very showy and I expect it costs a pretty penny (yen) to have a function there. Marina said that probably only rich people do anything there.
From Meguro we were back again on the Yamanote line to Shimbashi where we took the monorail to Daiba for the Oedo-Onsen Monogatari. We had already agreed we would do the onsen today because Ronni was actually interested in trying it as long she had a buddy to go with. I went along because I wanted to try one even if I would have to figure it out on my own. If you are unaware an onsen is a Japanese public hot bath formed over geothermal hot springs. As with anything Japanese there are conventions to be followed and I didn't have a mentor to work with so I just had to watch and guess along the way. I knew some of it beforehand because I had read about it but it was still moderately awkward for me, not that I was bothered that much. The idea is you get checked in and get a kimono, get undressed and then get into the spa part where you get a small and a large towel. Discard the kimono and get into the bath area where you first scrub yourself off in a little sitting shower area. They have soap, shampoo and rinse. You clean youself off completely. After you have washed you can get into the hot pools. I followed the protocol and scrubbed and rinsed then got into one of the middle temperature pools off the side of the hottest pool in the center of the room. I spent a few minutes there then got ou and cooled off for a minute or two before going into the center pool which was the hottest. I spent probably about 7 minutes in that one which may have been too long. I got out and cooled off for a couple minutes before getting in the jacuzzi type pools where I stayed for over 5 minutes before getting out and cooling off for a couple minutes then getting into a medium temperature pool to laze about for a few more minutes. Out of that I showered off with some cooler water and then toweled out as much as I could with my small already soaked towel. I went back to the locker room and dried off and dressed back into the kimono and then went into the central area to wait for the women. I was probably about 5 minutes ahead of them. In this veyr touristy onsen they have a large central area where you can buy food and drink and other stuff too. The thing is your stuff is all locked up in a locker. So when you get in you get a wristband with a key and a barcode on it. You use the key to lock your stuff into the changing room locker and you use the barcode to buy stuff in the central area. When you go into the hot spa you get another locker for your rented kimono as well but that is another story.
By the time I was done with the actual spa I was very overheated and felt moderately dizzy and decided I was done with the spa part for the night. Marina and Ronni came out a couple minutes later. I searched out a beer and they got drinks and we chatted for a while. We decided we should get food (Marina and I anyway) and we opted for the Korean place where we had some sort of spicy soup. I liked it but it was about a 3 on my spicy scale. Marina thought it was very spicy. The girl serving it said it was the spiciest they serve so I guess I didn't miss out on anything. Ronni got an ice cream at this point. After we ate and chatted some more they opted to go back in because they had missed the jacuzzi type pool. I got myself another beer and girl watched (Japanese women in kimono, enough said) and waited for them to finish up. From there we got sorted out and dressed and left the place. We took the monorail back to Shimbashi and then the Yamanote back to Hamamatsucho where we left Marina to finish her ride back home.
From there I had to get this written and my pictures uploaded which involved drinking another Yebisu The Hop.
The pictures for today can be found here.
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