Today Marina and I had originally planned to go to Ishinomaki but the injury to her leg made the idea of too much walking a bad one so we instead the night before decided to go to onsen probably around Hakone. When I got up we started to make our plans and we agreed to do some shopping I had to do before heading to the spa and to get some breakfast as well and decided we would meet in Shimbashi which is one stop away from Hamamatsucho on either the Yamanote or Keihin Tohoku line. I got to the station before she did because she has a much further route to take and bought an iced coffee in the Exselsior at the station to wait for her. A few minutes later she got in and we checked out two breakfast buffets. The first was on a 25th floor of a hotel and had a nice view of the city but it was very crowded so we decided to go to the second which I believe was the Mitsui Garden Hotel which had its breakfast buffet on something like the 24th floor and also had a nice view. They were only a few minutes walk apart. I am not really a breakfast eater so honestly a buffet cost is a waste for me but it was what she wanted to do so we did it. A little it after getting there it started to rain in Tokyo and it remained that way on and off until we eventually got out of town. My breakfast consisted of some fruit, bread, yogurt, bacon and juice. Marina took a bit better advantage of the buffet than I did but I just cannot eat heavy in the morning. After we were done with that we did the bit of shopping I needed to do in Ginza which didn't take too long then it was off to the train station where we took the Tokaido Line to Odawara which is sort of a gateway city to the regions around Hakone.
If you recall we went to Hakone on the first trip to Japan I took but we did it by bus tour on the same day we visited the Fuji station. We ended up directly in a hotel which provided lunch then were brought to the pirate ship on the lake. This time we had to take a Hakone Tozan Railway train to Hakone Yumoto which brings you into the center of town basically. When we got there we asked the information desk about the various onsen in town. Marina had been to one of them before and liked it but the woman said we should tray Kamon as it was a traditional style spa that is part of a ryokan which is a traditional Japanese style hotel. We got outside for the bus that would take us to the spa and asked again the security guy that was directing passengers to their correct buses and he also said we should go to Kamon because the other one she had been to before was much more crowded and we would be better able to relax at Kamon. So we got on the bus and a few minutes we were there and putting our shoes in lockers and getting upstairs to get checked in. I had to buy a towel for 300 yen to go along with my fee because I didn't have one with me. Still I got to keep it as a souvenir so that is kind of cool. It is embroidered with their name and a couple sakura. After getting checked in we got to our respective changing rooms and swapped to our provided kimonos and headed back down to the second floor for the spa. As with all onsen the male and female guests are kept separate and there are no swimsuits involved. This place was not busy at all. In fact when I got in there was only one other guest in the pools. I went through the process of the appropriate scrub down you are supposed to perform before going into the water. I spent probably about 5-10 minutes on it which seemed reasonable to me. This is part of the tradition of going to onsen and is always supposed to be done. Of course two Japanese patrons who came in after me didn't bother to do any scrubbing and just dropped into the pools bone dry. I am not sure if there are different rules if you are already staying at the ryokan part but Marina said some women did it on her side too. Most of the pools were 42C which is probably a little bit higher than I wanted. It had rained but was not when we got to Hakone but the temperature was still high outside as well. The pools were partially outdoors and partially indoors and the indoors were just covered by a real roof more so than completely enclosed. I am basically not fully cut out for onsen because I don't know how to be idle long enough to enjoy it as some other people do. This meant that I was constantly changing pools or getting out of the water and sitting on a bench to cool down a bit while I was there. I had only the one towel but it is traditional to bring one into the water with you and leave it on your head. I could not do this as I needed my towel to dry off after I was done. I spent about an hour in and out of the pools and even tried the sauna which was so hot I could only stand less than two minutes of it before I got out. It did feel nice back in the 29C weather outside once I escaped. When I was done I went back over to the washing area and rescrubbed to get the spa water off and then used my souvenir towel to dry off, put on my kimono and headed back upstairs to the waiting area where I had a cup of macha while waiting for Marina to come back up. I was sort of dozing off a bit when she returned and we both got changed back to our civvies and headed downstairs to wait for a free bus ride back to the train station area. The bus came a few minutes later and the ride downhill was very quick.
At the town center most everything was already closed. I am not sure why so early at only 5pm but apparently the really touristy towns just shut down very early around here. However we were able to find a reasonably good restaurant where I had curry udon noodles which were good but even more messy than the noodles that I had in Nikko. I also had an Asahi Super Dry to go along with the noodles. When we were done eating it was already getting late so though she made a couple suggestions of some other things we could do I was really ready to get back into Tokyo instead (I think this worked out best for her as well as she fell asleep on the Tokaido line). We basically backtracked our train rides from earlier in the day and went back to Shimbashi for a couple more minutes of shopping then had ice cream at a specialty store. I had a vanilla soft serve with brown sugar and soy bean powder on it. It looks terribly a lot like a hot fudge sundae with nuts on it in the picture but it tastes nothing like one (which is what I was hoping for). It was actually very good and I am glad it is what I ordered. The ice cream also came with a complimentary cup of tea as well which was a nice surprise. After the ice cream we walked back to the station and got on the slightly delayed Yamanote Line (apparently there was a man on the tracks for a couple minutes) and then I rode my one stop and she continued on to her home. From there it was a quick walk back to the hotel.
There are very few pictures today as it was not really a sightseeing day at all. The onsen being what it is does not lend itself to pictures either. What few there are are located here.
I just found out that Monday was the 67th anniversary of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima. It would have been crazy mobbed out there, they say 50000 people filled the square. Still, it is interesting to add that bit of history to this trip.
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