When I'm on my travels, I sometimes blog
Lake Kawaguchi
On November 17, me and Keef made our way to Shinjuku station and the express commuter train to Lake Kawaguchi station, which lies near the lower slopes of Mount Fuji. We had had a hard time finding information exactly how to do this trip, so we just checked in ourselves with our IC-cards. These are cards (PASMO or SUICA) used in many places, but for us mostly in the subways of Tokyo. It turns out we had to buy seats as well which the conductor helped us with. And in the middle of the trip we seamlessly changed train company, so we had to get an additional ticket to get let off the platform when we arrived. After the 2 hours of travel we were hungry, so we found a very nice ramen place and solved that problem.
We turned our back to the mountain and walked downhill towards the lake. Autumn colours were stunning, people's gardens, public plantations and the forest. The weather was beautiful and a very nice 19 degrees. Our walk took us around about half the lake, taking a shortcut across using the large bridge which divides it. About halfway, we could see Mount Fuji again. It was almost hard to take a photo with the beautiful peak not in it. After six hours we were back in the station and after some drama found seats in the train even though they were sold out and only standing room supposedly available. Two hours later we were two very tired travellers back in our Ikebukuro airbnb.
Be well!
Niklas
