Shizuoka: 6th Feb 2016

After breakfast this morning, we finally met up with Hiro! It's been about 7 months since I last saw her and I remembered her hospitality and guidance during my solo travel at Shizuoka. I was very happy to see her and she provided me with many suggestions to enjoy a road trip at Shizuoka.

So, we went to Toyota car rental office at the hotel lobby to get our car. This time, we drove a Toyota Ractis for three of us. The comfort was good and there we went off, hoping to capture nice pictures of Mount Fuji in winter.

We went to Nippondaira Hotel to take a look. Unfortunately, Fujisan was shy and shrouded by thick clouds. We felt a little disappointed but it was ok. So we left and decided to visit the strawberry farm! This was one of the adventures that I felt excited for this trip!

We reached the farm and paid tickets to enter the strawberry farm to pick strawberries of course!

Boy, they were huge and tasted really juicy! We had an hour there to eat all we can... we start stuffing ourselves silly with yummy strawberries. Both of us agreed that this is the best strawberry we have ever eaten so far haha

After this wonderful strawberry feast, we made our way to S-Pulse Dream plaza at Shimizu, which had several interesting museums like Chibimaruko Museum, Sushi Museum. We spent some time walking around and were very lucky to see Maruko-chan in the house! And she was happily waving to us haha

We moved off shortly to go Satta pass, where you get to see a different scenery with Mount Fuji inside. A really scenic area. The weather was good and Mount Fuji revealed its beauty! Very nice place out of nowhere.. even GPS has issues locating it but we were glad to have found it. There were many people that day.

We were really hungry after Satta-pass and drove to a restaurant which Hiro has kindly offered to bring us and have cherry shrimp meal. Cherry shrimp is a yummy delicacy found in Suruga Bay surrounding Shizuoka. Suruga Bay is the deepest bay in Japan. With great abundance of seafood from the sea, it is real blessing to taste the rich flavors of seafood in that area.We were too hungry so I ate it up without taking any pictures..here is one from Google Image to show you how it looks nice..goes really good when eaten with rice.

(http://japan-highlightstravel.com/en/travel/shizuoka/070030/)

After a hearty lunch, we drove to Fujinomiya Sengen Shrine, hoping to catch view of Fujisan with the shrine. However, weather was cloudy. 

We did explore around the shrine and did some prayers for blessing before bading farewell. The original plan was to go to Shibakawa Onsen but I wasnt feeling well that day, so we made our way to a nearby animal farm called Makaino Farm, hoping to see some animals haha...

However, this farm I felt was not as fantastic as Mother Farm which we had visited in July 2015.

A very long trip indeed but a fulfilling one! I was very glad that Hiro could make time for us to bring us around Shizuoka. She also sang Mount Fuji song during the trip and I must say she sang very well!

Great thanks to her for creating beautiful memories for this trip.

Me with Hiro

 After we returned the car, we said farewell to Hiro and started to make our 1h journey to Nagoya via bullet train!

Opportunity to explore Yamanashi/Mount Fuji in Japan!

Hello all! Here is an opportunity to explore Yamanashi Prefecture, Japan, where all the amazing seasonal fruit-picking, winery, onsen, Fuji 5 lakes and scenic landscapes near Mount Fuji can be found. This prefecture encompasses the northern part of Mount Fuji. An alternative choice to explore Mount Fuji aside from Hakone. By joining this discovery project (doing survey with no cost incurred), you will get to enjoy free experimental tours to explore this region!

<Image taken from http://www.yamanashi-kankou.jp/foreign/english/english027.html>

Click on Mount Fuji Yamanashi Endless Discovery Project to join!

Below are my recent shots taken in this region. Enjoy!

Shizuoka: 30th June 2015

The weather on this day was beautiful as I began my day having the buffet breakfast offered by the hotel. I opted for an outdoor seat to absorb the view of the hectic train situation at the nearby Tokyo station.

After breakfast, checkout was smooth and I was really happy with the overall impression of Maranouchi Hotel, Tokyo. I think I will come back again in my future trips :) I made my way to board the train going towards Shizuoka. It's about an hour train ride on the Shinkansen Hikari. Feeling excited along the way!

So I was supposed to meet Ms Hiroyo Aizawa, who will be my guide in Shizuoka (contact below). I have contacted her a few weeks before the trip. I was very pleased with the places that she has suggested me to visit in this half-day tour. Our only hope is for good weather as according to weather forecast, it was said to be cloudy and Mount Fuji is unlikely to be seen from the areas that we had planned to visit.

I saw Hiro at the station with a signboard written my name. Felt kinda embarassed though haha..but I was so glad to see her :)

She brought me to a nearby coin locker at the station to deposit my luggage before we set off in a local train to Shimizu station. In the short train ride, Hiro was very interactive as she filled me information to understand the various aspects of Shizuoka.

 Chibimarukochan (樱桃小丸子) is from Shizuoka!

After reaching the station, we took a cab going to our first destination, Miho Pine Grove (三保の松原) along the Miho Peninsula, Shizuoka prefecture. The taxi driver was a 71 year old man, who looked extremely friendly and energetic. We made small chats together and it was a pleasant ride before we reached the Grove.

And there it was, Mount Fuji! The weather was just right. We could see Mount Fuji with the waving pine trees along the beach. Hiro said we were very lucky to have seen Mount Fuji as for the past few days, Mount Fuji was shrouded by thick clouds. I'm really pleased with this!

So Miho Pine Grove had a mystical legend, which was also known as Hagoromo (The Feathered Robe). The following description was taken from Wikipedia: "The story of Hagoromo concerns a celestial being flying over Miho no Matsubara who was overcome by the beauty of the white sands, green pines, and sparkling water. She removed her feathered robe and hung it over a pine tree before bathing in the beautiful waters. A fisherman named Hakuryo was walking along the beach and saw the angel. He took her robe and refused to return it until she performed a heavenly dance for him. As the angel could not return to heaven without her robe, she complied with Hakuryo's request. She danced in the spring twilight and returned to heaven in the light of the full moon leaving Hakuryo looking longingly after her." 

Mount Fuji

The entrance to the beach

The Pine Tree in the legend

I took a couple of shots of the vicnity as the scenery was simply lovely with the pine trees. We said farewell to Mount Fuji and continued with our cabride to Nihondaira Ocha Kaikan. This was the place where one can experience tea picking and it has the green tea plantation fields and also see Mount Fuji. Mount Fuji is a shy mountain, as quoted from Hiro. I find this comment really apt as it seems to appear and disappear at times. I was really happy to see it again at Nihondaira. I did not do any tea picking but took some pictures of the lovely fields and the hydrangeas (Ajisai), which are blooming in season.

From Nihondaira Ocha, we walked to a nearby park to see more hydrangeas. The flowers were so lovely that I cant help but took more pictures of them. It was my first encounter!

The Hydrangeas in Bloom

The green tea leaves

Me and Hiro

 
We then visited a nearby hotel named as Nippondaira Hotel. This hotel was really posh and has a strategic location with great views of Mount Fuji on a clear sky. I hope to stay there in the future in winter perhaps to see Mount Fuji! Hiro kindly brought me there to their observatory deck to see the mountain and surroundings. 

I did some shopping at the hotel's shop and we waited for the shuttle bus that brings us back to Shizuoka station. Kinda helped me save some transport cab fees back to station! Appreciate this thought as advised by Hiro.

Along the shuttle bus journey, Hiro sang a short verse of her Mount Fuji and tea picking song. I bet it would have been real fun if she sang the entire song as she sang really well! When we reached the station, based on my request, we walked about 10min to Nanaya Matcha shop for some green tea icecream. I get to know about this shop from a blogpost and was really excited to try their icecream as they have 7 different grades of matcha icecream based on the intensity of matcha in it. They also have the roasted tea flavor. I tried the middle grade matcha icecream and the roasted tea. It was heavenly taste!!

We spent some time speaking to the staff and to understand about the history and origin of this interesting ice cream shop before making our way back to Shizuoka station. Along the way, Hiro introduced me to the various shops selling famous produce of Shizuoka which includes wasabi, tea leaves, sakura-ebi. It was an enlightening trip to have learnt so much about Shizuoka from Hiro and I really appreciate her effort in making this a wonderful trip for me. We bade farewell with several souvernirs given to me by Hiro and I was really happy that the weather turned out to be great on that day =)

If you are looking for a customised day trip/tour suggestions in Shizuoka, you may contact the following:

Mt. Fuji Shizuoka Guided Tours

To check out the status of Mount Fuji from viewing at Shizuoka, you may refer to the following website. An awesome one which has updates every hour!

http://www.pref.shizuoka.jp/~live/english/index.html

Attractions covered:
1. Miho Pine Grove (三保の松原)
2. Nihondaira Ocha Kaikan
3. Nippondaira Hotel
4.  Nanaya Matcha

Shopping Day : 8th July 2015

On our last day at Ubuya, Dear woke up pretty early that day and disturbed me from my sleep. The reason was there was clear sky in that morning and Mount Fuji was clearly visible at that very instant!! Thank goodness we finally got to see Fujisan on our last day!

A perfect end to our road trip!

Despite the sky being cloudy, the shape of Fujisan can be seen clearly with its reflection on the peaceful Lake Kawaguchiko. We had breakfast at the restaurant while enjoying this view. Now I understand why Japanese value Fujisan so much. The sight of it will just awe you with an immense satisfaction and respect for the mountain :)

Our elaborated Breakfast at Ubuya

Lobby at Ubuya

We really spent our time to the fullest at Ubuya before saying goodbye at the time of checkout (11am). We decided to drive back to the Toyota Kofu outlet to return our car and as there was still time, we decided to check out a really big Uniqlo store near to Kofu city... If you think the prices of Uniqlo products are affordable in Singapore, you will probably shop till you drop when you are in Japan, especially to less populated areas. We manage to find real good deals of good quality wear, be it casual or office wear at prices like 500 yen?!!! Totally unbelievable..you could easily spend a day there but we need to return our car, so we shopped to our best ability to the time limit...haha

After returning the car to Kofu branch, we dragged our real heavy luggages to the shinkansen, taking towards SHinjuku..It is about 1.5hour ride and we packed bento to have lunch on the train :)

Away from the peaceful and calm environment of Yamanashi prefecture, we returned back to the city life in Shinjuku. Weather was really bad that day with heavy rain. Fortunately, our hotel JR Kyushu Hotel Blossom Shinjuku was found round the corner from the South Terrace Exit of Shinjuku station. Shinjuku station is a big maze if you haven't been there.You can lose your directions with so many exits and so many buildings above the ground, and also underground as there are so many passageways. Luckily, Dear was at Shinjuku the day he arrived, so he was pretty familiar with the whereabouts of the hotel haha

Raining the whole day

Walk, Shop, Eat at Shinjuku

All Walks of Life

Phew, what a long journey! so we rested our feet before heading out to Lumine EST to make our Zoff spectacles. Have heard a lot about Zoff specs from friends, known for its light and good quality specs, fast service and reasonable prices, so we decided to give it a try! Although little English could be used for communication, we managed fine first by choosing the design, did a free eye-test, and made the payment. In around 25mins, the specs were ready and we were really happy with the purchase that we wore them immediately as they were so light!

(taken from another good blogpost on Zoff specs)

We went ahead to have dinner, this time some pasta, as we had many many days of Japanese cuisine and decided to have a short break from it haha.. and after dinner, I wanna explore the Yodobashi and Bic Camera outlets in Shinjuku. But, I did not know Yodobashi Shinjuku is divided into many small outlets everywhere in Shinjuku, and the different type of items are sold at different areas, not under a single building! This is really confusing to me as at Osaka and Sapporo, all items can be found in a single building with no hassle of walking around in circles! 

After purchasing what we wanted, we couldnt help but feel the travel fatigue kicking in again. Gotta rest early today as the following day we would be meeting Nakano-san for our adventure in Nikko!