Hakone: A Multimodal Transportation Adventure (9/27)

On Wednesday, Colin, Lisa, Yuri and I went to Hakone to try to see Mt. Fuji.

First we took the subway to Shinjuku, the busiest subway station in the world at the height of morning rush hour.

Then we rode the Shinkansen to Odawara.

Then we took a bus to Hakone.  (While we were getting oriented, we actually DID see Mt. Fuji over the lake.)

We walked up the road a bit to see the shrine there, and then had lunch at a tiny noodle restaurant.  After lunch, we took the bus out to the Amasake Tea House, where the same family has been serving the same fermented non-alcoholic rice drink for 400 years.

Then it was time to take a boat across the lake.  It was decorated kind of like a pirate ship.

On the other side of the lake we took the Hakone Ropeway up and down the mountain, and saw more of Mt. Fuji.

Once we were over the mountain, we took a cable car down the other side.

Then we took a train down more of the mountain.  There were a couple of switchbacks where the train actually changed direction rather than make a turn.

One more train ride, and we were back at Odawara station.  Lisa’s JR pass has been having some issues so we had to take the slow (but still perfectly adequate) train back to Tokyo.  Colin and Yuri stayed in Odawara for dinner and then headed back on the Romance Car train, which is just the name of a train that goes from Tokyo to Hakone, but makes me laugh every time I come across it.

We had a lovely day in Hakone!  Here is the transit map from inside the cable car, showing 4 different modalities, 6 different “lines,” and a more than 1000-meter altitude change from the top of the ropeway down to Odawara station.

Here's Colin's post on the same day, which is focused more on what we did and less on how we got there.