We’re Illiterate

I realize that literacy is nothing to joke about, however, Lindsay and I feel Illiterate right now, seriously. We just spent the last day and a half at Hakone Yumoto which is a little mountain village nestled in a valley. It’s probably the equivalent of the Banff of Japan, 1 hour from Tokyo, tourist trap, etc…

The funny thing is that although it’s a HUGE tourist trap there are very little english signs. We spent a good deal of time trying to ride the right bus, follow the right signs and read the maps. When we were in another tourist town we were trying to find the great Buddha. We deciphered the Buddha Kanji symbols (Japanese writing) to be Man-14. Which, can be translated into a sign that looks like a man and a sign that looks like 14.

Anyway, enough about us not being able to read. Onto the Fujisan and fish eating our dead skin cells!

So yesterday we tried to go and see Mt. Fuji. In fact this is the modes of transportation that we took. Train -> Train -> Bus -> Shuttle Bus -> Walk -> Bus -> Walk -> Boat -> Ropeway (we call a cable car) -> Ropeway. Anyway after all that work Mt Fuji was hiding in the haze and clouds. It actually looked really cool because you could ‘just’ make out the silhouette of it in the mountain.

This morning we woke up and went up to see Mt. Fuji. He was in full glory this morning which was super neat! The funniest part of the whole thing was we took a ropeway (cable car) up to the top. Right when you get to the top Mt. Fuji LITERALLY pops out of nowhere. You seriously can’t see the mountain then BOOM Mt. Fuji. Anyway, when we went up this morning we were looking backwards and then suddenly we hear about 15 excited japanese ladies all saying Fujisan, Fujisan. I wish we would have made a video of it because it was so awesome.

Then this afternoon we headed to the Yunessun which is basically a gigantic Japanese water-park. But instead of water-park more like water pools. There was a Wine Pool, Sake Pool, Green Tea, Dead Sea Salt Water pool (which you’re totally buoyant in!) and a coffee pool (hold the cream and sugar). Heather you would love it, although, I’m pretty sure that you’re not suppose to drink the pool.

However the highlight of the whole place was the fish eating thing. I don’t know what it’s called (see above about being illiterate) but it was awesome. Basically, you sit down and put your feet in the water then tons of fish come swimming to your feet and start gnawing at the dead skin cells. For those of you who have seen my feet will know that I was definitely a popular man at this pool. I had so many fish eating around my feet that the Japanese girls beside me pointed at my feet and said something … probably equivalent to, “Dude, those feet must be disgusting”

Well, now we’re off to Kyoto!