Devi Japan Travels Part 15: Fuji Five Lakes and Sayonara
Tuesday, July 24, 2018
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This is the final blog of my Japan travels, which span over a month. It started out in Fukuoka, went all the way down to the southern point of Japan's main islands. From there on, while having adventures, I traveled upwards to Tokyo to meet a lot of my old friends and then finally say goodbye and return to Singapore. This part will be about the final four days, well actually the last day doesn't count because I travel back on that day. So three more days of enjoying Japan to the fullest!
Tokyo Day 3: Fuji Five Lakes with Dex-kun
I got up really early to meet up with my Dutch friend Dex who lives and works in Tokyo. He arranged a car from his company, picked me up, and we drove to Fuji Five Lakes. Sitting dead tired on the train to the meetup point I realised all that traveling and meeting up with people has taking its toll on me. But, a few more days to go and lots of friends and places to see, this always gives me energy! Adventure instead of red bull, works for me. On the way to Fuji five lakes we had a few stops. First one of course to get snackageee.
So we stopped at a parking lot and went to the Family Mart to get some snacks. Dex got something I never had before, and it is SO GOOD that it became my new addiction!
Little cheese breads with a mochi like feel to it! SO gooddd!
On the way to Fuji five lakes, we went to this place Dex wanted to visit. I don't remember the name of the place but it had caves. We put on some safety helmets and went to explore! And I must say it was a hot day but so so cold in the caves, so people that visit caves be ware. I was also really cold when I visited some caves in the south of the Netherlands even though it was hot that day.
Not without the safety helmets!To slide off or not.. I think NOT.
So dark in the caves, and sooo cold! I am ready for a cold winter.
We drove up to Fuji five lakes and it was kind of rainy and a bit cloudy, but despite that the first lake was already very nice. From there on the next few hours we just drove around, looked at stunning views, had lunch, took pictures, more pictures, a LOT of pictures, and not only of the Fuji, but also it was selfie time with BFF. Luckily the weather cleared up and it became really sunny!
Random people camping..
Cloudy though... will it or won't it rain?
The waters are a bit restless..
.. But it is clearing up!
The clouds are dissipating slowly
Omg it's getting soo bright!
While driving away we saw this and we HAD to find a clearer view...
... a soccer field will do!
When we were driving around trying to get the perfect shot of mount Fuji, Dex suddenly had a thought. Wasn't the suicide forest near here? We looked it up and we were just 5 minutes away from it. Dex was in a bit of a Blair Witch mood, so we parked the car on the side of the road where there wasn't even a parking space (I am quite sure we weren't allowed to stop there..). We saw a white ribbon that was lying there and we didn't know what it meant. I didn't know much about the suicide forest, only that people went there to commit suicide sometimes. There wasn't a clear path so we decided to walk near the white ribbon and walked on some rocks, dirt, and tree roots, trying not to fall. I didn't feel like hurting myself so we left. We did see a license plate lying around, apparently they were from people that just drove up there, left their car and walked into the forest with no intention of coming back. The more I knew about this place, the creepier it got. They say the forest has pieces of clothes and stuff as well, only thing I thought was why would someone go naked for that. Anyway, it was a bit of an adventure, but hearing about the youtube dude Logan Paul being so disrespectful after going there made me realise that I don't want to go back there. Maybe only to go hiking on the designated paths.
We went back to Tokyo and had some drinks at a very nice jazzbar with nice jazz music. Afterwards I went home after yet another long day.
Tokyo Day 4: Nakano Broadway
Today Aya is joining me to go to broadway! Well, Nakano broadway, not the musical one. Besides Akihabara this is the other main place to go to for anything anime, games, manga, figurines, and such. This place has a very old feeling, nothing like Akihabara which feels a bit more modern. The shops outside of the building seem to be more for old people as well.
Getting out of Nakano station towards Nakano Broadway, there was a promenade with shops and we saw some currypan. I tried one with cheese and it was really delicious! That and some of the anime stuff was definitely the highlight of my day. There was a big Mandarake, lots of shops with gadgets too. Overload everywhere. There was a Western girl that really got excited when she found a big Guts figure and I was happy for her. I really like Guts as well but I couldn't take one that big in my suitcase. I am a very minimalist anime lover. There is another blog here by Reina that also writes about Nakano Broadway, so for more on that click here.
Tokyo Day 5 & 6: Auf wiedersehen Tokyo, see you again!
I did absolutely nothing but chill this day, all the traveling and meeting friends had gotten to me. But since we are here, let's meet up with other friends anyway. We met up with a friend of mine and had some dinner at Grandma George's in Shibuya. This was awful, the food was so so but the waiter was very arrogant and not nice at all. So it DOES happen in Japan, that rare bad service! After this we were like let's just get a drink somewhere. While searching I stumbled upon a shisha bar, my friends had never tried it before but always wanted to. We walked in, it had a very chill atmosphere and they were playing Nujabes! Instant love. Nujabes is one of my favorite artists, may he rest in peace. I love his music, it's very chill and relaxing. Been in love ever since I first saw Samurai Champloo, of which he had done the soundtracks. One of the best anime soundtracks in my opinion. We had a cherry shisha and some tea, they also did shisha with alcohol in it but that would have had a different impact.. After a nice time we went home, I spent my last day in Tokyo kind of chill. Aya kept saying I should just come to Tokyo every weekend, if there was a magical portal that got me to Tokyo instantly for free, yeah. Maybe. Queue up Singapore! Queue for daysss lol.
The next day it was very sunny, time to fly back to Tokyo! We got up, had some breakfast and took our time getting on the train to Narita airport. When we arrived we had some lunch at... yep, soup again. The same I had when I came to Tokyo. Very nice and affordable meal. After this my very last matcha latte while sitting at the observation deck seeing planes land and take off. The sun was shining and I had good company. I think this is the chillest I have ever been before a flight. After hugging Aya goodbye I went through everything in like 5 minutes, there were no lines! Indeed the chillest ever! Getting on the plane a Japanese lady sat next to me and we started talking. turns hout she had lived in Singapore for many years and was a total nice person. We saw mount Fuji when we were in the air with a sunset, definitely the most beautiful scenery I have seen on a plane. Japan bids me farewell, for now, with one last beautiful view of mount Fuji as a parting gift.
It looked better in real life, I swear!
~Written by Devi~