Multivehicles Adventure

On Monday morning we left for a day tour to Hakone, the most popular destination for "us', residents of Tokyo.Beautiful Hakone has so much to offer: Hot spring resorts, mountains, lakes, and breathtaking views of Mount Fiji. But as far as i am concerned, Hakone Open Air Museum is Hakone's number one attraction (ichiban).

But , before we reached the museum, we had to travel for 1.5 hour from Tokyo to Hakone on a train, appropriately named:Odayku Romance Car.

From Hakone Yumoto we transferred into a delightful, mountain climbing,two car electric tram that winds its way through forests and over streams and ravines. The red maple trees added enormously to the beauty of the ride. The trip took lasted about 45 minutes, and we disembarked in the small station of Chokoku-no-Mori, where the famous Hakone Open Air Museum is located.The museum's showcase presents primarily 20th century sculptures, in a spectacular setting of glens, gardens, ponds, meadows and mountains.There are 400 sculptures on display, among them 25 pieces by Henry Moore. It would have been so nice to spend the whole day in this spectacular setting,  but there is so much more to explore. (my advice:  Spend at least 2 days in Hakone, or if you have only 1 day, spend it in the Open Air museum!)

Back on the choochoo train from Chokuko-no-Mori to Gora. In Gora we hopped on a 9 minutes cable car ride, to be followed by a 30 minutes ropeway gondola's ride, to be followed by about 30 minutes boat ride on lake Ashi, searching for the best view of Mount Fuji. Alas, by this time Mount Fuji disappeared into darkness.

This is not the end yet. There was still a bus ride, back to Hakone Yumoto, followed by 1.5 hour train ride to Tokyo.

The moral of the story: sometimes my energetic personality works against me. But the memory of the beautiful museum is etched in my brain

Oyasuminesai

Piki