Hakone, Ryokans and Onsens

This past Monday and Tuesday, I went up to Hakone, a mountaneous area south of Yokohama that is famous for its hot springs. To get there, we had to go on two local trains, and then a little red switchback train through the mountains.

Fall seems to come a bit later in Japan (apparently it also takes longer to get warm in the spring) and like everywhere else, Japan's been experiencing unusua climate patterns lately. Even though it was early December, it felt like early-October-in-Vermont in Hakone. All the trees were turning orange and red and the air had that crisp mountain feel. As we went into the mountains, I could almost pretend I was back home, except volcanic mountains (which I don't think I'd ever seen before) are shaped really differently from VT mountains. Volcanic mountains are much more dramatically shaped and less sloping. I still think northwestern Tanzania looks more like Vermont than anywhere else I've been. As we got further into the mountains, we could see steam pouring off some of the slopes, a sign of volcanic activity.

We got off the train at Gora, the last stop before the monorail. It seems Hakone revovles around the hot springs (onsens) and the domestic--and few foreign tourists--who come to use them. There was also a large local handicraft industry fueled by the onsen traffic. We walked by a huge open air sculpture museum that had pieces by Rodin (my favorite), Calder and Picasso. It looked pretty cool in the dramatic setting-- there was even a cool midair walkway over a cliff--but it seemed a little odd to put a museum so far from urban centers where most people could access it. We also saw what may be my all-time favorite cafe concept--it centered around a foot hot bath that people sat around while they enjoyed food and drinks.

As it was getting dark, we checked into our ryokan. A ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn with tatami mat floors where everyone sleeps on futons on the floor. It's very elegant and customer service oriented. Every room is assigned a maid, and when you check in, you tell the front desk what time you would like dinner and breakfast served at. The maid brings in your courses at the appointed times, and then clears the table and lays out your futons (which are stored in a closet) while you are in the onsen. (The experience also reminded me how weird it feels not to tip here, but it's very taboo.)

Our ryokan was located in the valley below the nearest train station. We checked in at the top of the train station, and rode this little cable car down through the forest for five or six minutes to get to the ryokan. It was located right on the hot springs, a spread-out clump of pale buildings with red trim just on the edge of the cliff.

After drinking tea in our room, we put on our yukata (a yukata is roughly the same shape as a kimono, but it is made out of thin cotton. It's a bit like a thin, long bathrobe with kimono sleeves. It's important to cross the left side over the right side-- the reverse cross is only done on the dead) and our hopi (kimono sleeved bed jackets that tie at the waist) and headed down to the onsen. I struggled a little to put on my split toe socks, but by the end of the visit, I mastered it. Our maid scolded us if we left our room without our hopi for fear we'd catch cold.

In contemporary Japan, onsen for men and women are almost always seperated, but my understanding is that before the occupation, unisex public baths were common. The onsen itself is procedure heavy, and there were lots of signs explaining the process in English, Japanese, and naked-person-cartoon (I guess it doesn't quite count as a manga). First, after undressing, everyone squats on wooden stools about 9 inches off the ground in front of a series of faucets (this is probably among the most unflattering positions ever, but were I more properly focused on thoroughly cleaning my toenails--a Herculean task for sure-- I wouldn't have noticed). After a very through scrub and rinse, one enters the onsen. A critical point of etiquette as highlighted by the signs is "let's not dunk our towels into the onsen." I was a little mystified as to why this was even a concern, but I guess it's more of a problem on the men's side where "vanity towels" are common during the scrubbing. The towel then is positioned on the head while in the onsen.

There are indoor pools which are VERY hot and outdoor polls that are quite hot. I prefered the outdoor pools because as it got darker, I could look up and see the stars, and I liked the contrast of the very cold air and the hot water on my skin. There was also a great view of the springs from the bath itself. Although I went to a Turkish bath once to clean up after an all night bus ride, this was my first time seeing a hot springs, and I really enjoyed it. We went in before and after dinner and breakfast the next day. My skin still feels very soft.

Meals were both very good and kind of terrifying. It's considered very rude to not finish all the food, and can result in not being invited back. However, Rachel and Brett are both allergic to shellfish, so we plastic-bagged and flushed a lot of food. We felt a little guilty about this because it's all very fresh, gourmet Japanese food, but it's also very intimidating. Dinner consisted of assorted sashimi (including really good tuna), tofu with a silver of beef decorated with pine nuts, an abalone with mushrooms and peppers that cooked on a burner at each place, mini ramen, a dumpling in a soup, tempura crab, plum wine and many other things I forget. One 'goal' of the ryokan is to never show you the same serving/eating dish twice, and the dishes everything came on were equally beautiful. My favorite was shaped like a boat.

I haven't really adapted to the Japanese attitude towards rice. I'm alright with rice as a vehicle, but in general, I stop eating my rice when I run out of curry to soak it in, and I believe the optimal curry to rice ratio is very high. I can taste the difference between good rice and horrible rice, but I'm blurry on the whole spectrum. In Japan, rice is the most important part of the meal and is often served after the rest of the food, intended to be eaten all by itself or with pickled vegetables. I was entirely too full to eat my rice (bad Japanese person!) and considered the plastic bag approach before Brett voluntered (good Japanese person!).

Breakfast was pretty difficult. I'd bragged to Julie I had no qualms about a tuna onigiri in the morning, but a steaming tofu-fish pudding was another story and Brett and Rachel took pity on me. Please don't take my non-picky eater card away. I'll do better next time, and I did enjoy a broth-with-clams, a mini omelet dumpling in broth, and even a small fish with its head and tail. (Come on, everyone, you know that's really scary. It's almost a live fish. Even though it doesn't smell fishy, there's the knowledge it COULD smell fishy. I could have eaten some part not intended to be eaten. I couldn't tell the nama gomi from the delicious. Also, fish look kind of like monsters when they are dead.) It was actually very good.

Almost everyone staying at our onsen--except us and an Iranian man named Jimmy who was married to a Canadian Japanese woman-- was Japanese, so it was cool to get the traditional Japanese ryokan experience. I debated whether going to an onsen was a good choice given the limited amount of time I had, but Brett and Rachel were enthusiastic and it was a really good trip.

After a final dip, Brett had to head into Tokyo for a business meeting and Rachel and I took the train up to Gora, and then took a monorail/funnicula/cable car higher up the mountain. It was much colder up there, and even though the sky was perfectly clear, there were drops of rain. I've tried to look this up online to no avail, but my best guess is that it is volcanic steam condensing. After exploring and enjoying the view, we hiked down to Gora and then did some shopping before heading home.