New Year’s Eve guided tour to Mount Fuji, Lake Ashi cruise, Tokyo station anime and Ramen street.
Good morning everybody. We are starting the video from Mount Fuji. You can just see it. Oh, I’ll show you now behind me. It’s -3°. It is freezing out here. So, we got the bus tour this morning, very early. There wasn’t anything to show on that cuz we were literally on the bus for 2 hours. So, I didn’t really have anything to show. And this is the first stop we’ve come to is Mount Fuji. And like I said, it’s absolutely freezing. So, you can just see the mountain just here. Look, we’re at the fifth stop on the mountain. There’s been a little bit of snow on some of the floors. You can see here, Mount Fuji, fifth station. We’re just going to go up to the shrine here and we’re going to go into the shop where we can get us. They’ve got a voucher for a bell, haven’t we? Oh, over that way. Oh, no. But this is the shrine. We’re going this way to the shrine and then we’re going to go and get the bell. We’ve only got about 20 minutes now. So, we haven’t got long left here. Okay. So, it’s been a bit of a rush cuz it’s absolutely freezing outside. This is a little shop at the top of Mount Fuji. So, it’s Mount Fuji World Cultural Heritage and they give away a Mount Fuji commemorative gift and it’s like a little bell that’s a welcome good luck charm. So, you can read the little sign there. I’ll just hold it over. And that’s in Japanese there. This is where you get the little bell from. It tells you how many feet you are in the air. The only thing is things are really expensive up here. Jeez, charging you 100 yen there just to go to the toilet. So, we went the toilet around the other side. They weren’t charging 100 yen for that one. Drinks are not too bad in this machine. Um, you can get some hot coffees and things in this one, but I went queued up for a coffee a minute ago and it was 700 yen for a match, which is still cheap compared to at home, but these ones are only 200 here, whereas the other ones were 700 at somebody stand. So, definitely because of where you are, things are a lot dearer. Like, I had to pay 800 yen for a Mount Fuji um bridge magnet each. But there’s lots of different things up here. Lots of different souvenirs, random things, food, lots and lots and lots of different things. Okay, so we’re back on the bus. Tilda and Matilda got called Dango. So I think we had one of these in Dot and Bang. Dango is different. Oh, this is different. Dango. And what was it, Matilda? What flavor was it? Cherry blossom. Cherry blossom flavor with what’s on top of it? Bean paste. Bean paste. It looks very nice. Just going to put it down there. What’s it going to taste like? It was like quite sweet. Is it nice? Really sweet. So, we’re back on the bus. I’m sorry I didn’t film much, but it was absolutely Yeah, it was -3°. It was freezing. It was freezing. We only had about It was below freezing. Half an hour there. We had It was so so cold. Well, cuz it was below freezing. It was mine. Oh, cuz I said it was freezing. Cheeky. Um yeah, it was really really cold. But I will just Can I split that there a minute? I will just show you the um itinerary for oop jeez for today. Um now I’ve got a minute. Oops. Gosh, I’ve got ants. Now I’m good. Please. So this was our start. Um so it wasn’t actually an 8:00 depart meeting point at Shinjuku, was it? It was a start. Yeah, we got at Ginsa at 720. We had to be there for we had to be there at 7:20 at Ginsa and we left at 7:30 and then they did drive to Shinjuku, didn’t they, to pick up paperwork and we had to change one person. Um, I wonder if that’s what they always do then because it does say 8:00 depart meeting point Shinjuku. Um, then we’ve been to here Mount Fuji fifth station. um does say during off season they will go to the highest station or an alternative spot because obviously sometimes you can’t get to this fifth station. Yeah, this time last year it was already closed. Um so we’re lucky that we’ve been able to get up this high because most sometimes like now anytime from now they’re going to start shutting it. Yeah, by car. Yeah, this is the highest point by car and the other 2/3 of the way up. So, you can’t go any higher by car. This is the highest point you can get by car. Then we’re going to have lunch after this. We don’t know how long it’s going to take to drive there, but we’re going to drive somewhere and have lunch. Then we’re doing the Hakonei ropeway. Um, so it’s like a cable car. Then we’re going to Lake Ashen for a cruise. And then we go to Odawara station where we get tickets to go back to Tokyo um from with the um bullet train. Yeah. Which only takes 30 minutes or you can stay on this. Oh, okay. Okay. So, I shouldn’t So, normally if it’s a weekday um or not holidays, you have the option of either getting the bullet train or staying on the coach. So, you can stay on the coach, but it could be heavy traffic or you can get the bullet train, but because it’s a holiday and a weekday, you have to get the bullet train, but it’s included in the price, the bullet train ticket, and it only takes half an hour to get back to Tokyo. So you get back to Tokyo a lot quicker than sitting on the bus which would take about 2 and 1/2 hours whereas you’ll be back in half an hour. So you can see a little bit that shows you a map of the Hyone map it says. So you’ve got the Aquad. That’s the station up there. So that must be where we get I think that was the station it said. Yeah. That we go from. Then there’s another station here. Oh, no. So, this is the cable cars here. Then it looks like this is like a lake. There’s a station here, a shrine, and all bits of kind of stuff here. So, there’s lots of different things there to look at. Then, this tells you the Shinkansen bullet train information. Non-reserved seats, car are on that platform. Shinkansen comes every 30 minutes. Since it’s a non-reserved seat ticket, you can take the train at any time. Okay, so we’ve stopped off for lunch. It was in this little kind of restaurant here. I didn’t show it because it was really really small, wasn’t it? And it was really crowded around like a really small little um you can get like little ice creams and stuff in there. I bet you could have got a drink from in there. Okay, let’s go. It was around a really small Let’s go. Let’s go. Um kind of little stands. It was really hard to see. Oh, you can see really good views of Mount Fuji here though. So, this is the Japanese gardens where you can get really good views of Fuji. So, you can just see Mount Fuji there in the background. So, it has a really nice view of Japanese gardens here that you can walk around. Fortunately, we don’t really have long here. And then this is like ninja style. I don’t know why it’s a ninja place. A ninja place. Everything to do with ninja, isn’t it? Yeah, they’ve got kids going in there for ninja classes. Yeah. Is that I thought that’s what it was. Kids were going in for ninja classes. Yeah, it was really hilarious. But we had to be on back on the bus in like 10 minutes. So, we’ve come to have a look in the gardens, had something to eat, been around the gift shop, and the next one is going to Hakonei for the um oh, what’s it called? Like the cable cars. Okay, so this is actually where we are. Oino Ninja Village overview overall view. So we’re at the Ashino Ninja Village. So we are here at the minute. So, there’s a restaurant, a footpath, a shobu lookout, playground of ninja, a throw in the ninja star, a ninja trick house, an outdoor stage, a water spider art, a tea house, and a Japanese garden. There you go. You can see where we’ve been. Okay, so we’ve arrived at Hakonei. Unfortunately, we can’t do the ropeway cable cars because the weather’s took a turn and it’s really windy. So, because the wind is too bad, the um cable car has been cancelled. So, because the the wind has been cancelled cuz the wind’s too bad and the cable car has been cancelled, we have now going to be given a voucher to go into the gift shop and to buy a souvenir. But we are still going on our boat tour. So the boat tour is here as well. So we are going to go on the boat tour. But now um we’re a little bit earlier. So we can go on the lakeside and have a little walk around here. Come back at 140 until we’re going to go on our boat. I found a stamp that’s got this really nice stamp from here. Coney ropeway. So even though we’re not going on the ropeway, it shows the boat that we’re getting on. She did say it was a pirate boat. I thought she was joking, but it does actually look like a pirate boat. So, it does say, “Please purchase the Hakonei stamp book from a nearby vending machine.” So, you can purchase a stamp book as well if you don’t have a stamp book. So, it’s 500 yen available in two colors, red and blue. But, we’ve already got our stamp book. So, we’re okay. So, you can just do your stamp there. Hakone ropeway. Lots of people going over now doing the stamp. So you can see here it says suspension of service, reason for suspension, strong wind. So this is the ropeway. Um so it’s suspended due to strong wind. And this is the ropeway there. That’s where the sections all suspended sections all across here because of the strong wind. And this is where it starts. Here’s where the boat is. So, we’re going to go here on the boat and we’re going to go around the lake here and we’re going to get be able to see scenes of Mount Fuji and things. And there’s Tory gates in the water that we can see. So, apparently it does say when the weather improves you might be able to go on it, but obviously at the minute we don’t know when that is. So, it’s suspended at the moment. Okay, we’re on the pirate ship. So, the tour guide said if we wanted to, we could pay what was it? 800 yen each4 which is £4 each. So, a total of £12 for the three of us to go in first class, which there’s no difference in um the levels of where you go, but there’s less people in this class and you get like better seating. So, it just means that it’s less busy, so there’s more chance of getting near a window to get better pictures. And I just thought, you know what, £12 is nothing. So we just paid the we thought another family were doing it. So that’s how we went up cuz we don’t want to be the only family to do it and then we went up to do it and then the next thing this other family didn’t do it in the end but we’ve sat here and so we’ve got like a front view and then we’ve got a side window here. So we can see right out the side here. So we can see all the mountainous range here and we can see all of the out the top here as well which is going to be really nice. So I’m hoping that we’re going to get some good views. Um like I said it’s really nice. The seats look really lovely and comfy as well. So we’re really excited. [Music] need to open We’re just coming out the little toy gate in the water. There’s a tiny little toy gate in the water. Really, really small. It’s the same boat as what we’re on, but it’s just going back the other way. It’s see it there now. It is kind of like like a pirate ship. This is the one that we’re on, but that’s going back the opposite way now. So, it kind of goes around a few stops around the lake and then goes back. So, you can see it dwarfs that other boat there. Oh, really big. We’ve come we’ve come outside. You can see the second brigade. The bigger one is just right out there. And there’s also some kind of little red ones just around here. See the top really grip my phone because it’s so windy out here. Matt’s just gone up there with an like the very top of the ship. So, this is like the first class bit cuz he was like hardly anybody in here. And then this is like the standard class over there which is pretty full of a lot of people. Yeah, there just is pretty full on that side. There’s not really many people on this side. Um Exactly. Oh, there’s the little Tory gate. Tory gate. Oh, is that the other big one again? I’m confused. No, cuz the other big one’s over there. Oh, no. We lost it now. And we’re off the pirate ship. I’m trying to think what it’s called. The coone sightseeing cruise. And we can see Fuji in the background. So, everyone stopped having pictures. Our Tai Blue is taking pictures of really, really good. She’s lovely. Oh, it’s going again. back to its next stop. So, we got off here. A Coney sightseeing cruise. Looks like there’s a few little cafes and shops around here as well. Oh, there’s toilets just here. Loads of little things around here. Surprising how many things there actually is. Even like a little bridge and a little lake. Loads of really, really nice things to say. The sky is completely clear as well. Gorgeous sun coming through. And we’re at the Shinkan Zen. So, we went we took the bus. I can’t think what I’m trying to say now. We did get the bus to the um gift shop, didn’t we? No. Did we get the bus or the gift shop? No. Oh, yeah. Sorry. When we got off the boat, we walked to the gift shop. Um, we all got was it 800 yen I think it was which was the price of the high not calling it high rope now I’ve gone mad now the cable car thing so it was eight we all got a voucher for 800 yen each which was the price that our ticket that would included for the cable cars but obviously because of the high winds we couldn’t go on it so we all got a voucher for 800 yen each so we all chose something in the gift shop Matilda chose a lucky pack, which was actually 1,00 yen. So, we did put a bit of money to it, but she got absolutely tons of stuff in it, didn’t she? Like a purse and a this and a that and a tea towel and all sorts of random things. But it was quite good to be fair. And then I got some What did I get? Matcha cookies. Yeah. And then aunt just got two Hakonei fridge magnets with his I think we had to put about 1,000 yen to it or something. I can’t remember now. 800 yen. We had to put 800 yen to it, I think, because of Matilda’s in the fridge. Magnets were a little bit more or something. We had to put a little bit to it. Wasn’t much we had to put to it. Mountain Jew. He loves this. Mellow. Mellow yellow is basically Mountain Jew. That’s what he says. Mellow yellow is Mountain Jew. Then we got the but back on the bus to what’s this station now called? Odawara. Odawir. Odawara. Yeah. Odawara station. Um it was only about 25 minutes, wasn’t it, to Odawara station. Just missed the train. Yeah, we just missed it cuz of traffic and it was half an hour to the next one. So we went into Lawson and picked up a drink and a little snack and we’re just waiting for the next shinen now which is due in about 5 minutes I think now. Um we’re in unreserved seating soles the carriages to get. So it was either carriage 15 and 16 or 1 through to six. So we’ve chose to stand outside 15 near 15 and 16 thinking that most people will go to 1 to six. So we’re hoping 15 and 16 it’ll be less busy. We also can’t see anybody from our coach. So, I don’t know where they’ve all gone. But she did tell them that because you had half an hour in the train station. There was like um a shopping mall like four floors and you could go keeping on. No, but it’s time keeping on the coach. I suppose if anyone makes it back, but that you could go on the shopping center and put your feet in like the hot springs. So, it was free, didn’t she? Your feet in the hot springs. And everybody was like ubing and aring over that. So, I imagine they’ve all ran to that. Um, and I can’t see anybody here. And now the train’s here. So, we’re about to get on board the Shinkansen, which is basically the bullet train, which is called the Shinkansen. Okay, so we didn’t get much from Lawson. We just kind of wanted a little snack, but I kind of got these tubes for me and Mat to share because I didn’t know which one we’d like. So, I got bread with white peach jam and whipped cream, which sounded really interesting. And then I also got a banana steamed cake, but we wasn’t sure if this one would be a little bit dry. So, we got the banana steamed cake. And then I picked up this one as well in case that was dry. But I’m still not convinced we’re going to like this one any home and just give it a try. So, like I said, it’s it says bread, so it’s probably not really like a cake, but they do that where it’s kind like a sweet bread. So, it has got, like I said, a white peach jam, and whipped cream does seem to be a thing over here. A lot of things seems to have whipped cream in. And aunt just chose a plain boring chocolate cake. Like how boring is he? Flipping chocolate cake. So this is the peach and cream bread. Trying to show you that. See? As you can see there, that’s the peach jam. That’s like the whipped cream kind of texture. So it is like really fluffy like white whipped cream and it’s kind of reminded like the cream like the whipped cream that you get in America. So that’s like the whipped cream. That’s the jam there. And it is like a sweet bread. It’s really nice though. And then the banana was very artificial banana. I’m not sure if it’s even actually seen a banana in the whole banana bread cake. But it was still nice. It just was quite artificial tasting. But this one was really nice. This one. This one was the best. Just thought I’d show you a little look at the map of the bullet train. This is our last little look at the bullet train. Now that shows you all the cars of the bullet train. Everywhere that the toilet is on the bullet train. There did used to be a smoking room on the bullet train as well, didn’t there? We saw it the other day in one of the carriages. Not listed on there anymore. We seen that. Yeah. March this year. We’ve seen it in a lot of places though in the train station and things and the airport. There’s like a room actually called the smoking room where in hotels and stuff. Yeah. Where you can just go and just smoke in the room. Um so that’s the last look at the bullet train. Oh, the door shuts has been closed. Bye bullet train. You can just see now what they do is they turn the chairs around. Look for the new train. The next people getting on. How cool is that? Okay, we’ve got off the Shinkan Zen and we’ve come downstairs in Tokyo Station because this is where all the toy shops are. It’s basically called Character Street. Yeah. So, they’ve got like um Carman Rider. What was that one a minute ago? One Piece. Whatever that is, I have no idea. They’ve got like Pokémon, Mythy, Tokyo Station one. Um they’ve had a Hello Kitty one, haven’t they? Basically anything you could ever imagine. Powerpuff Girls. It’s heaven. Powerpuff Girls. Yeah. Literally every character, everything you can ever want is all down here. No idea what that character is, but everything of everything is everywhere. Oh, she’s now find something else she wants. Whatever this is. This one piece again. Don’t know what this is, but she likes this now as well. What is this one? I don’t know. Oh, this is anime. Now, we’ve actually found a Harry Potter shop. They do Harry Potter Hershey’s kisses. Look at these Harry Potter sorting hat kisses. These Harry Potter Hershey’s kisses are £750. It’s not bad really. Look at this. It’s so cute. Oh, look at the shirt. 30 Bes on. 30 Bans. I can’t speak. Even the shops like really themed to Harry Potter. Really cool. Oh, these are cute. Happy birthday, Harry. I like these dinner biscuits. Hey, we’ve come here for tea and you press what you want on the machine and then you pay for it here and then you get a ticket and then you go inside. How cool is this? This is the special ramen with all the toppings and this is soy sauce ramen. Then I got the guoza dumplings and our cold matcha. How pretty is this at the station? So we’ve had our food and we’re now going to show me online. Why am I saying my harm? It’s cuz Matilda keeps saying my harm because she wants to go to Disney because my the Disney station. Take me back. They keep confusing me saying we’re going to my harm. Matilda. Because we’re going on We’re going on the line that goes We’re going on the KO line that goes to my No. On the escalator now. Yes. So, we’re on the KO line going to Show Me cuz Show Me is where the hotel is. The food was really nice, wasn’t it? Matilda was like full of noodles. Yeah. Like, how many you had like tons of noodles in your less than £20 for the three of us? And we had two coats. It was one of two Cokes by accident. I had a matcher. Someone’s waving at me and they don’t realize I’m filming myself, not them. No. I had a matcha. Um, dad had a beer. And I had a coke. I thought I’ had two Cokes, a matcha, a beer. Get off the escalator. Never mind looking at the video. Yeah, we had two Coke, a beer, a matcha. I had gaoza. We both had ramen. And we both had ramen. That’s going up that one. And it was like what? £20. This one was about £18. About £18. It’s hoovering the stairs. That’s amazing. Um and it was really good. And there was lines. There was lines outside every single [Music] um every single one of them had a line outside it. Sorry, I’m not good on the stairs and I’ve got a throat sweep. I love got really sore throat. Um, every single one of them had a line outside them. All the ramen places, but it was just like where it was in the character bit was full of like all the character shops. That was just like a ramen place. Like everything was just full of ramen, wasn’t it? Yeah. Oh, it’s actually called Ramen Street. Yeah, it’s called Ramen Street. Like one bit full of characters, one bit full of ramen. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, this hoodie she’s got is so cute. A really short one. But then I realized I’ve already got a nice scarf anyway. And I thought they could share it. And then it ended up booking mine. Yeah. Well, cuz I do have one anyway. But mine’s just a scarf. Yours is like a hood and a scarf. Yeah. Scarf. It’s like wearing a scarf. You wrap it around like that. So it is cute. I like an act. And it’s so soft, isn’t it? Yeah. It was only cheap though, wasn’t it, as well? Like Yeah. I can’t remember how much it was. It wasn’t expensive. Not for like what you think it would be. Like £15 maybe or something. It wasn’t expensive. It wasn’t like Tokyo Disney wasn’t expensive at all. It was not like Florida. It wasn’t um wasn’t any more than £15. It was really good. But we’ve had a really nice day today. Yeah, it’s been It’s New Year’s Eve. Should we stay until midnight? I don’t think I will be. What time is it? 6:00 past 6. 5 and 1 half hours left. And so lots of shops are starting to shut now. Um and so we’re on our way back to the hotel. The Fuji tour was really good, even though the other thing got cancelled. That was quite sad, but we still got a gift voucher. We still got the gift voucher. And the um actual going up to that fifth station was just like amazing. Freezing. It was freezing. But it was just like amazing being up there. It was just like one of those experiences that you’ll just never forget that you were up like to the fifth station of Mount Fuji up and that you went 2/3 of the way up it. It was just amazing. It was below freezing. I know. It was -3°. It was so cold. It was also really nice. But I can’t to actually that concert has been so good experience that we went up there. We did it and we went to like the shrine bit, didn’t we? And we saw the tour gates and we got the the goshing stamp in our book which was really nice. And we had that experience up there. It was really, really, really nice. And we got the little bells, didn’t we? And we got a drink up there. And I can actually show people bells. Oh, you got the bell in my pocket. You have freed them. I’ll just get out one. Yeah. So that’s a little bell. So each got one of those from the top of Mount 34 Mount VJ the Fuji lucky bell. Um and then we went to Hakonei which is like another little town that we’ve not been to in Japan. So that was a new place in Japan to visit. Pone said that’s our train then the next stop. [Music] Um yeah so Kobe was lovely seeing the lake and going across the lake Mount Fuji views. That’s loud. Sorry that was really loud. The other train pulling up. Um yeah, so it was lovely going across um going across the lake in um a pirate ship. I forgot what it was now. Hakonei. Um that was really nice. Like a pirate ship. Yeah, it was really funky that boat, wasn’t it? And stuff. That was really good. And then they don’t learn masks that every child thinks that might happen. It doesn’t They don’t do what? They don’t load masks. They have all these mask things with flags. Oh, they don’t load the mast. Yeah, it was really good that experience. And then um we got opposite and went in the gift shop and then we got the bullet train again. So, some people hadn’t been on the bullet train. And if you’re not going to go on the bullet train, that’s like your chance to go on the bullet train as well. So, we had our last ride on the bullet train, came back and then obviously we’ve had a little bit of a time round here. So, I think we’re going to end today’s video here because we’re only one couple of stops away now from our hotel. So, make sure to like and subscribe. We hope you’ve enjoyed the video. Tomorrow is New Year’s Day, so we’ve got our day to ourselves tomorrow where we’re going to hit Team Labs up. So, we will see you all later. Thanks for watching and it’s bye for
Today was a bucket list item on a bucket list trip!
We are going to visit Mount Fuji!!
We’ve booked this tour with @japanpanoramictourschannel9946 and the day started super early as we were picked up at Gina for a 2 hour trip to Mt Fuji 5th station.
We were told that this area was closed by this time last year so we are so lucky as this is the highest part of Fuji accessible by vehicle.
It was absolutely freezing at minus 13 degrees Celsius. The views were breathtaking and something we will never forget! At the 5th station was a few gift shops and a shrine so we took our photos, got a stamp from the shrine, a hot drink from the shop and headed back to the bus.
The guide then took us to our next stop which was lunch at Oshino ninja village. The food was great but the dining room was compact so we didn’t film but we took time to explore the amazing grounds and get even more photos of Fuji.
We then headed off to the Hakone doorway and lake Ashi cruise. Unfortunately the ropeway was closed due to high wind so we had a bit of free time to explore before our pirate chip cruise across lake Ashi.
When boarding we were given the choice of upgrading to 1st class for the equivalent of £3 each so we jumped at that as they said it was the same amount of space but with less people and there was free water.
The cruise itself was lovely with great views!
Once of the cruise we headed into the gift shop before the guide took us to the Shinkansen station at odawara. The train was included in the package and only took 30 mins to get back to Tokyo station.
In Tokyo station we Anime shops before heading to Ramen street. This place was so busy and we didn’t have a clue which was best so we chose one with a line and weren’t disappointed. The Ramen was amazing and such great value.
We then headed back to the hotel for a much needed rest ahead of exploring team labs on New Year’s Day.
#travel #japan #fuji
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