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Published: November 19th 2014
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Another beautiful morning with a clear blue sky saw us heading up the mountain again to explore Lake Ashi.
On the ropeway ride Mt Fuji was again visible in the distance. On the ride we met a couple of fellow Australians.
We arrived on the lake shore just in time to catch a boat. These boats look like a cross between a pirate gallion and a Mississippi paddle steamer - quite unique. Joan missed the OH&S talk about life jackets, here such things seem to be ignored. Lake Ashi is 20km around and about 6km long. It is shaped like a cressent as the initial crater lake was partially filled by a subsiquent erruption. The shores are mainly covered by forest, beautiful in their autum colours at this time of the year. Fishermen could be seen on the lake after brown trout and tiny fish called spelt.
After disembarking on the far end we spent some time trying to find a museum of ancient armoury and a garden of rare grasses. However our map was more diagramatic than accurate and disappoingly we found neither. Undetered we set off to investigate the lunch options and tourist traps. In one
shop we found a man crafting parquetry items and we were fascinated by puzzle boxes, one of the many items he was producing. Puzzle boxes use a number of hidden movements as a form of lock. Anything from 4 to 72 moves were required to open the boxes. Looking at a box it was impossible to tell what part would move at all.
Wallets a little lighter we turned to lunch. After checking a number of places - thank goodness for menus with photos - we selected an establishment, struggled with what looked like an automatic door and chuckled with a lady who showed us the touch door opener. We joined a queue and the same lady indicated we needed to add our name to a list in order to be called. Our name stood out as it was the only name not in Japanese characters. We wondered how our name would be pronounced but when it was our turn 'Greg' was called out as a smiling man beckoned to us. With no English in sight we managed to place our order for a set meal featuring panco crumbed spelt (small fish about the size of an anchovy) and
Our yummy lunch.
This is a typical Japanese meal of three courses.
First is the deep fried whole small fish with a salad (rear right).
Then the ever present miso soup in the bowl with a lid. This is eaten with the bowl of rice. You add whatever condiments you like, but usually some pickles, in this case pickled ginger (centre front). Also pickled seaweed in the small black bowl. If you want further variation on the table were toasted sesame seeds and a spicy sprinkle in the wooden container (both top rear left).
The desert is red beans with an avocado jelly and cream. Desert is not particularly common. beers.
Beer has become our standard meal beverage as wine is rarely seen and the larger style beer goes very well with Japanese food.
The set lunch turned out to include three courses, very good value. The whole small fish were stunning and the desert was a plesant surprise even if we could not work out what it was. Add in a fantastic window seat view - what more could you ask for.
We are now becoming quite partial to rice with miso soup, a standard part of many meals. The miso soup is stunning and the accompanying bowl of rice comes with some form of pickled veg and perhaps other seasonings that you can add to the rice as you see fit.
In our wandering we spotted a service station and Greg went over to check out the fuel price. $1.30 a litre was much lower than expected.
From the shore we spotted the town's famous toti gate in the distance and decided to hike there. The ancient stone path wound through the forest along the shore line and took us to the gate. The WW2 peace treaty is entombed in this gate, hence
its historic significance. It is probably no coincidence that the sister gate is found in the lake at Hiroshima.
Behind the gate a flight of stairs led uphill. Eventually we came to an ancient temple complex, established 1250 years ago! This was the first time we had seen a working temple with people offering prayers and performing various rituals.
With the sun getting lower and the mountain temperature dropping we made our way home.
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