It's about …
It’s coming up to Valentines Day, so what better reason for a lakeside country town to hold a cheesy romantic festival?
That’s right, at Miyagase, in Kanagawa Prefecture, it was the Valentine Week festival. This was an event stumbled upon after a hike to nearby Tanzawa-san – we’d descended the mountain, it was getting dark, and were searching for the bus stop to get back to the Tokyo, when we stumbled upon a surreal lake-side event. (more…)
Last weekend, I hoped to go up a mountain and see some snow. Tanzawa-san is around halfway between Tokyo and Mt Fuji, and it seemed to be a prospect to have a bit of white stuff on top of it without needing too much winter hiking equipment.
The first part of this walk was a revisit of the climb up To no Take. This is reached by taking the Odakyu Railway from Shinjuku to a station called Shibusawa (the kaisoku express trains stop here), and then catching a local bus up the hill to Okura. The track then ascends steeply up Okura Ridge.
I did part of this walk last July in the summer heat. This time, the trees had lost all their leaves, but the weather was crisp and clear. Instead of summer humidity, mist and haze, this time it was sunny and cool. And, sensational views of Mt Fuji.
