Today, Friday Oct 14th, we were able to make the trek out to Hakone.

It was about a 2 hour drive, and all 5 of us crammed into the tiny little car to get there. I can definitely say it wasn’t the most comfortable ride as a result. We didn’t stay too long, but took a ride on the “pirate ship” cruise they had which crosses the lake which Hakone sits on. It has the looks of an old ship, but is clearly powered by modern engines.

You can see Fuji-san (Mt Fuji) off in the distance in some photos. A lot of untouched Japanese landscape, which is reminiscent of Western Washington.

At the end, we stopped in the town briefly to capture the pictures of the little shrine next to the giant torii gate that you pass through heading toward where we boarded the pirate ship.

After Hakone, I wanted to be let out at Odawara, and was planning to simply take the train back by myself. (Less cramped and gave the remaining passengers a bit more room to stretch out.) We all pretty much ended up getting out and visiting Odawara Castle.

The first set of pictures are of the bridge crossing the moat (only goes part way around the castle, not completely encircling). There are lots of Koi (large carp fish) in it, and when an older Japanese gentleman started throwing bread out into the moat and they went nuts trying to get some.

We then headed in through the main entrance toward the castle.

One of the castle gates, this was not the main gate, but one of a couple of them.

Continuing along the path, I went around toward one of the sides which did not lead through the main gate to the castle and snapped photos of the garden and other features they have along the way. This was along the south-side of the castle.

Along this south-side path on the castle grounds there is also a shrine which I wandered into.

They also apparently have a small little theme park with rides on the grounds, though I didn’t see it completely, I snapped a photo of these train tracks which a small Disneyland-style train runs along. (I saw it pull out with some passengers as I was walking up, but didn’t have enough time to snap a photo before it was gone.)

These are photos of part of the base of the castle grounds itself. Although this castle is not original and was actually rebuilt during the mid-20th century based on age-old information of the grounds and other sources, it still looks very much like it would have during the height of it’s time in the Edo period.

Once I made my way up to the top of where those walls were, I was able to snap a photo of the castle itself.

Huge is definitely the word. It’s certainly not a European style castle, but it’s still very large. (The inside is not full of actual rooms or anything, it’s definitely museum at it’s core, but it’s still very cool.)

There are stairs leading up to the entrance.

A plaque at the base of the stairs.

These are all photos of the exhibits inside the museum, however at one point there is a very clear indicator sign that says you’re not allowed to take photos of the artifacts and things they house and show on a particular section/floor of the building, so I wasn’t able to show some of the hundreds of years old items that they had found in the castle’s ruins prior to it’s rebuilding. It was definitely an amazing experience to walk through none-the-less.

After going up 5 floors (stairs-only), I came out on the top floor and took some photos of the city of Odawara as seen from the castle.

On the way out, I snapped some pictures up close of the main castle gate that I would have entered had I not went around to the side to see the shrine first.

At this point I looked up where the nearest train station was from the Castle (it was only a few blocks away) in my offline maps app and caught the train back home. It was a nice change of pace from the car and because Odawara and all the stops I traveled along were far enough away from Tokyo and Yokohama, and even Yokosuka to some extent, I was able to sit the entire way back instead of standing, which was relief for my poor feet after walking/standing for so long.

All-in-all a great day.