Day 3

A fairly chilled out day today primarily due to the climb soon upon us. We faced a difficult decision this morning, we knew we had to get to our tea ceremony for 12:00, but do we take a taxi, bus, or face the underground. When looking at prices there was only one option, the underground, however this would mean we would need to take on the world busiest underground station in the world with 3,000,000 users per day (well 3,000,002) today. Having looked a youtube videos I now felt prepared enough to take on the Japanese subway system, and once we worked out how the paying system worked we where incredibly impressed with the way it works, just follow the crowds and the signs. However just when we though we had mastered this, Mike shot off and through the wrong gate, which now meant he was stuck on the inside. I faced a difficult decision, do I leave my own Father to face the wrath on the Japanese Transport police alone, or do I too illegally pass through the barrier and support him in what could be a difficult time. I took the room key and left him....only joking I too passed through the barrier. We where now stuck on the inside and unsure where to go, but we could see the light at the end of the tunnel, information kiosk. Who thankfully spoke no English so we pushed through the wrong way, pretended to be on the outside, and then turned round and headed out. So in the space of 5 minutes we had broken the law 4 times, and we are currently in the room awaiting the knock on the door to be taken away!!!

However, the crimes where worth it... Happo-En is amazing. In typical Tokyo fashion, between 6 sky scrapers and modern buildings is a 300 year old Japanese garden, it would appear that random Emperors then send historic buildings over to the garden to preserve them. The main income seems to be from weddings as the garden is picturesque, however we where to visit the tea room and partake in our own special tea ceremony. So we where guided to the Tea room or "Muan" as we now know. This tea room was built during the Meiji Era by a silk merchant, and now we where being led like royality to our ceremony. Inside where 2 Japanese Women, who greeted us and gave us our own fans, (we where very grateful due to the stupidly high temperatures outside) we sat down and the ceremony began. We where handed a piece of paper on it we laid 3 sweets, the first was a jelly type sweet with a sugar coating, the second was a rice pie with some bean filling (Tasted like flour) and the third was a sugar shell. We where to eat these while the lady brewed our tea. One the tea was brewed it was served in a bowl, and we had to bow, rotate it clockwise twice, Take a sip, drink it all, slurp at the end, then rotate anti clockwise twice. A lot to remember but we did it, and then to our amazement we where told that the bowls we where using had a symbol of Mount Fuji on and we where surrounded by Fuji Cherryl Trees, by which we explained we had one in our garden at home, she was quite impressed!! We then toured the garden, before chilling by the pool back at the hotel...

So the time has come to commence the climb, a lot of apprehension today, and talk by the pool, so how likely is it really for Altitude sickness to kick in..."Well we've been skiing in high altitude resorts", having now googled it they are 1500m lower than we are going. Yer but at least it wont erupt to which I then read "Mount Fuji last erupted in 1708. Many scientist believe that this valcanoe has a history of errupting every 300 years" so basically it is due!! But its all mind over matter...the next blog update will hopefully be an indepth description of the successful climb up Mount Fuji!!! 
If you are really bored photos have been upload to www.flickr.com/timmckeegan 


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