So come out of your cave walking on your hands

We live in a town called Zushi, which is directly east of Kamakura, which I've raved about many times. They are divided by mountains, on which there are many hiking routes and some historical sites. Since Kamakura was once the seat of the shogunate, these sites date back for centuries. One of those sites only opens a few days a week for a few weeks of the year, if at all, and we were able to jump on the opportunity to visit!

This is the Mandarado complex of yagura, which are manmade caves for the memorial services for the dead dating back to the samurai era between the 13th to 15th centuries. The dead would be cremated nearby and then buried or memorialized in the caves. There are more than 150 caves here, making it the largest of such clusters!

I love this handsome face.

We finished our outing with some delicious burgers - some of the best we've found in Japan. Mine had 5 different kind of cheese on it, and it's really good our cave visit involved a bit of hike to balance that out.

Local friends, this is only open Saturdays-Mondays until December 17, so if you want to see it, go soon!

Look around, look around!

Back in January we did one the best things we've ever done in Tokyo - a puzzle scavenger hunt in and around the Tokyo Metro. We were super excited to find out that it was back with all new adventures and puzzles! And, once again, the Tokyo Underground Mysteries did not disappoint!

Many other people doing the same thing we were doing - trying to interpret a series of windows!

We got a late start in our day, so we started with lunch while we figured out the first puzzle and then we were off!

Fried rice (chahan) from Pepper Lunch

Godzilla Road with Godzilla in the background!

Subway buddies!

Once again, my favorite part was the mystery train ride. We got on a the train, per instructions, and then had to answer questions solvable only during the ride between each stop until we knew where to get off next.

Watching the board for answers and clues

Puzzle book in one hand, train handle in the other, pencil had to go somewhere!

Not a puzzle, just an amusing sign outside of a restroom

Dialing for a clue

Chocolate pecan waffle break

Found an excellent view of the Shibuya crossing!

It took us a little longer this time, but we worked well together and definitely wouldn't want to do this alone. Once we'd acquired all the clues, we headed home, took a break, ate Thanksgiving Dinner Part Deux, and then spread everything out on the dining room table to solve the final puzzle. It took some trial and error and even a little serendipity, but we did it!

More windows = more clues

Hooray!

For those in the Tokyo area or visiting before the end of January, I highly recommend this adventure!

I'll be your candle on the water

This morning, Blake took me on a little adventure to a place here in Japan that he had been to but I had not, which is a rare occasion here. Our destination today was the Kannonzaki lighthouse. The first lighthouse at this location, built in 1869, was the first lighthouse in Japan and designed by the same French engineer who designed the base for the Japanese that we currently use. That first lighthouse was destroyed by an earthquake in 1922, and the second by the great Kanto earthquake in 1923, so this structure is technically the 3rd one, built in 1925.

It's a short little hike from the bus stop and a climb uphill at the end, then stairs in the lighthouse itself, but the view of Tokyo Bay is incredible. Lots of ships and boats were out on the water today and even though clouds obscured much of the view on the other side of the bay, it was still lovely.

On the way down the stairs, Blake told me some of the best trivia I may have ever heard and was officially surprised I didn't know yet - why spiral staircases are usually clockwise. It's so that defenders of the castle would be able to use their dominant hand (usually the right hand) to wield their sword against attackers who would be forced to fight with their non-dominant hand or run into walls. I took stage combat in college and love sword fighting as a result and I love trivia, so this was great to learn!

Before catching our bus home, we shared a Coke in a limited edition Shonan bottle. The Shonan region is essentially our backyard and it felt appropriate to buy one on a day we were exploring it!

In case I haven't made it clear, I love living here - learning both the ancient history and more modern and experiencing this fantastic culture. I also had a chance to practice my Japanese language more than usual today, since we helped clean the church before our outing and the sister missionaries are having a no English day today to work on their Japanese language skills. I responded a lot in English, but enjoyed practicing my listening skills!

It's been two years now since we moved here and it's gone by fast. We will still be here for a little bit, but it's not forever, so I still have more learning and exploring to do!

A cave with a few small shrines on the hike to the lighthouse

Eating things only with chopsticks

I've made it pretty obvious that I love Kamakura. No matter how times I've been, there is always more to explore or someone to introduce to something I've previously fallen in love with or favorites to see again. Today's trip was most of the latter two options. With Blake preparing for his next TAD soon and a move and other life changes closer on the horizon than we will ever be truly prepared for, we are trying to be proactive about visiting favorites potentially for the last time (at least together) and crossing things off our Japan bucket list. 

Blake really wanted to make sure we visited our favorite restaurant again, the one we just happened to find on our very first Japan outing and take as many people to as we can, so we built a Kamakura day around that. 

Lunch was delicious as always. We love yakiniku so much that we have our own tabletop grill for it at home now, but this place is so good and the lunch price is excellent, so it's worth the trip. 

Following lunch, we went to a chopsticks store that we feel is like Ollivander's wand shop from Harry Potter, where the wand chooses the wizard. There are fancy and fun chopsticks of all price ranges, many of which you can have a name engraved on. We've purchased several of these for gifts in the last two years, but we hadn't yet purchased any for ourselves. More on what we picked in a few paragraphs, when it's time to pick them up. 

A few days ago, I asked Blake if he had been to the bamboo forest in Kamakura yet. "Nope!" he responded. "Have I taken everyone but you!?" I queried and resolved to fix that today. It's a small but gorgeous garden on the grounds the Hokoku-ji Temple, and we enjoyed a stroll whilst our chopsticks were engraved.

Our first (or preferred, in Blake's case) names are written on each chopstick, one in hiragana, one in katakana, which I wrote out myself on the order from. My Japanese handwriting still isn't great, but it was sufficient today!

In case you can't read Japanese, mine is the pink with the inlaid mother of pearl and Blake's is the blue with wood. The hiragana is on the left of each set, katakana on the right.

Finally, we topped off the day at what seems to be our favorite Kamakura ice cream shop with their latest creation, a five layer ice cream!

From top to bottom - matcha, purple sweet potato, blue Ramune soda, strawberry, and vanilla.

It was a lovely outing. I hope that wherever we live in the future we can find little places like this that we enjoy revisiting over and over again. 

The art of the trade, how the sausage gets made

We had grand plans today. A trip to Tokyo to a museum we hadn't seen yet, a restaurant I've had my eye on for a while, and possibly some shopping. We don't have much time before Blake leaves for his next TAD (temporarily assigned duty), so we're trying to knock some bucket list items before he goes.

But then yesterday was a bigger day than we anticipated and we didn't get to bed until late (11pm, so late, we're so old now) and our house was kind of messy and we decided to just stay home for the day. Our house is now cleaner, we had video chats with both sets of parents, I had time for a small nap (or at least a closed eyes in a dark room for a bit, not sure if I slept), and we took our dog and our weekend dog friend to the dog park. It was a good Saturday.

We figured that we'd at least get out of the house for dinner though and went to a Chinese/ramen restaurant just outside the gate of our housing detachment that we haven't been to in almost two years. We went twice shortly after moving in and then tend to forget about it as an option, even though it's the only restaurant within walking distance (while the one on our detachment is under reconstruction) and less than 15 minutes away.

I love watching the kitchen staff at ramen restaurants

Blake chose shrimp in chili sauce over rice, which wasn't too spicy and, therefore, pretty yummy.

I chose . . . poorly. I don't know what I thought I was going to get, but it was some sort of scrambled eggs with crab meat in a tomato sauce of some kind and I only managed to eat about a third of it.

Fortunately, Blake didn't finish his shrimp, and the side dishes (bean sprouts, egg drop soup, and spring rolls) were sufficient and delicious. I usually order pretty well at all the different restaurants we've tried, even when I can't read the menu, but it's always a risk to try something new. Most of the food we've had in Japan has been even better than I expected (American Japanese restaurants are probably ruined for us now), but then sometimes, like tonight, it's weirder or less desirable than expected. And that's okay. That's life! There were a lot of other good looking things on that menu, so I'm just going to have to go back and try again.

The sign outside our gate as seen on our walk back home

Rise Up

Blake's job as a first tour JAG has been to rotate between the four main branches of military law to learn about their functions and start figuring out what he likes best and what he is suited for. He started in prosecution, then legal assistance, the operational law/command services, and finally spent the last several months in defense. It was actually a bit more complicated than all that with some of his temporary assignments, but that's the basic gist of it.

Defense is actually a different command than the rest of it, for obvious conflict of interest reasons. You can't have the same chain of command working on opposite sides of the same case. So in May, he checked out of the Region Legal Service Office and checked into the Defense Service Office. Within the next two weeks, he will check out of the DSO and back into the RLSO for his next assignment.

As such, the DSO had two farewell events in his honor this week. The first was an informal dinner with fellow officers (spouses were invited, but I was the only in attendance) at a local izakaya, a type of Japanese bar where you can get a private room and order small dishes for everyone to share to accompany your beverages of choice. He received a certificate that was lighthearted in nature to commemorate his time at DSO and we enjoyed the casual social time.

The final event was his formal farewell from his command during an all hands meeting, in uniform, at the office. Here, his commanding officer read a letter detailing his accomplishments over the last five months and praised him in front of the entire command. Normally, he would have also received a plaque, but the engraver is apparently down and he will just have to get that eventually.

I cried some happy, proud tears. He really has done great work and learned a lot, which will certainly serve him well in his career to come! This life isn't easy, but he is doing it well!

Another hundred people just got off of the train

I'm a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as the Mormons. When possible on Sundays, I discuss some things related to my faith and what I believe. With respect to your own beliefs, I hope this gives you a chance to get to know me and my religion a little better. For previous installments, click here.

When I was in London on study abroad, our group was split up between several area congregations (ward) so as not to overwhelm one with 40 of us. My assignment was in a ward that was an hour and a half away from where we were staying and involved at least two trains and a bus. I had been asked to teach a youth Sunday School class, so I frequently used that time to plan my lessons. It was only for about seven weeks, so it wasn't a terrible inconvenience for long.

For the last two years in Japan, we've been taking the train to church again. Two trains again, but no bus. If we leave our house at exactly 15 minutes after the hour (45 minutes before services start), we arrive about 10 minutes early, which is, in our opinion, right on time. 

Last week, we had almost two hours on multiple trains each way to attend stake (multiple congregations in a larger geographical area) conference. Frequently, they broadcast the meeting to our individual buildings, but sometimes we are requested to gather in person for additional fellowship.

By contrast, while I was growing up in both Utah and Texas, church was rarely more than a five minute drive for regular meetings, sometimes 30 minutes for stake meetings. As an adult in Virginia, maybe it's been closer to 15 minutes. So, 40 minutes or more one way each week has been adjustment, but since attending our church meetings has been a top priority in our marriage, we've made it work. 

Sometimes I miss the easy commute, but I enjoy the time with Blake, talking about our church meetings, or family stuff, or even brainstorming what's going to be fastest to make for lunch we when we get home. Sometimes it's the only train ride(s) we get together all week.  

Of course, church is more than just a weekly meeting. Church should be everywhere all the time, and I really appreciate this relatively new video form our church about that.

Lookin' for some hot stuff, baby this evenin'

For some reason or another, every time Blake and I have planned a trip to Hakone, a mountain town southwest of Tokyo well known for its volcanic hot springs resorts and views of Mount Fuji and only a couple of hours away from us, something has come up and we've had to cancel. We kept hearing of friends' adventures there and seeing beautiful photos and just never making it ourselves.

Just walking around the town is charming!

Until this weekend! We finally made it! We could make it one long day trip, but that would mean close to five or six hours on trains and buses just getting there and back, not to mention any travel around. We chose to make it a little more relaxing of a getaway and did the long trip out there Friday after work and stayed the night at a hotel to rest up before a day of exploring. We found a nice western-style hotel with an onsen, instead a more pricey (but definitely worth the experience when you're in Japan) traditional Japanese inn or ryokan. I took advantage of the onsen before bed for even more relaxation, and we both enjoyed the breakfast provided in the morning.

One night away from home and we accidentally pack the same shirt (our family reunion shirt from when Blake's entire family came to visit us this summer). Luckily, we both wore hoodies most of the day.

The first few hours of our day seemed like just going from one mode of transportation to another, but the variety of transportation methods and the lovely views of the fall leaves in the Hakone National Park were the point. The joy is in the journey, after all.

Our first stop was Hakone Shrine and the gorgeous torii gate submerged into Lake Ashi, a volcanic crater lake.

Then, even though it hadn't been high on our priority list, we took a reproduction pirate cruise ship north on Lake Ashi. It was included in our Hakone Free Pass, a pass we decided to buy at the last minute that covered most bus routes and all the other transportation we took plus discounts or entry at a variety of other places in the area that was well worth the money, and it was going from where we were to where we wanted to be for the next leg of our adventure, so why not? It was a lovely little cruise with excellent leaf peeping opportunities. On clearer days, we would have seen Mount Fuji.

The ship Victory

The same torii gate from earlier!

It dropped us off at the beginning station of the Hakone Ropeway, which we took all the way to the end and then took a cable car.

We stopped at Owakudani, a volcanic valley with active sulphur vents, including a new one from a small eruption in 2015. Here, you can eat black eggs that have been boiled in the sulphuric water. Each one you eat is said to add seven years to your life!

After lunch at a Ninja Cafe, where the staff were dressed as ninjas, we headed to Yunessun, which was conveniently only a few minutes by bus from the end of the cable car line we had just chosen to take to the end and go from there. It's almost like I planned that! (Maybe part of me knew this, but I did surprisingly little advanced planning for this trip. I knew what we wanted to do and kind of where stuff was, but we figured out the travel parts as we went.)

Yunessun is basically a onsen themed water park. There is a traditional onsen portion, though we skipped that this time, but the main attraction is the family friendly, bathing suit area with a variety of different themed baths. We tried just about all of them! It was a chilly day, so relaxing in a warm bath was just what we needed. Besides the ones pictured below, we tried a few different tea baths, one in a cave with an aquarium of jellyfish, and more!

Coffee bath (sorry about the water on the lens)

Sake!

Wine - This one was probably our favorite. Fun color and nice temperature, so we started and ended our bath exploration here.

Then, though there were many other attractions in the region that we could spend days locating and enjoying, we decided that we would also be well served by not completely exhausting ourselves and heading home in time for dinner (which we picked up on the way).

It was a great day and we're so glad we finally made it! Hopefully, we can go back and see some of the things we missed!