Final Day in Japan

National Art Center 

Food Court at Mitsukoshi

Ando, IsseyMiyake Design Museum

National Art Center 

Food Court 

Chicken Yokitori

Chicken Pate

Chicken Yokitori with Wasabe

Jiro Sushi

Ginza Architecture at Night

Today was our last full day in Tokyo. We leave a few minutes after midnight to return to Los Angeles. In one of the quirks of the International Date Line we get to celebrate Halloween twice. Today is the 31^st in Tokyo, we leave for the US on the 1^st but arrive in the US back on 31^st! Trick or treating twice!

We took the subway to Midtown and visited the Design Museum by our favorite architect Ando and Issey Miyaki then on to the Nation Art Center. It is a huge complex of a museum with spectacular architecture.

Back by subway to Mitsukoshi Department Store and finally back to The Four Seasons where we enjoyed a final massage before we have dinner The massage was excellent!

For dinner we went back to Birdland (which turned out to be quite close to our hotel). We knew that Birdland (which is a 2 star Michelen Rated Yorkitori restaurant was down a flight of stairs inside a subway station. What we didn’t know is that it is located directly next the famous Jiro Sushi (of the documentary Jiro Dreams of Sushi). We peeked into the restaurant. I am glad we went back twice to Tomoki Sushi rather than eating at Jiro.  The husband wife owners are a wonderful couple and I am sure we enjoyed it more than if we had gone to Jiro. We sat next to an interesting women at Birdland, although she lives in England she works sometimes in Japan and India. She works for a publishing company. She reached into her purse and pulled out two unreleased books and gave them to us. We convinced her she must come to the Jaipur Literary Festival in January. Hopefully she does and we can meet up with her again!

After dinner we went for a very long walk in the Ginza. Every possible high-end store you can think of is represented in oversized architecturally interesting buildings that are grandly illuminated. Some of the buildings have light shows  and animation projected onto them.   We walked all over the Ginza and then back to our hotel to catch a taxi with all of our luggage to take us to Haneda Airport. Haneda is closer to downtown Tokyo then Narita, but doesn’t have the facilities as its bigger, newer brother.

Our plane left Japan at 12:05am. We got on, I had a Scotch and sleeping pill and fell directly to sleep. We both slept for about 7 hours and woke up with only 2 ½  hours till we land. It has been a great trip. We will return. If you are ever interested in travelling to Japan, I can’t recommend highly enough Esprit Travel and Nancy Craft. Every year Condi Nast Traveler ranks them # 1. They will craft a vacation that perfectly fits your desires.

We Will Never Eat Sushi in LA Part Duex

Boro Kimono at Amuse Museum

Senso-ji Temple

Beef at $ 450.00 a pound!

Grilled Mackerel

Red Snapper

Tuna (Toro)

Uni (Sea Urchin)

Sea Eel Sushi with Sweet Miso Sauce

Corner View From Our Room at Four Seasons

We awakened to a non-rainy day! We decided to walk outside for a bit, then returned to our room for breakfast followed by our last visit to the hot springs, soaking up the hot volcanic water. We sadly checked out of Gora Kaden and were driven down the mountain to catch the Shinkansen train for the short ride to Tokyo. We had reservations at the Four Seasons Hotel. A representative from the Four Seasons met us at the station, gathered up our luggage and walked us the short distance to the Hotel. No taxi, no car just a short walk.

Our room overlooks the tracks at Tokyo Station. That might sound weird but it is wonderful. It is like looking down on a giant toy train set. Every minute or so, multiple trains come zooming in and out of the station. This is one of the busiest train stations in the world. It is fun to watch (especially after you have had a couple of glasses of wine).

We headed out to Asakusa area of Tokyo taking the Ginza Line Subway. I really enjoy figuring out how to navigate the Subway. I only wish we had such a comprehensive transportation system in Los Angeles.

Asakusa is an area of Tokyo that still reflects the old city. It is dominated by the incredible Senso-ji Temple which is giant Pagoda. The reason we were headed to that neighborhood was to visit a new museum: The Amuse Museum. It wasn’t about appetizers, but rather the show was about Boro. Boro is a textile tradition in Japan where old clothing is constantly repaired by patchwork. Nothing is thrown away, the poor, mostly farmer families would constantly repair garments they wore by recycling and attaching small pieces of other garments. Nothing was ever discarded. It is the ultimate recycling. Surprisingly, these old patched garments, look like current fashion items. The documentation of the textiles was in English and Japanese and was outstanding. The collector of over 20,000 garments, Chuzaburo Tanaka, has meticulously documented his collection of Boro and in addition has written extremely emotional descriptions of the women who labored to create these garments. It is an excellent show.

We then headed by subway back to our hotel, but had to make a stop at our favorite department store anywhere: Mitsukoshi. Unlike American Department stores, not only do they sell clothing and house wares but they have a combination of both groceries and takeout food that are unbelievable and extremely expensive. You can’t help wondering who can afford to but all these delicious items. We love walking through the store.

Once again, Tokyo overwhelms. We have a corner suite and I could stay up all night watching the trains and looking at the incredible architecture. I don’t think any city has more interesting architecture than Tokyo. The city is incredibly wealthy. It reminds me in a lot of respects of the movie Blade Runner. It is like stepping into the future. The downside of course is no one can find anything. We got in our cab to go to dinner, we handed a map to the restaurant, in Kanji to our driver and he proceeded to get lost finding the restaurant. It is typical. With all of their GPS and technology, he eventually called the restaurant and then dropped us off on a small street and pointed in a general direction. Of course ALL of the signs are in Japanese, and we could have been directly in front of the restaurant and wouldn’t have known if we were there or not. Suddenly a woman ran up to us and said “Mr. Meyer?”. The restaurant sent her out to look for us.

We were going back to Tomoki Sushi. We ate there at the beginning of our trip, and we knew we would never get Sushi like this in Los Angeles. The Husband and Wife owners are adorable and the sushi was great. We didn’t order anything; they just brought out course after course. Highlights were the Salmon Roe, Red Snapper, Sea Urchin, Sea Eel Sashimi with sweet Miso.  In reality, all courses were great. When we left the restaurant we needed to hail a taxi. The wife came out stood in the middle of the street in our chef whites and halted a cab for us. She told the taxi driver to take us to the Four Seasons and I handed him a hotel card with a map and the address in Japanese. As he approached the Hotel, he continued past it. I said the hotel was behind us now about 50 yards. He pulled over, let us out and refused any payment. This time the taxi gods were with us.

Hakone in the Rain

Okada Museum of Art, Hakone

Trees turning at Gora Kadan

Shrimp Dumpling Soup with edible Chrysanthemum, Red Spinach and a touch of Yuzu flavor

Thinly Sliced Toro Sashimi

The Tenderest Meat Ever for Shabu-Shabu

Hot Dashi for Dipping Meat and Vegetables 

Outdoor Public Mens Bath with steam rising

We woke up to a rainy day on top of our mountain in Hakone. If you are on vacation and its raining, what a place to be: Gora Kadan is an incredible onsen and there are nearby museums. We took a long bath outside in the rain enjoying the hot volcanic waters. The trees are turning red, especially the maples in the quintessential autumn weather.

After a long soak, Hiroshi brought us a feast of a breakfast. He continually reminds us we don’t have to eat it all! After getting dressed the staff drove us to the Okada Museum of Art. This is a brand new museum and just opened on Oct 4^th. It is typical of many Japanese museums (now that I think of it, American too) where a business tycoon buys a ton of art and builds and endows a museum. Think of the Norton Simon Museum, The Getty Museum, The Broad Museum, The Huntington Museum, The Hammer Museum all in Los Angeles.

This is a splendid museum, devoted to Oriental Ceramics, Japanese Painting (mostly on screens), and other arts. It covers 5 floors of a brand new building. We spent almost 3 hours enjoying the art. The museum is having a soft opening (very Japanese) and we were practically the only people in the museum. We had a great time. It amazes me that there are large ceramic vessels that are from 2500 – 3000 BC, still in existence. How they found there way to this collector I am sure would make a great story. If you are wondering how this esthete mogul made his money the answer is simple: Slot Machines. He is one of the biggest manufacturers of them in the world. Who would have thought?

We returned to the hotel and relaxed before our massages. After our massages the rain had let up and we walked around outside, returning for some champagne. Another long soak in the natural hot springs off of our room was next on our agenda.

We had a multiple course dinner again. I can’t believe how much they serve. Hiroshi said again, we didn’t have to finish it all. A few of the standout dishes were the Shrimp Dumpling Soup the dumpling was like the lightest matzo ball ever, of course since it was filled with shrimp, it wasn’t exactly kosher. The Sashimi was spectacular. You used your chopsticks to roll the sashimi up and eat in one or two bytes. We had never eaten Shabu-Shabu before. I can’t describe how tender the meat was, you dropped it in the bubbling dashi and it cooks in less than 30 seconds. The meat as you can see in the picture is incredibly marbled. We had three different sauces to use with the cooked meat and vegetables.  They served us a giant platter of meat, we only ate about half of it. Later tonight will try the public bath here at Gora Kandan. Tomorrow we leave from our mountain top and take the bullet train to Tokyo.

Taking the Waters at Gora Kandan

Looking from our dining room thru bedroom to private garden and pool

Our Pool and Garden

Landscaping at night

Hiroshi Serving Plum Wine

How to serve Sake

Grilled Spanish Mackerel in Miso Sauce

We could get use to this

White Miso Soup with King Prawn, Spring Onion and Japanese Mustard

Sashimi

We checked out of the hotel and took a taxi to the train station to board the  Shinkansen (Bullet Train) heading for the city of: Odawara. Before boarding I bought a Bento box to eat on the train. This is very traditional, and most of the people on the train bring Bento boxes. They are sold in the train station and are of every variety of food. I chose pork cutlets.

Flawlessly (as all the connections are) as soon as we stepped off the train and exited through the turnstiles, our driver was waiting for us holding up a sign with our names. He spoke no English at all. We then drove for 40 minutes up a very windy, narrow two lane mountain road. We were headed for the small city of Hokone to Gora Kadan our home for the next two days. This was the former retreat for the Imperial Family. It is breathtaking. Gora Kadan is an Oncen. That means it has natural hot springs for bathing. Our room has a private outdoor pool just for Cathy and I. They also have public bathing facilities (men and women are separate).

You needn’t pack your clothes when you come here, because our butler, Hiroshi, dresses us up in Yukata for our stay. You never wear western clothes in the Oncen, just the Yukata and its matching down vest. Hiroshi, shows us how to dress and does everything for us. There is no public dinning. We eat alone in our room served by Hiroshi. The whole idea of coming here is to decompress, there are a few museums in the area that we will visit, but essentially it is relax, eat, drink, massage, bath – repeat until you leave. We took our first hot spring bath, then walked around Gora Kadan taking in the architecture and the beautiful natural setting.

Dinner was served to us in our dining room it was a classic Kaiseki dinner. We had nine small (and not so small courses). The highlight for us was a white miso soup the Sashmi and the grilled Spanish Mackerel with miso sauce. Of course two carafes of sake made the dinner perfect.

As full as I was I scheduled an after dinner massage at 10pm. What an introduction to Gora Kadan.