JapanGirl64

 On Saturday we took the train to Yokohama and visited the Sea Paradise amusement park ("Sea Para" in Japanese). We enjoyed the park but we only really wanted to see the aquarium. It was beautiful - I always love looking at all the amazing creatures that live under the sea! After Sea Para we stopped by the Yokohama Strawberry Festival. I was hoping for something more Farmer's Marketish - but it was really a food event with Strawberries being the theme of the day!                                                                       Ginormous WALRUS!                                    Can you see the walrus is standing on the bottom?

 This weekend we took a drive to the Five Lakes area near Mt Fuji to visit a frozen waterfall called Hahanoshirataki. Legend says that this is the place where pilgrims preparing to ascend Mt Fuji would come to wash and purify themselves before they began the trek. We were a little nervous about the drive because this area had a pretty big snow fall a day or two earlier. The purple grape (our car) has what you might call "toy tires". So were hesitant to drive it in snowy conditions. However, we found that most of the main roads were plowed and clear.  Our first stop was to visit an ice cave (lava tube - part of the Mt Fuji network of lava tubes). It was quite small, but with the cool lighting inside the ice was pretty impressive. The forest near the entrance to the ice cave was beautiful with all the new snow. But we had some pretty big hunks fall down all around us. One hit me on the hand. I bit of a sting, but no major injury. Next we went to Kawaguchi Asama Shrine. This shr...