With jetlag, we woke up way too early as expected (3:30 am). Tried to convince ourselves it could be different till like 4:15, before deciding to head out for Mt. Oyama. Walking through the streets of Tokyo is always one of the little highlights of our trips, especially in the early morning when we have it all to ourselves.

I was a bit grumpy for the very long trip across Tokyo by subway, but found solace in all the other people who were napping on the train this early as well. On the next leg of the trip, about an hour on the Okyuda line, Lu ended up being next next to a passed out drunk guy who kept taking up as much room as we’d give him. Then a 30 min bus, and finally we started walking up the mountain.

Absolutely beautiful views, lush forest, ancient Shinto and Buddhist statues and temples the whole way. But also absolutely steep. Felt pretty winded after reaching the initial Afuri shrine, which wasn’t even close to half way done.

Decided to wait in line for Teahouse Sekison (茶寮 石尊) to open, and boy was that the right call. We had some social anxiety about whether it was even going to open, and missed our chance to be first in line, but still got a nice seat and our drinks and food quickly. Matcha tiramisu, matcha latte, spicy latte (chai), all impeccable. Match Tiramisu, not too sweet of course.

Did the rest of the mountain to the summit. Some of the highlights were:

  • perfectly clear views of Mt Fuji.
  • very old Japanese people showing better fitness than us.

Somehow they manually manage a little restaurant to function at the peak. We replaced all the sweat with soba and fried onirigiri ( literally everyone had homemade onirigir except us it seemed like), and we were ready to head back down!

After a surprisingly long hike back, we decided to take the tramcar down to save our legs a little bit. While restaurant availability was haphazard, we did manage to get some delicious tofu at Wachu-Sou: Green tofu was beautiful, flavor, texture, novelty, omg. Clam chowder tofu

The trip back was a tired one, fairly busy on the trains but fortunately uneventful. I am a hungry man, so wanted to eat a proper dinner. The Flamme d’Or, Asahi’s restaurant at the base of their headquarters, was on my list, with a surprisingly good Tabelog rating (3.49). The cuisine is German beer hall style, at least the Japanese version of it. While it wasn’t the best thing we’d eaten, it was a fun trip, and interesting to see the clientele – primarily older Japanese people, and of course some white tourists on pilgrimage. We got to try some unique Asahi offerings, and then got some konbini pudding for dessert.

Go back | Home | Next up