Landed!

And soooooo excited to see my family!

Mt Fuji

We got to our beautiful hotel and had a great Chinese complimented with a magic show from Mai and Kaho. Had a ok to bad night sleep with the doll and  all. But after a Japanese style breakfast we were off to Fuji. Another three hour car ride. We were nervous as we were getting near Fujisan but then out of the corners of our eyes, we saw it. Amazing. It was huge!!!! We drove for a long time up the mountain until we got half way and found a village place! Who knew there was a village on Mt. Fugi?? We ate lunch and got many pictures of Fuji. There were lots of shops on Mt. Fuji. We bought everything from Mt. Fuji beer to keychains. We loved Mt. Fuji, but after a 5 hour drive back to home. But any five hour car ride isn't complete until you have eaten soft cream!

Man vs wild

I'm getting a little sick of blogging for my mom, but you know how it works. The more cooperative and nice you are to your mom, the more willing she is to buy you soft creams. 

On the way to our hotel we took a short detour (about 3 and a half hours) to a big park called Sumatakyou (Kyou means valley) with a cool rope bridge called Yumeno- Tsuribashi high over a river called Sumata river. Of course when we got there, no body had any idea of where a rope bridge is. So the workers did some research, and after  about thirty minutes we figured out where to go. We got out of the car and left Akemi waiting for us to come back. We started our treacherous hike to the bridge. A man later picked us up and drove us half way and we had to walk again. We got to the bridge and the first thing that caught our eye was not the huge rope bridge but the BEAUTIFUL river. It was solid turquoise. BEAUTIFUL. The river was completely surrounded in huge mountains.  Me, Nana, and Mai breezed through it twice and the second time we went the whole way with no hands. My mom was white knuckled the whole time. She was three yards into the bridge when she decided to go back. I pulled a funny trick on her and bounced the bridge. Hahaha she was so mad. We walked back and got some soft cream and Akemi told us we still have three hours to our hotel. Oh boy. 

-michael

While you were sleeping

THE DOLL (read at your own risk and/or if you want to laugh)

Lately I have been waking my mom up in the middle of the night going MOMMY MOMMY and then falling right back to sleep. I think it's revenge for her waking me up every morning like MICHAEL MICHAEL GET UP ITS SO LATE. But last night we stayed in the hotel "Grand XIV." Setsuko calls it what it a actually looks like the "Exiv hotel," but I think it's Roman numerals making it Grand Fourteen hotel, but I don't know. She lives here and I don't. But anyway, yesterday we went to my mom's friends house. She's a doll maker. Here house is filled with dolls. We stayed for an hour and a half. Of course I fell asleep on the tatami floor. Later that day we went to the hotel. It was the nicest, most beautiful hotel I have ever stayed in. The hotel room itself had 6 rooms (including bathrooms) and the biggest shower and bath room ever. We had a good Chinese dinner and fell asleep after that. I have no recollection of this but my mom told me. At 5 in the morning I woke up going MOMMY, MOMMY, That doll just moved I SWEAR TO GOD. My mom goes WHAT DOLL? WHERE? And I go, on that table over there? And she says that's not a doll. And I say what is it then? And she says a cellophane bag of American cherries. I go right back to sleep. Lol. 

-michael (again)

This is THE DOLL

Rope way

This is michael again because my mom refuses to blog and is making me but, I hope this post suits your fancy. 

After another great night sleep on a futon I was again woken up by my mom. We had plans to go to the Gozaisho Rope Way. We had another Japanese style breakfast and after that we were off on our mini road trip. We stopped at a mini stop (a convenience store) and bought many snacks. We had what they called a "snack party" in the car with the snacks from the mini stop and with the many snacks in the car prior to the stop. I, myself, am a big fan of the snack party. When we got to Gozaisho we busted into a pack of pee pees (a mint that whistles when you blow into the whole in the middle.) After we got our tickets for the rope way we went to at the bottom of the mountain and got bread and delicious soft cream. I am also a big fan of soft cream. After we finished our soft cream we did some fun coin tricks and then got on the rope way. It took about 10 minutes for the trip up the mountain. Kaho was very scared on the rope way and she would yell things in Japanese. Setsuko would translate these words and all of them would turn up all along the lines of this,"I'M SCARED", "SOMEONE HELP." She's a cutie pie. She started fake crying and Mai started cracking up and nana joined in a little later. We reached the top at 4,000ish feet and saw the beautiful view. The kids wrote a postcard to jack, Ty, and Junie. After that we rode a one person seat ski lift to another part of the mountain. My mom was paralyzed with fear. It was the smallest, closest to the ground ski lift I have ever seen. I see where she's coming from though. It does take a lot of bravery to maintain a height of 4 ft off the ground and go a speed of 2 1/2 miles per hour. We got to the other side of the mountain and we played around on the rocks. We had a lunch of bread that we got from the same store we got soft cream from. It was soooooooo good. We walked back to the main place and we rode back down. Of course I was the only one to get more soft cream. We rode back home and made some sushi. My mom forced me to eat some sushi so when she went to the bathroom I ate it all at once and everyone cracked up. Woo hoo I'm finally funny to someone! Of course another evening of chasing the girls around and then another good night sleep on the futon. 

Pictures of our adventure