Hakone is a district 25 miles in circumference, bristling with mountain peaks, some of which are belching fumes of sulphur. It abounds in superb natural scenery, made up of manifold lines of undulating mountain, deep forest, silver lake, murmuring stream and health-giving hot springs. Add to them the little up-to-date village-towns, located here and there near principal resorts, with their smart shops, and comfortable, even luxurious, hotels as well as shrines, temples and wide motor-roads. It is altogether too wide an area to be mastered by one or two visits only. It is the sort of place one can become acquainted with only after a lifelong experience of visits and stays, repeated at frequent intervals in various seasons of the year.
Unlike Fuji, Hakone is an all-year-round resort, with attractions to match every season or climate. In spring it is bright with cherry blossoms and other flowers peculiar to Hakone, the color of which is enhanced by the verdure of its fresh sylvan beauty, and its sweet-smelling mountain air. In summer it makes an ideally cool resort, as the mercury seldom rises beyond 80 degrees F., and it is free from mosquitoes and other pests which infest some places. Autumn brings a brilliant crimson tint all over the mountains, and winter a whole range of sporting possibilities which depend upon ice and snow. Moreover, the luxurious accommodation of modern hotels in Japanese and European style, together with the perpetual flow of hot springs, have robbed Hakone's winter of all its former stings, making it as popular a resort at Christmas and winter time as at any other time of the year.
What makes Hakone the premier hot-spring resort in Kwantō is its accessibility. The splendid motor-roads leading to the top of the high peak, together with the railway, bus and electric tram cars constantly moving from its chief resort points to Tokyo, Yokohama and adjacent cities, make it a very comfortable journey of a few hours from the busiest commercial and industrial centers to the depths of mountain, away from the din and dust of workaday life. Modern facilities of communication and transportation, along with the latest improvements in hotel accommodation, have breathed an entirely new meaning into the word Hakone, which once was a word symbol of fear and misgiving to many a traveler to or from Edo.
Of course, the scenic beauties were admitted, as well as the medicinal virtues of its hot springs, but Hakone was more notorious for its barrier than renowned for its scenic attractions. Lying upon the highway of Tōkaidō, between Edo and Kyoto, travelers to and from had to pass this most difficult of the barriers before they could heave a sign of relief. The stiff walk of 8 ri (20 miles) over the jagged mountain paths was as nothing compared with the rigorous examination at the barrier, whose officials, representing the Tokugawa régime, kept both their eyes wide open, as there was always a possibility of the wives of daimyō, kept as hostages at Edo, trying to smuggle themselves out in disguise, or of the spies of powerful southern feudatories smuggling themselves in. The vicinity of the Hakone Barrier is still redolent of bloody romance. Every conductor on a charabanc going up and down Hakone will point out the spot where a certain daring woman who "broke" the Barrier was summarily hanged. There are other places charged with gruesome memories. The site of the old Barrier is marked by a signpost, lying midway between Hakone-machi and Moto-Hakone on the eastern shore of Lake Ashinoko. Both were thriving towns in olden days, of which the little cluster of huts and shops now seen only faintly reflect the glories of the days gone by. Only the classic name, Hakone, now remains to cover the whole of this mountainous district, not of the mere little town on the Ashinoko lake that it once designated. The prosperity of this town was due to the fact that many travelers had to pass the night on one or other side of the Barrier, to await their turn for examination at the hands of the august officials, whose conduct must of course be dignified by unnecessary delay and formality.
Lake Ashinoko, that forms the highest point of Hakone district, is 13 miles in circumference, 2385 feet above sea level, and 500 feet deep at the deepest place. It forms one of the great attractions of Hakone. In fine weather it carries on its serene, deepblue bosom the graceful figure of Mount Fuji, as do all the five major lakes around Fuji. Indeed, the Fuji-bearing lakes in the mountains are among the grandest and most exquisite pictures Japan can show to the world.
The individual features of different places in Hakone district have become so well known that it is becoming a fashion to speak of different resorts by their own names, instead of using the generic term Hakone. Thus we speak of Yumoto, Tōnosawa, Gōra, Kowakudani, Miyanoshita, etc., of which the last-named is most famous among the foreigners because of the well-appointed foreign-style hotel, the Fujiya, situated there; but space prohibits all we would like to say of this beautiful district. We dwell awhile on the beauties of other National Parks.
Showing posts with label Hakone. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hakone. Show all posts
Fuji and Hakone
To anyone accustomed to think of a park as a largish sort of public garden crisscrossed with some drive roads, a number of winding promenades, picturesque paths along a serpentine pond, and some woods plus a zoo and a hothouse, the name Fuji-Hakone Park, when its natural features are fully understood, will appear to be something like a grave misnomer. It includes not only the whole of the world-famous Fujisan, with its broad basis set with five beautiful lakes, but the entire district of Hakone, which is better known to the rest of the world by that gem of a resort--Miyanoshita. A park more grand and majestic it would be impossible to conceive. The grandeur of its scale is almost un-Japanese; for the country, while universally conceded to be picturesque, is often associated with the beautiful but miniature. We amateurs will continue to wonder for a long time why Fuji and Hakone should not have been made two separate parks, each on its own great basis.
Mount Fuji is 12,400 feet high, its basis 63 miles in circumference, full of trackless parts, untrodden by the feet of men, and therefore still inhabited by many wild animals such as deer, foxes, and boars. It lies astride the three provinces of Kai, Suruga and Sagami; hence the old maxim about Fuji being "the greatest mountain in the three countries," the veiled allusion being to Japan, China and India. This was an old Japanese way of praising Fuji as the grandest mountain in the whole world.
The average Japanese may not realize it, but Mount Fuji is inalienably linked with the national character. A psychological analysis of the Japanese character will reveal that a good part of it is influenced, directly and indirectly, by Mount Fuji. We knew Mount Fuji long before we saw it. It is one of the first words that every Japanese baby hears from his mother's lips, and the first picture of anything he sees, and indeed the first picture he draws as soon as he is given pen and paper with which to draw anything. Fuji is synonymous with mountains, or what is high, noble and beautiful. No Japanese home, however poor and wretched, but has a picture of Mount Fuji in some form or other. Numerous traditions and numerous allusions in prose and poetry will rush to one's memory at the bare mention of the charmed word.
As the child grows older, he conceives the wish to see the mountain--a wish that is realized sooner or later. Then he finds the reality, so familiar and so true to the picture he has known all his life, yet so unlike the picture--much more adorable and majestic. And then the charm of the mountain grows. Each time he gazes on it he seems to know it better. The face of Fuji, so simple in the graceful sweep of its cone, yet has a wondrous variety of complexion. Though it looks serene and peaceful always, there are times when one seems to detect a stern, even menacing aspect of it, looming large and silhouetted against the scarlet sunset. At other times it is completely hidden behind haze or clouds, or deigns to show only a very little of its summit. It is a picture so easy to draw and yet so difficult to make a masterpiece of. Eternally unchangeable, as it appears, it has its surprises, terrible surprises, too, as its old climbers could attest.
However opinions may vary concerning the most beautiful spots of Japan, none has ever visited the Fuji Lakes without being thrilled by what is unquestionably one of the finest Lake Districts in the world, and there are many of the world's greatest travelers who vote it the finest of all.
It is in the variety of scenery and all that is associated with a lake district that the Fuji Five Lakes appeal so much to the senses and imagination. The five lakes are named Yamanaka, Kawaguchi, Saiko, Shūji and Motosu and their charms vary as much as do their names. The limpid lake water with its many colors varying as the depth increases as plainly seen by one standing on the shore, reminds one of Lake Louise in the Canadian Rockies because of the grandeur of the surrounding scenery and mountains. Yet at the same time there is something so delicate about everything associated with the lakes, something that suggests both the grand and the miniature, the mighty and the fairylike at the same time that they capture the imagination as even the Canadian Lakes or the English Lake District or Killarney fail to do. Though they give so much pleasure to the eye -- these lakes abound in pleasure to those who would shoot, boat, swim, hike, study, meditate or write. It would be impossible to leave the Five Lakes without referring to Fujisan, whose peerless cone is reflected in their waters. Either the mountain or the lakes would in themselves be sufficient attraction to invite all the world. Together they mutually enhance the glory of each and make of the Japanese Lake District one that no lover of beauty can resist. It is just this combination that makes it no exaggeration to say that no other place in the world can compare with the Fuji Five Lakes in natural beauty.
Fuji is one of the easiest mountains to climb; thousands of men, women and children climb it every summer. But woe betide those who take it too easy, or commit any desecrating deed on the sacred mountain! Many reckless spirits who ignored the advice of experienced guides, or dared to stray into untrodden paths, have been known to be overtaken by storm, or to run into the thicknesses of the woods, never again to emerge. Thus the love of Fuji gradually deepens to reverence, and then to worship. All over Japan are scattered the so-called Fuji shrines, dedicated to the spirit of the mountain whose memorial day is June 1st. A small replica of the sacred mountain has been raised in the compound of such a shrine and is worshipped by the devotees of Fuji. In Tokyo alone there are five or six such shrines, and many districts and streets are named after Fuji. There are Fuji-mi-chō both in Azabu and Kōjimachi, Kami-Fuji-mae in Hongō, near the Komagome Fuji Shrine; and Suruga-chō of Nihonbashi and Surugadai of Kanda are named after the province in which Fuji stands.
Like virtue itself, Fuji is known to every child, but to know it well it takes a longer acquaintance and more intimate personal contact, so to speak. Then it will be realized that the worship of Fuji is not a mere superstition of soulless ignorance.
Mount Fuji is 12,400 feet high, its basis 63 miles in circumference, full of trackless parts, untrodden by the feet of men, and therefore still inhabited by many wild animals such as deer, foxes, and boars. It lies astride the three provinces of Kai, Suruga and Sagami; hence the old maxim about Fuji being "the greatest mountain in the three countries," the veiled allusion being to Japan, China and India. This was an old Japanese way of praising Fuji as the grandest mountain in the whole world.
The average Japanese may not realize it, but Mount Fuji is inalienably linked with the national character. A psychological analysis of the Japanese character will reveal that a good part of it is influenced, directly and indirectly, by Mount Fuji. We knew Mount Fuji long before we saw it. It is one of the first words that every Japanese baby hears from his mother's lips, and the first picture of anything he sees, and indeed the first picture he draws as soon as he is given pen and paper with which to draw anything. Fuji is synonymous with mountains, or what is high, noble and beautiful. No Japanese home, however poor and wretched, but has a picture of Mount Fuji in some form or other. Numerous traditions and numerous allusions in prose and poetry will rush to one's memory at the bare mention of the charmed word.
As the child grows older, he conceives the wish to see the mountain--a wish that is realized sooner or later. Then he finds the reality, so familiar and so true to the picture he has known all his life, yet so unlike the picture--much more adorable and majestic. And then the charm of the mountain grows. Each time he gazes on it he seems to know it better. The face of Fuji, so simple in the graceful sweep of its cone, yet has a wondrous variety of complexion. Though it looks serene and peaceful always, there are times when one seems to detect a stern, even menacing aspect of it, looming large and silhouetted against the scarlet sunset. At other times it is completely hidden behind haze or clouds, or deigns to show only a very little of its summit. It is a picture so easy to draw and yet so difficult to make a masterpiece of. Eternally unchangeable, as it appears, it has its surprises, terrible surprises, too, as its old climbers could attest.
However opinions may vary concerning the most beautiful spots of Japan, none has ever visited the Fuji Lakes without being thrilled by what is unquestionably one of the finest Lake Districts in the world, and there are many of the world's greatest travelers who vote it the finest of all.
It is in the variety of scenery and all that is associated with a lake district that the Fuji Five Lakes appeal so much to the senses and imagination. The five lakes are named Yamanaka, Kawaguchi, Saiko, Shūji and Motosu and their charms vary as much as do their names. The limpid lake water with its many colors varying as the depth increases as plainly seen by one standing on the shore, reminds one of Lake Louise in the Canadian Rockies because of the grandeur of the surrounding scenery and mountains. Yet at the same time there is something so delicate about everything associated with the lakes, something that suggests both the grand and the miniature, the mighty and the fairylike at the same time that they capture the imagination as even the Canadian Lakes or the English Lake District or Killarney fail to do. Though they give so much pleasure to the eye -- these lakes abound in pleasure to those who would shoot, boat, swim, hike, study, meditate or write. It would be impossible to leave the Five Lakes without referring to Fujisan, whose peerless cone is reflected in their waters. Either the mountain or the lakes would in themselves be sufficient attraction to invite all the world. Together they mutually enhance the glory of each and make of the Japanese Lake District one that no lover of beauty can resist. It is just this combination that makes it no exaggeration to say that no other place in the world can compare with the Fuji Five Lakes in natural beauty.
Fuji is one of the easiest mountains to climb; thousands of men, women and children climb it every summer. But woe betide those who take it too easy, or commit any desecrating deed on the sacred mountain! Many reckless spirits who ignored the advice of experienced guides, or dared to stray into untrodden paths, have been known to be overtaken by storm, or to run into the thicknesses of the woods, never again to emerge. Thus the love of Fuji gradually deepens to reverence, and then to worship. All over Japan are scattered the so-called Fuji shrines, dedicated to the spirit of the mountain whose memorial day is June 1st. A small replica of the sacred mountain has been raised in the compound of such a shrine and is worshipped by the devotees of Fuji. In Tokyo alone there are five or six such shrines, and many districts and streets are named after Fuji. There are Fuji-mi-chō both in Azabu and Kōjimachi, Kami-Fuji-mae in Hongō, near the Komagome Fuji Shrine; and Suruga-chō of Nihonbashi and Surugadai of Kanda are named after the province in which Fuji stands.
Like virtue itself, Fuji is known to every child, but to know it well it takes a longer acquaintance and more intimate personal contact, so to speak. Then it will be realized that the worship of Fuji is not a mere superstition of soulless ignorance.
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