The Water Wheel - Fabulous Japanese Dining

Alright, so my camera doesn't really do "night shots," but you get the idea. This little restaurant is tucked away on a tiny side street off of Route 51 and the Japanese name translates to "The Water Wheel." Our friends Dan and Yumiko wanted to take us here and I am SOOOO glad that we found a babysitter and took them up on it! The restaurant is an old house converted and is located very close to both Camp Zama and the Army's Sagamihara Housing. Dan and Yumiko explained to us that because of the remarkable collection of Samurai and turn of the century armor and weapons housed here, the big wigs of the military and American government are often entertained at this restaurant. I have to admit that even with my limited interest in armor and guns, I was super impressed! The places is both a restaurant and a MUSEUM! After one of the servers, (robed in full kimono,) showed us to our private room, we slipped out to view the armor and weapons collections. Below is the room of armor.
Almost all of the guns were well over 100 years old. Every one of them was uniquely decorated and carved.
Not sure how old these guns were...
Cliff amidst the armor. Again, every suit was unique and interesting.

We all liked this one a lot.
Detail of a dragon.
And what samurai collection would be complete without some swords? The rusty thing on the bottom was apparently a sword dating back 1,000's? of years?
And onto the food! Equally if not more impressive than the weapons was the FOOD! I am an artist and thus a sucker for presentation. The Japanese do presentation like no other country on earth. Everything that was served to us had it's own place, edible flowery counterpart, and seasonal story. Everything was fresh. Most importantly, everything was was mind blowingly delicious. We ate crab, squid, season fish, roe, Japanese vegetables that I have never heard of... It was such an adventure! The salad in the bottom right corner had crab and squid and fried squash and POMEGRANATE! Who comes up with these combinations? It was spectacular of course.
This might have been my favorite dish. It was the best sashimi I have ever had in my life. It was fresh and cool and firm and fantastic. The lemon was a nice touch too. YUM! There were at least 6 different kinds of fish.
The sukiyaki was the main course. They brought over the marbled beef and cabbage with mushrooms and noodles and cooked it right in front of us. It was awesome. Just awesome.
Fish and flowers! Lovely!
Scroll in our room.
Our table.

Here we are outside by the wheel. The place is also open for lunch. I can't wait to go back!

Hakone: Owakudani (In Search of the Black Eggs)

Cliff and Lilia and I recently took a day trip to Hakone. We had been meaning to go for a long time and with the fall leaves changing into such gorgeous colors we decided there was no better time then the present! Ironically our favorite place in Hakone was actually the nearly barren wasteland of Owakudani! Hakone is famous for its hot springs and in Owakudani the water is so hot and sulfuric that they actually boil eggs until they turn black for the tourists! Supposedly eating a black egg from Owakudani adds seven years to one's life. We had to try it out! Off we go!
Not many trees here!


I made sound like a major goobery dork here, but I just loved hiking around Owakudani. It felt so otherworldly to me - like maybe I had stepped back in time or crossed over into middle earth or something. Owakudani reminded me of the outskirts of Mordor. Rather than the one ring to draw us deeper into the realm, though, we had visions of hard boiled eggy goodness.


Beautiful!
I think if I had a nice camera these pictures would have been even more amazing. I thought the lighting was great!



We're getting closer!


Don't touch the water!

I love the contrast of colors in this photo.

Looking back at the ropeway house where we came from.
At last! We are so close! Let's go buy our eggs!

This lucky man's job is to lower and remove the baskets of boiled eggs from the springs.
Success! This little bag of eggs was HOT! I hat to keep switching hands! Rather than eat them at the top of the hill we decided to trek back down the path before eating these.



This area reminded me so much of Yellowstone and my little brother. The sulfur smell bothered him so much as a child when we visited that park that my parents had to buy him an air freshener to carry with him.... ha ha!


Here we go!
Oooohh ahhh! I think mine looks like a picture from the Hubble Telescope. I see a few nebulas... some solar systems....
All Lilia saw was LUNCH! Yum! I think between the three of us we tacked on about 35 extra years to our lives!!