Mt. Fuji

Today we rented a car in Tokyo and drove outside to Kofu and Mt. Fuji and back to
Tokyo. I don't know if I would recommend it unless you have someone with you to help. We were lucky to have 2 business associates from NEC to help us get started. First of all no one at the rental office spoke English. Second, although we had navigation with the car it was in Japanese and we would never been able to program it. Our friends from NEC help at the rental desk and then pre-programmed all our destinations. While driving the voice was in English. Once we got past that, driving was really easy. If you can drive on the left side the traffic was good and signage was in Japanese and English. Our friends went with us to Kofu and then we were on our own.

The picture above was taken from the car on the expressway back to Tokyo. It had been raining and there was a mist in the mountains that made it look like a traditional painting of Japan. It was a beautiful sight.

Too much rain and clouds

Close to the top of Mt. Fuji

Map showing how close we were

We had planned to see Mt. Fuji but with the rain it was in the clouds. So we had to punt and we decided to drive as far up Mt. Fuji as possible. The road was good and you can drive almost to the top. In the summer you can hike the rest of the way to the top. It is closed this time of year because of the rain and chance of mudslides. We drove to the end of the road and parked to walk around and of course have a beer or two.

We also got a pleasant surprise on the way up there. I saw something like this on the news. It may have been the same place. There was a section of the road with groves cut into the pavement. When the tires of the car went over the grooves the tires played music. It was really cool.