While Bill was in Kauai with Andrew and Shawnie, I took an overnight excursion to Kahone, a mountainous hot-spring area that sits on a volcano not active in 4000 years. I took a loop circuit of a bus up the mountain, lots of walking, boating over a lake, several cable cars and cog railway and a return trip on a small railway down the mountain after my overnight at a royokan hot spring spa hotel. I had a thoroughly enjoyable day and night. The area is quite beautiful and very near Mt. Fuji, but the day was cloudy and Mt. Fiji was not visible.I walked along the shoreline of this lake along an ancient cedar tree path dating to the Edo period of the 1600s, visited a beautiful art museum with magnificent views of the lake, and climbed up a hill to an observatory and park with beautifully manicured trees, then took the boat over this lake and up to the mountain-top here.
Arriving at the top was eerie with the steam pouring out of the mountain.
On to my royokan with a soak in the hot spring, a massage and food unimaginable as to what it was - mostly fish.On my return trip on the cog rail, I observed an amazing scene. At one stop several people got on the cog car, walked straight across the car and out through the door on the other side. It was such a surprise to see this happen. Obviously there's only one way to get from one side of the cog line to the other - walk through the car when it stops for passengers. I would never have imagined such a set up, but it works!
