Tokaido Day 7 – Wednesday, 15th November: Hakone Checkpoint to Numazu (26 km)

Didn’t get back to my hotel until 7pm this evening, so tonight’s post will be short on words and consist mostly of pictures.

In brief: caught the Shinkansen back to Odawara, thence bus to Hakone Checkpoint (shadowing the route I’d walked yesterday) and picked up the trail.

Alongside Lake Ashi is one of the prettiest stretches of the Old Tokaido so far:

Although the ‘top’ I’d reached yesterday certainly felt like a peak, there’s actually a bit more climbing beyond the lake until you reach the ‘official’ Hakone Pass, where the new road crosses (this was looking back into Kanagawa Prefecture, where I’d just come from):

And then it was downhill all the way to Mishima – a long, long way down, some of it steep and some of those sections on the dreaded ishidatami. But where the track surface was good, it was very pleasant going indeed.

In places where the road surface had been restored, it looked as it must have done when originally constructed:

Past the site of a long-vanished castle:

… and the very modern Dragon’s Castle (a massive kids’ adventure playground):

Throughout the day, I kept getting views or glimpses of Mount Fuji:

… and views down to the coast:

A group of Jizo watch over travellers:

At the outskirts of Mishima I stopped at the very beautiful Mishima-taisha Shrine:

Mishima, with its Shinkansen station, was one stopping option, but by now the OT was flat and I felt pretty good, so I pushed on into the sunset to my original destination of Numazu.

(I didn’t see the boy sitting at the bus stop until I walked past him. He was engrossed in his phone and I don’t think he even registered my existence.)

Dusk afforded a final glimpse for the day of Fujisan, sandwiched between an apartment block and a pachinko/slots (gaming) venue the size of an Australian RSL club. Perfect.

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Tokaido prologue

Hiroshige, Fifty-three Stations of the Tokaido . No. 26: Kakegawa I visited Japan in 2017 and 2019, on the second occasion with Fred, as well as my partner (with whom I’d travelled in 2017) and her son. Like most people who come for the first (or second) time, we took the Shinkansen – bullet train – from Tokyo to Kyoto on the line called the Tokaido. Volumes have been written about the wonders of Japan’s Shinkansen system. It is, I think, something that should be experienced at least once in everyone’s life if possible. ‘Tokaido’ means ‘eastern sea road’, and the line bears that name because it follows – more or less – the route of the centuries-old road that linked the Imperial capital of Kyoto with the Shogunate’s headquarters in Edo (now Tokyo), respectively the seats of ceremonial and administrative power. For hundreds of years, thousands of travellers made the 500-kilometre trip between the two cities (and usually back again), the vast majority of them on foot: horses were rare, t...

Tokaido Day 14 – Wednesday, 22nd November: Fukuroi to Takatsuka (32 km)

The clouds had disappeared overnight, and the day was bright and clear. Maybe a couple of degrees warmer than recent days, but still great conditions for walking. After buffet breakfast at the hotel, I took the train back to Fukuroi. From the station it was another kilometre or so just to get back onto the Tokaido – or so I thought. When I checked the map in the guidebook it turned out I’d walked further than I needed. Never mind. Outside a temple, a group of jizo looked particularly handsome in the early-morning light: So much care has gone into this little tableau, from the hats and bibs to the fresh flowers. A fine example of an ichirizuka (a reconstruction, as it turned out) was accompanied by a plaque that carried an English summary: Opposite the ichirizuka, a shrine seemed like a good place to pay my respects for the day. As I was leaving, I was greeted by a gentleman I’d noticed at Fukuroi station and noted as a possible fellow walker. Yamada-san had, in turn, spotte...

Tokaido Day 15 – Thursday, 23 November: Takatsuka to Futagawa (30km)

Slightly warmer again today, although with a haze that obscured the more distant views. I again took advantage of the hotel’s free breakfast before jumping on a Tokaido local train one stop down the line to Takatsuka. Not far down the road, a large shrine provided an opportunity to pay my respects and hope for a successful day’s walking. There was little of interest between Takatsuka and Lake Hamana, although it was good – as always – to come across an avenue of typical Old Tokaido pines: I stopped for a takeaway coffee from a konbini and spotted a park opposite that offered shade and benches. It turned out to be the grounds of a shrine, hidden amongst the trees, but as a group of seniors was setting up for a game of that golf-croquet hybrid I’d seen a few days earlier, I figured recreation was just as valid as devotion in this particular spot. A woman parked her bicycle near my bench and spoke to me; I adopted the default position of smiling and nodding, and gesturing to indicat...

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