Road Trip - Day 1

I left my humble abode at 7:07 this morning, picked up Christy, then Paula and Ann in the city, and we were on our way! We drove east to Kakunodate and arrive just before 10. We met Maggie (and her visiting friend, Leslie, who we explored Sado Island with on our road trip in Sept) and decided to go to a cafe. We had a lovely little brunch and chatted over cafe au laits (except I drank water). Back on the road, we headed toward Lake Tazawa (see my trips there in Sept and Jan with my sis). Oh we stopped on the way at this honey shop. They have a bazillion kinds of honey and honey products (from jam to lotion!). I decided to try out the popular treat - fresh fruit of your choice blended into ice cream and topped with honey. I got strawberry, banana, and orange ice cream blend with a little lemon honey on top! Crazy good!

At the lake, we decided to rent a paddleboat and toodle around. Oh yeah, it was waaay hot today- 30deg midday in the mountains! so we paddleboated for a half hour in a rocketship-shaped boat.

Then we continued our drive north in the mountains along the Akita-Iwate border taking dozens of photos because it was SO beautiful! Ridiculously beautiful. Our next stop was Hachimantai (it's a volcano!), where we went for a short hike around the sulfur pits and mudpots at the top. They were pretty cool (hot, actually) and smelly. It was fun because there's still patches of snow in that area, but the day was so warm we were hot walking around in T-shirts! The volcanic wonders were neat, but not as expansive as the stuff at Mt Lassen and it kind of made me miss CA in a nice way. The girls were really stoked about it though, because apparently Chicago, Dublin, and Johannesburg don't have volcanoes nearby and had never seen the sulfur/mud before. They kept asking me all kinds of questions that made me wish I'd paid more attention on those Lassen fieldtrips! :P

After mooore driving, we got to Kazuno, our destination for the night. We picked up some groceries, rented a movie and made ourselves at home at Nick's (Christy's bf, but he's out of town) apartment. We cooked a nice dinner and relaxed - now it's time for bed!