We decided to get up REALLY early this morning to head down and see if we could check out the Tuna Auction at the Tsukiji fish market. We knew that they were only letting 140 people in, so we got up at 3:30 and were at the market by 4:10. We were already in the second group and by 4:20 they had reached their maximum and were turning people away. They must have turned away 75+ people while we were there.

Finally, at 5:40, we got to head into the auction area. There were lots of buyers wandering around checking out the tuna. Some were feeling them (they have a small piece cut open on the end so you can see the flesh), some were tasting them, somewhere even hitting them with little spiked sticks and looking inside them with flashlights. It seemed to be a very involved process.

After about 15 minutes of this, the auctioneers appeared and started ringing handbells, apparently to indicate that they were getting ready to start selling the tunas in their section. Once they had rung the bells for a little bit, they erupted into furious and animated selling that only lasted a few seconds. The auctioneer that was closest to us appeared to be selling some very large tuna, but he was only selling 15 or 20. The sale of all of those took less than 5 minutes! (click on the Tuna Auctioneer picture for a video)

After the auction, we browsed through the wholesale section of the market and watched a merchant filleting a massive tuna with a knife the size of a sword. It was very impressive to watch. The rest of the market was a cornucopia of seafood, I'm sure that if you were looking for a specific type of marine creature, you would find it there.

Once we had our fill of the market, we headed back to the hotel, had a quick breakfast and waited for our bus to come for our Mount Fuji trip.

Once the bus had picked us up, we were informed that since this was the first Saturday of Japanese summer vacation, traffic was likely to be horrendous, and it was. The trip that normally took 1.5 hours, took over 3! In fact, we went straight to the restaurant for lunch first, since the drive had taken so long. After lunch, we found out that instead of going to Hakone for our boat cruise and cable car ride, we were going to another lake for them. We arrived at Lake Kawaguchi and headed up the ropeway (cable car) to the top.

Once we got to the top, we saw that we had a great view of Mount Fuji, except the mountain was shrouded in clouds. This was disappointing, but we hoped that we might see it later on. We took some pictures and headed down for the boat cruise, with Christine stopping to get some grape ice cream on the way. The ice cream was tasty, but the mix of grape and cream was a little odd.

The boat cruise on Lake Kawaguchi was very nice. There was a nice breeze, and the views of the surrounding areas were fantastic. It was very relaxing but it was only about 25 minutes long. It would have provided a beautiful view of Mt. Fuji, however, it remained behind clouds. Then we were back on the bus to head up to the 5th station on Mt. Fuji. There are 10 stations on the mountain, but the 5th station is the highest you can get in a vehicle.

When we got the 5th station, the mountain was still mostly shrouded in clouds, except for a brief moment when we saw the peak. There wasn't even time to get a decent picture. We were getting discouraged, but on the way down the mountain, our guide noticed that the mountain seemed to have cleared. The bus driver stopped at the first station (not a normal stopping spot on the tour) and were able to see the whole mountain VERY clearly. Woooo Hooooo!

After taking many pictures, we got back on the bus to head to Hakone to drop some people off at a hotel they were staying at, and then headed to the Shinkansen station to make our way back to Tokyo on the bullet train.

We have another early day tomorrow as we head for our two days in Hiroshima!