Atami - Day 1
On the weekend I went to the Izu Peninsula in Shizuoka. From Yokohama, it's about 2 hours south by train (assuming you don't take the expensive shinkansen, which we didn't).
I went with my coworkers Nami (manager), Aya (assistant manager) and Pete. It was probably one of the best weekends I've ever had. They are all nice, fun people, and we went to some beautiful places; the food was good, the weather was good, we did some fun things...
So, first we went to Atami. We were staying in a kind of ryokan (traditional inn) slash hotel. In my experience, a ryokan differs from a hotel in two main ways: there are more rules, but they take better care of you, especially regarding food.
The main rules involve following a rather strict time schedule (Pete commented, 'oh, I didn't realise we were staying in a military hotel') and making sure you're wearing the right kind of footwear.
The scenery near our ryokan was beautiful. After checking in and having the customary cup of green tea awaiting us in our room, we went down to the beach. Now, up close, that beach was disgusting - the far end of it was strewn with garbage, and we found a dead albatross buried in the sand.
However, we had a lot of fun. Aya had brought a beach ball and we took lots of silly pictures and wrote in the sand.
Of course, the next day we realised that there was a nice, clean, non-black beach just 100m further down the road...
After that, we went to get in a hot bath before dinner.
I love hot springs. Atami is very famous for its hot springs; in fact, there's even a hot spring complex in Yokohama that pipes in its hot water all the way from Atami. Pete went into the guys' side and the rest of us into the girls'. We had a small indoor hot spring bath and a small outdoor one, rimmed with rocks. Very relaxing!
After the bath, it was time for dinner. Dinner starts strictly at 6, and when we went into the dining room we found many tables laden with meals, each serving prepared, ready for the guests.
Atami - and the Izu peninsula - is very famous for seafood. (I think I've mentioned this, but it seems like every place in Japan is very famous for something. Whenever you say you're going somewhere, people will say 'oh, you should try their local soba' or 'you should eat ramen there'.) Accordingly, seafood we ate.
That meal was pretty impressive. There was a huge sashimi boat in the middle of the table. I didn't eat any of it except to try one piece of tai (snapper). Then, each of us had several small dishes, such as tiny, flavoured shirasu (baby sardines); what tasted like potatoes with a thick coating of nikujaga-like paste; small shrimp to be eaten whole, head, legs and tail; an oyster; edamame (soy beans), tsukemono (pickled vegetables).
That was just for starters. We each had a kind of pot; a waitress lit candles/fuel things under each of them. These 'candles' burn fiercely for several minutes, cooking what's inside the dish. Inside were clams, which opened as they became hot, and mushrooms and bean sprouts.
We were brought a whole fish, a big orange one, divided into four bits. Me and Pete claimed the middle parts; Nami got the tail and Aya the head. Pete didn't like the eye staring at him while he was eating. We also had as much rice as we wanted, and miso soup with crab legs in it. To finish, we had ice cream and green tea. It was a very satisfactory dinner. ^_^
After dinner we went to karaoke, as our ryokan had karaoke rooms. We had an hour included with our ryokan. Then we had an hour of ping-pong, in a huge room we had to ourselves. This was a lot of fun, though I'm not good at ping-pong...
After this we went back to our ryokan and set it up for bed. Usually, ryokan staff will set up the futon while you're at dinner, but we had to do it ourselves, laying out the futon, sheets and quilts. Our room had tatami mats and paper sliding screen windows, so we opened a window to let in the cool night air.
Ryokan and hotels in Japan provide you with yukata (casual Japanese robes) you can wear in and around your room. They're a great idea for places with hot springs, because they're less hassle when dressing and undressing. Also, in Atami, with its holiday feel and quite a few hot springs around, you can see a few people walking on the street wearing yukata. (I think usually you'd only wear yukata within the confines of a hotel. It's like nightwear.)
Then there's shoe etiquette. You wear your normal shoes outside, then put on the ryokan slippers for walking up to your room, then you leave the slippers outside your room and go in your room in your bare feet or socks. If you use the bathroom, there's a set of bathroom slippers in there. You can also borrow the ryokan's zori (wooden sandals that go with yukata) to wear outside. It's easy to forget what you're supposed to be wearing...
We had another hot spring bath before bed. ^_^
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