Aunt Laura's Visit
(and our overnight trip to the Izu Peninsula)

We had a great time while Laura visited us in Japan for a second time. Sydney ingratiated herself with Aunt Laura by thumping downstairs and barging into the living room at 6:30am every day of the week she was sleeping on the pull-out couch. And most days weren't complete until Sydney hosted a tea party in Aunt Laura's honor.

We also whisked Aunt Laura away with us to explore the Izu Peninsula overnight. We took a Superview express train from Yokohama and, with the help of my Japanese friends, sat in the first seat of the first car so we could have the "Super-est" view.

Of course this was the first time Aunt Laura had met Miranda, who celebrated her first birthday while Laura was visiting.

The ryokan (Japanese inn) that we stayed in had great hot spring baths (onsen), which were separated by gender. The English version of the "how to bathe" manual stated "red" curtains are the baths for men, "blue" for women. Ahhh, not sooo--come to find out. All three of us, on three separate occasions seemed to pervertedly sneak peaks of the wrong gender before concluding the English manual must be reversed. But the real question is this: who's the joke on?

All bets were off when we saw these green and purple curtains leading to the men and women's outdoor

rooftop onsen. Sydney and I picked purple, one of her favorites, and hoped for the best.

We were alone at first, but later discreetly confirmed we had chosen correctly.

We also reserved the special green tea bath, made with matcha (ceremonial powdered green tea) grown on the grounds of the ryokan. Antioxidant properties of the matcha are supposed to be fabulous for the skin and body. First we toasted as we drank some chilled matcha. Then we took turns bathing in a warm vat of it. We both just turned another year older; we'll try anything.

We ate like Japanese emperors with an elaborate course of crab shabu shabu and many different little dishes including pickles, tofu, miso soup, rice, and two different kinds of fish--one of which was a fried, clearly identifiable fish. When it was delivered to the table, Sydney noticed it was a fish, saying, "Don't eat it Daddy, don't eat it!" But after much coaxing from Brian, she tried a little taste of it and thought it was pretty good. But to this day, she won't admit she ate some fish!

The next morning was Miranda's first birthday (more on that in the next post)! After our third and very last night ever sleeping on futon, we had our first traditional Japanese-style breakfast, which included rice, a very softboiled egg, miso soup, fish, pickles, and very silver tiny fish with daikon radish (the only dish I couldn't muster the gumption to try).

Then we set off for a little hike of the Kawazu Nanadaru or Seven Waterfalls area near the ryokan before heading home. It was a whirlwind little vacation, with two kids, a lot of work and only one night, but we're glad we saw another piece of Japan.