Across the street from the Kowakien Hotel (where we had stayed the night) is this very large, very beautiful building. To me, it looks like something out of Europe...but we are still in Japan and inside this building is the coolest hot springs water park in the world! We were heading to Yunessun!
Up to this point, we had each experienced (except for Tayla, Nathan, and Kirstin) the traditional Japanese onsen of mineral water from a hot spring in a beautiful relaxing atmosphere, bathing as the Japanese do with no clothes. Yunessun is an onsen, but with a themepark twist. There are several hot springs pools, but each one has a different theme. We had heard a lot about this place from other American families and we were excited to go to it ourselves.
Just like other onsens in Japan, we had to shower using shampoo and soap before getting on our swimsuits to swim. That's right, this place actually allows swimsuits! Yay! No more swimming naked for us!
This was the first pool that we swam in and it was similar to what we have in America--yet it felt like hot bathwater and didn't have any chlorine. The ceiling was painted like the open sky.
Audra Mae and Mom enjoying the massage jets.
Next, we went into the Wine Pool. It was pretty warm in this small room, so it was hard to take pictures due to all of the steam. While we were here, an employee came and squirted an entire bottle of wine all over the swimmers and into the pool. I'm sure that the pool is colored with some type of dye, but they apparently use real wine as well.
The sign at Yunessun said that bathing in wine is a rejuvenation treatment for the body, and it has been said that the Queen of Egypt, Cleopatra, loved to bath in wine.
Audra went a little nuts over this pool. She thought it was the greatest thing ever to be swimming in pink water!
Then, we stood in line so that we could try out the Dr. Fish spa treatment! We had to wash our feet before sitting down next to this pool and dipping our feet in. As soon as we put our feet in, the fish swarmed around our feet and legs and got right to work eating all the dead skin off. We were allowed to have our feet "treated" by the fish for five minutes before we had to get out and dry off. I didn't get a picture of us doing this (wasn't allowed), but we all dipped our toes in with the exception of Kirstina.
We were all a little worried about doing this....it seems kind of gross to have little fish swimming all over your feet and nibbling at your toes. It wasn't as ticklish as we thought it was going to be. The parents liked it. The boys really liked it, and the girls didn't. Audra ended up pulling her feet out of the water, she disliked it so much.
Next, we moved on to the Green Tea Pool. It was a sickly green color and the pool was tiny. It was shaped to look like a tea cup.
It even had a tea bag!
Next to the Green Tea Pool was the Sake Pool. There is a constant dripping from a huge cask filled with real Japanese Sake. It is said that Sake is very good for the beauty of your skin. I thought it just smelled like straight alcohol.
We saw a few people opening their mouths and trying to drink the sake as it dripped out of the barrel. We didn't stay here long, and it wasn't one that we came back to. We didn't really care for this one.
We then moved on to the Coffee Pool! This spa contains real coffee made with hot spring water. It has been said that coffee adds beauty to the skin.
Some of us love the smell of coffee, so this pool was a welcome change from the odor of the Sake Pool. It was a warm brown and fun to swim in. Again, the steam coming from the spa made pictures difficult.
We also tried out some pools that had collagen in them and was supposed to be good for your skin.
Then, we moved outside! They had a shallow kiddy pool with slides and water spraying everywhere. Audra is on the slide and Nathan is at the bottom.
Audra, Dad, and Kirstin
There were three slides that we could try. You had to be at least 4 ft. tall, so unfortunately, Nathan and the two little girls couldn't go down them. Nathan was pretty bummed about it. The lines were never long and it was fun to go down a water slide with hot water! We all went down the slides quite a bit and had races with each other. No one could beat Mom, though! Her swimsuit made her the fastest in the East! In this picture, Caitlin is in the purple suit with one of the boys behind her.
We also spent a lot of time in the Wasabi Pool. This was a fun one! It smelled kind of spicy, like wasabi. This is the upper pool, which connected to a lower pool. It was a bright green color, but the water would trickle down to the lower pool, so the employees had to regularly put more dye in the upper pool. This is right before they put more dye in, so it's not a very bright green.
Nathan is at the waterfall connecting the two pools. You can see an employee pouring more dye into the upper pool. It was a powder that felt like laundry soap. He poured it into the kids' hands so they could smear it all over themselves and then wash off in the water. They had a ball painting themselves bright green with the wasabi dye.
Below the Wasabi Pool was the Bubble Pool. It had a waterfall that you could go through and the pool had millions and millions of bubbles!
While we were in the Bubble Pool, Kirstin rested her head on her inner tube and fell right asleep! It was past her nap time, and she was warm from the hot water, so I guess she was comfortable enough to have a nap. She slept like this for over 30 minutes. Ha!
If you went under the waterfall in the Bubble Pool, you found a series of caves, all full of hot springs water.
The kids thought it was great to swim in "caves".
We spent the entire afternoon and into the early evening swimming in the different hot spas that Yunessun had to offer. Our favorites were the Wasabi, the Coffee, and the slides.
When we had only a little over an hour before the park closed, Raymond, Chris, and Logan decided to go over to the other side of Yunessun--the Mori No Yu. Yunessun is divided into two sections: the swimsuit section and the naked section. The Mori No Yu (the naked section) is divided by gender and is a traditional onsen experience. This picture is of the male side of the Mori No Yu. Since these three "men" enjoy the traditional onsen experience so much, they wanted to go check it out. Chris said the onsen was so beautiful! He said it was much better than the onsen at the hotel the night before. The rest of us were not interested at all, and instead swam some more in the Wine Pool, the Coffee Pool, and the big pool that we started with.
We left when the park closed, and began our trek back to the Hakone train station. Raymond had accidentally misread our train schedule, and we had missed our train back to Tokyo. It took some doing, but we were able to transfer our tickets to another train and got home pretty late.
Oh, what a jam-packed weekend! Hakone is beautiful! Out of all the cities in Japan that we have visited, Hakone had the least friendly people. Maybe they are sick of tourists, so that's why they are rude. However, we were able to see some amazing things and experience a traditional Japanese dinner and an onsen. It was a great Christmas present for us all!
Interestingly, the day after we returned to Tokyo, the Hakone volcano started increasing its activity. An analysis of satellite data found that the ground level rose by up to 12 cm between April 17 and May 15. We were there on April 24-25th. On April 26th, the reported number of earthquakes in a 24 hour period tripled in number compared to the normal number. As a precaution, the ropeway on the Hakone Loop was closed, as were several of the hotels and onsens in the area. We were lucky to have gone when we did, since it remained closed until long after we had returned to the United States.
Here's what the kids thought of our Hakone trip. I also asked them which Yunessun pool was their favorite, and if they could make up a new theme/flavor for a spa pool, what would it be:
Caitlin: The traditional dinner was really good, but with the whole fish and shrimp made me think of a quote from Ratatoullie. "If you can muscle your way past the gagging reflex, all kinds of possibilities open up." The ropeway was super scary. I loved being able to walk around the actual caldera of a volcano. You can't do that in America. The black eggs were not that bad. Yunessun was pretty unique. We'll never be able to do anything like that ever again. It was fun swimming in different colored water. The onsen at the hotel was very pretty inside. The outdoor one was my favorite because it was cool outside and so it helped me to not feel like I was boiling like a lobster. I'm glad I did it for the experience, but I'll never do it again.
Favorite onsen: Tie between Wasabi and Red Wine
New onsen flavor: Hot Chocolate and Root Beer Float
Tayla: The Japanese dinner was awesome and I really enjoyed it. However, I was disgusted when I saw the whole fish and the whole shrimp. It was really funny when I discovered that they were whole fish and not noodles because everyone else had already eaten their's, and almost everyone was grossed out. I thought it was really cool to go on the ropeway and go into the caldera of a volcano. I liked being able to touch the water in the stream on Mount Hakone, it reminded me of Yellowstone, but we couldn't touch the water at Yellowstone. I thought the black eggs were pretty good, but I like regular hard-boiled eggs better. The Yunessun was awesome and it was one of my most favorite things that we did in Japan. Some of them were too hot, and other ones I didn't care for. The slides were really fun and it was cool to go down water slides with warm water. The Wasabi Pool tasted good, and I liked the smell of it. It tasted like mint ice cream. The Coffee was really deep, and so it was the most fun. When nobody was there, me and Chris were doing cannon balls into it.
Favorite onsen: Wasabi, followed by Red Wine and Coffee
New onsen flavor: Jello, Hot Chocolate, Ice Cream, Ramen and M & M's
Christopher: The hotel onsen was really nice. I was really embarrassed, but when I saw that no one was paying attention to me, I was o.k. I loved the traditional Japanese dinner, it was really fun! I even loved the whole shrimp and the whole fish. The dessert was the best dessert I've ever had in my life. I loved the ropeway because we were flying over the sulfur mine. Caitlin was freaking out because we were up so high, and I thought it was funny. I did not like the black eggs, oh, they tasted so gross. I loved the pirate ship because it was really neat to be on a boat and being able to look out and see the torii gates in the water. I loved Yunessun! It was cool because all the water was hot. The traditional onsen at Yunessun was so nice. It was much nicer than the hotel onsen. It was probably my favorite part of Hakone. I wasn't as embarrassed because after going to the onsen at the hotel the night before, I knew that no one would be paying attention to me. I want to go back so bad, I'm sad that it's over.
Favorite onsen: Wasabi, Coffee, the Sake
New onsen flavor: Frosting, Watermelon, and Cabbage
Logan: I thought eating an egg that was cooked in a volcano was really cool. I loved the Wasabi Pool. I loved the cable car going up the mountain. I loved the pirate ship. It was really cold, and Nathan had left his jacket at the train station. I gave him my jacket, and I was freezing. The dinner was really fancy, probably the fanciest dinner I've ever had. That was a really good dinner. I was embarrassed to swim in the onsen at the hotel. But, it was nice. I didn't know if I wanted to go to the naked part of Yunessun, but I bribed myself and went. It was nicer than the hotel. I'm kind of glad I went, but I also wish I didn't go because it was embarrassing.
Favorite onsen: Wasabi
New onsen flavor: Juice; also, they should do a soy sauce one because the Japanese use a lot of soy sauce when they cook
Nathan: I liked going on the train to get there. I also liked riding the train in the air (the ropeway). That was fun. I loved the pirate ship, but it was cold. I took a bath in a really deep bathtub. I splashed out most of the water and I tried to dive, but I'm too big. But, I did cannonballs. There was a drain on the floor, so I didn't get in trouble for splashing. I loved swimming in all of the pools. I loved the special dinner that we had. It was so nice. I liked everything.
Favorite onsen: Wasabi
New onsen flavor: Bread
Audra: I swim in pink water. I swim with Caitlin too, and I showed my bum. I didn't like that. Bums are gross. People have bums. My swimsuit is pink and purple. It has bubbles on it. We swam in bubbles.
Favorite onsen: the pink one!
New onsen flavor: Milk
Such a cool experience!
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