May 19th

We never did get back to sleep this morning. One thing lead to another and next we knew we were packed and showered so off to breakfast we went. It was an odd variety in food. Everything from French fries and hot dogs to eggs and bacon to yogurt and fruit to ... well we don't really know what all the Japanese options were. We recognized the Miso soup and the rice of course but the rest we were pretty much guessing. And the coffee was amazing!
After breakfast we left our secondary bags with the hotel and caught the shuttle bus back to the airport. First stop was a bank machine. Note to other travelers - it's not so easy getting money from the ATMs! None of Heidi's cards worked. Mine worked but has a rather low daily limit. We decided to go look for the JR pass office first and deal with the ATMs later but we turned around and there was a currency office! So Heidi turned in some of her american cash for Yen. It's not quite accurate but a close approximation of the exchange rate is to drop two zeroes from the Yen. example: 10,000 Yen is equivalent to $100. It might be the jet lag but that simple math tripped us up all day.
Everything went smoothly at the Japan Rail office and we got our official rail passes plus booked our trains for the day.
First train was the Narita Express which we took from Narita (the airport) to Shinjuku (tokyo but not tokyo station). At Shinjuku we had to change trains and what an experience that was. The woman we bought the tickets from wrote on one of the tickets that we needed the "chou line". Well it turns out there are multiple "chou lines". We got to one platform, found someone to ask and nope we were wrong. He pointed us into another direction and told us 105. So back up the stairs we went, stared at all the signs saying "Chou-line", none of which said 105. So we asked someone else and he sent us down a stairwell we hadn't even seen! Asked yet another person who directed us onto what we hoped was the right train with minutes to spare. I was really hoping a conductor would come to check our tickets as confirmation but nobody did. It did take us to our desired destination but not at the right time. Either we were on the wrong train (milk run vs express) or Japanese Trains don't run as precisely as the European trains. One more train transfer and we were finally at our destination. There was so much to see from the train, rice fields, all sorts of examples of compact living, signs, people, rivers, gardens...As you've seen from Heidi's earlier posts, we even managed to buy lunch on one of the trains.
Our final destination is Lake Kawaguchiko which is one of 5 lakes around Mt.Fuji. We found our hotel without issue and it turns out that although I thought I was booking a cheaper hotel away from the lake, the hotel is between the lake and Mt. Fuji and we have a great view of Mt.Fuji!
Despite Heidi being very tired we decided to venture out. I had prepared a list of options and we decided the boat cruise around the lake was about the right speed. The lake is a short (but very interesting) walk from the hotel. There is just so much to see! We just missed one boat so bought ice cream while waiting for the next boat. We kind of lucked out as both the boat before and the one after had quite a few people on it whereas our boat had less than 10. I have to admit it wasn't the views I had been imagining with Mt. Fuji reflecting in the lake but it was still fun to do.
Dinner was next on the agenda. Not sure what is up, but one restaurant after another was closed. We finally found a very tiny restaurant and enjoyed really good coffee and a Japanese version of Cobb salad. The light began turning and the clouds clearing so we decided to head back to the hotel (exploring the side streets as we went). We caught the sunset from our hotel and decided to call it a night.