Buns O steel Part 1-B Mt. Ikoma

Hiking trip # 2 was great. It was attended my me, shiv, Dom, Kim, Alex(USA) and Sheila(Vancity). we started our real early. 7:30 check out time from our apartment. We then headed to 211, dom and kims apartment and from there we headed to shin_imamiya station to meet alex and sheila.

From the station we took the train to Mt Ikoma. The plan was to hike the mpuntain, see some shrines, an abandoned amusment park and have fun. All initatives were met and my calves still hurt 4 days later.

We took some wrong turns getting up the mountain but we saw some cool shrines, a pool of ceramic turtles, some chanting by shinto monks, old stone shito relics in the forest and much more cool stuff. We started off our hike by walking along a pilgramage path. so every hundred meters or so there were shrines and relics and all sorts of neat rockery.

Me and shiv came well prepared with our MEC bags, full of food and extra clothes. They were a tad heavy, but atleast we were warm, well fed and dry (dad!). we passed through lots of residential areas, it was really nice to see actual houses and not so many apartments. As we made our way up the mountain we passed by probably the best smelling place ever. it smelt like cinnamon, cloves and wintergreen.

we got to the top and waiting for us was a old old amusment park and vending machines. YAH! we passed by this gate that was full of pad locks. the pad locks have an interesting story though, lovers lock pad locks on to the gate as a symbol of their bounded love. some of the locks were really old. I think 1950's at least. very neat.
we then started to make our way down the mountain and at the end of the path was my pot of gold. a ramen shop!!
I love ramen. i love ramen. its a big bowl of beefy broth, noodles, mushrooms, sprouts, and a slab or ham. i love ramen.

we started our hike at 9ish and ended at 2 ish. all i can say is i worked muscles i never knew i had. to make the evening perfect we finished off the night by heading to alex and sheila apartment for Burritos. so good, i had to put a picture up on the blog to commemorate them.