Ibaraki Prefecture

   Yesterday I went to my friend's house (actually my friend was not there, but her mother is also my friend... so, yeah, my friend's house) in Mito city to stay there these 2 days. I got there in the end of the afternoon so we staid at home just talking, eating good food, and playing with the pets. There are a lot of animals there! (3 cats, 2 dogs, 1 frog, some fishes, birds, chickens.... and maybe others I didn't see) 

   At night we took a walk with the dogs (carrying the bag to bring their 'excrements' back home, of course =] ) and after taking a bath in the ofuro we sat in the kotatsu (it's a table with a heater under it) and watched some funny japanese shows on TV until we got sleepy. Except for the zoo, it was a typical japanese family night. I slept in a futon with one of the dogs beside me and the cats jumping around the room in the darkness.

   The next day we ate breakfast (salad, hamburg and toast with butter - yes, we also have this kind of disjune here in Japan) and went for a walk with the dogs again (more poo in the bag!). After that we went for a drive.

   Our first goal was a strawberry greenhouse! Apparently there had been something about it on TV the week before so a lot of people went there on the weekend and ate almost all the strawberries. But, fortunately, after looking for a long time we found one place still doing it. It costs a thousand yen (10 dollars) to eat all the strawberries you can for 30 minutes! Actually, after 10 minutes we couldn't eat more, but I guess I ate enough to say that one thousand yen was cheap  =) Not to say that just seeing the place was very interesting!

                                

                                

                                                                 sorry for this one

 

 

   The next place was Tsukuba Mountain (the highest mountain in Ibaraki)! We went half the way by car and got the ropeway (cable car) to the top. It's only 877m high but since there are almost no other mountains around we could see very far away. My friend said that on clear days you can even see Tokyo and Mount Fuji.

                                

there were still some snow left

   After doing some hiking around the top we went back to the car and back to Mito (while watching a movie on the cell phone).

 

I got the bus, and came back home sleeping the whole way. \0/

                         

p.s.:  thank you very much for these great 2 days, Rie-mama!