This year I really had nothing planned for Thanksgiving, but I wanted to do something so I decided to try to make a simple apple pie. It wasn’t bad but not quite like at home.

This months hiking club was to Mt. Mitake to see some fall colors. Although I have been up Mitake a few times before, this time we took a slightly different course to a small waterfall. The path down the mountain was also one we had not taken before and it took a bit longer than expected for everyone to get down the mountain to the bus stop. I on the other hand enjoyed the steep more difficult course and was swinging on trees as I made my way down the mountain. I made it down first followed by 3 other people who took it as a challenge to try to keep up with me. The other members of our group didnt get down quite in time and missed the bus.

The small waterfall.

Lunch was Oden. Everyone brought something to put in it. We had a bit too much and there was some left over.

My friend and I went down to visit Odawara Castle. I have been to a surprising number of castle throughout Japan but still have not been to some of the closer ones to me. The castle was fought over many times, and has had different lords including Tokugawa Ieyasu. The surrounding area is also nice with many cafes and old fashioned shops selling the famous products of the area, including kamaboko, himono, and umeboshi.

We stopped into one old umeboshi store with a nice lady explaining that umeboshi can be stored for 100 years without refrigeration and still be edible. She then pulled out a jar of 70 year old umeboshi. Instead of the red color I am used to seeing these were black. She then stuck her hand in the jar, pulled one out and gave it to me to eat. Although a bit salty, the flavor was very nice and I imagined what this plum looked like as it was picked and put into a jar way back during WWII.

On this 11th day of November 2011, I made super delicious pumpkin pie.
It was soo good that it was eaten before any pictures were taken.

My friend wanted to go to Disney Sea. I was told that it was the fist week after they put up the Christmas decorations and they are celebrating their 10th anniversary so it would probably be crowded. We went on a Thursday and surprisingly is was not very crowded at all. We hit all the major attractions (Tower of Terror. and Journey to the Center of the Earth twice) and saw the Mystical Rhythms and Fantasmic shows. For dinner we went to the fancy dining room about the S.S. Columbia. Maybe next time I can finally make it to Tokyo Disney Land.

Since I enjoyed the first class so much my friend invited me again to the Japanese Sweets making class. This time we made sweets that represented the Japanese autumn. The sweets were a little bit more difficult to make that the last time, but I enjoyed the challenge and think my sweets turned out pretty well. I cant wait for the winter sweets class.