05秋季日本行(第二天富士山河口湖車站) Japan Trip 05 (Day II Lake Kawaguchi Station under Fuji Mountain)

離開富士急樂園也是三點過後的事了。芊玩得很盡興，有些設施硬是玩了兩遍才肯依依不捨地放手，也就因為這樣，原本想要早一點到河口湖車站的計畫也生變。
We left Fujikyu after 3pm. Chien was having a lot of fun and went on many of the facilities twice before she could let go unwillingly. For this reason, we had to change our plan and arrived Lake Kawaguchi Station later than scheduled time.

從富士急樂園站到河口湖站，火車慢慢開也不過兩分鐘就到，連加速的感覺也沒有。到站以後才驚覺這段車票之昂貴，日幣180圓，搞不好是走路就可以到的距離…
It took only two minutes to arrive Lake Kawaguchi Station from Fujikyu Station by slow train. The train didn’t even speed up. At least I didn’t feel it. It’s not until we arrived Lake Kawaguchi Station that I surprisingly discovered how expensive this ride is, 180 yen for a distance that I could probably reach the destination by feet.

到河口湖要做什麼呢？老媽說：「看猴子表演。」千里迢迢到河口湖看猴子表演？說穿了也是因為要找個芊可能感興趣的地方。
So what are we going to do at Lake Kawaguchi? Mom said, “Go to the monkey theater.” Monkey theater? All this trip just to see the monkey theater? So it’s another trial to get something that Chien might be interested in after all.

一到河口湖車站，我看大家都傻了…車站小得讓人驚訝，火車站就像集集車站一樣大小，旁邊再加一個同樣大小的公車站，就這樣。猴子劇場在哪裡？幾點有表演？怎麼去？我在傳單架上拿簡介的同時也丟了一連串問題給老媽（因為我完全沒有看到任何猴子劇場的消息），她在候車室裡看了老半天，終於找到了資料，最後一場表演是三點，早就過了…
When we arrived the station, we’re all surprised by the scale of the station. It is so small! There’s only a tiny room for purchasing tickets and waiting for train in the station, and nearby there’s another small house of the same size as the bus station. That’s all. “So, where’s the monkey theater? What time is the show? How do we get there?” I asked mom when I collected flyers on the rack (because I didn’t see anything related to the theater). Mom looked around in the room for a while and finally got the information. The last show was 3pm, long passed already.

接下來的問題是，那我們要幹什麼？老媽答應芊要讓她坐到湯瑪士彩繪火車，得要等到六點半，中間這兩個半小時怎麼過？看了看地圖，決定坐公車到離河口湖最近的車站下車，大老遠跑了一趟，總不能連河口湖的影子都沒看到吧！
So the following question is, what are we going to do now? Mom promised Chien that she’d be able to take the Thomas train on the way back. (There’s a train decorated with various trains from the animation running back and forth but the schedule is limited.) We had to wait until 6:30pm. How are we going to pass the two and half hours? Looking at the map, we decided to go to the nearest station where we can at least see the lake by bus. After traveling all this way to arrive here, we can’t leave without seeing the famous lake!

下一個問題是，公車怎麼坐？
So, the next question is, how do we take the bus?

我隨著老媽進了公車站問，小地方，英文不管用，老媽又聽不太懂，售票人員拿起一張傳單指著上面的一日卷票價1500日圓，告訴我們在外面搭乘。我滿腦子問號走出了公車站，看看傳單，原來要搭的是我們在一出火車站時看到的古典觀光巴士，離湖最近的一站是香草館。花1500日圓搭四站公車來回？也未免太貴了些，難道就沒有單程車票？我又在公車站附近仔細看了看，‘好不容易’才看到英文說明…眼睛也太大了點，那麼明顯的牌子竟然漏掉了！單趟公車不到兩百日圓，終於出現了個可接受的價錢。
I went inside the bus station with my mom. But a small town like this one can hardly find anyone that speaks English. And my mom couldn’t understand fully what the bus station staff was saying. Excellent! So the woman picked up a flyer and pointed the one-day pass price 1500 yen, and then pointed out where we should take the bus. I went out of the station with my brain full of question marks. Looking at the flyer, so the bus we should take is the “classical bus” we saw when we got out of the train station. Getting of at Herb-kan we’d be able to see the lake. 1500 yen for a return bus trip? That’s way too much! Isn’t there any single ride ticket? I searched around the station again and eventually I found some English panels… My eyes are just too big to skip those evident signs on the way from train station to bus station. So a single bus ride is less than 200 yen. Finally got an acceptable price.