Fishing in Hakone

On a number of weekend trips, I've seen fisherman out in the middle of rivers trying their hand at fishing. Most of time, I have unfortunately been in a car or train so picture-taking was not possible. However, on the weekend we went to Hakone, right at the start of the walking tour portion, we got dropped off at one of the tourist parking lots just outside the town of Yumoto. It's a gravel based parking lot which connects by a dirt and grass path to the main road, so it would not have been a great drop off point had it been raining that day. The day turned out much better the weather forecast had predicted. There was supposed to be about 70% chance of rain all day long. We got sun, haze and a whole lot of humidity. Other than the sweat off our brow, we managed to stay completely dry if just a little sticky in the humidity. The throngs of people trying to catch the last glimpse of the ajisai in full bloom didn't help the intense heat situation either.

Before the big adventure to see the ajisai, ride the cablecar and ropeway, we had to get to the edge of the town of Yumoto by crossing over a bridge. It was over this bridge that I notice the fishermen in the river below with long rubber pants and long fishing rods. I watched them as I prepared to take out my camera and I gladly gave up my spot at the head of the queue in our tour group. I took a few snaps but couldn't wait around long enough to get one when they had a catch. It was just interesting to me that they would wade that far into the water before casting a line when their fishing rods were obviously long enough to handle a line cast from the shore. As a side observation, this river looks a lot cleaner than any of the rivers that I've seen within Tokyo's 23 ku.

One of these days, I will catch this fishermen in action and be closer to them when I get my shot. I'd like to try fishing in Japan so that I can say that I did it once, but you need a license to catch most fish in Japan. I'm not sure which fish are okay to catch without a license, but I'm not adventurous enough to try my luck without knowing in advance. In my younger days, I might have tried fishing in a small Japanese river or lake unlicensed --- and back then I probably would not have needed a license, since this whole license to fish thing is new. Sounds a little less sexy than 007's tagline of license to kill, but I'm not sure that that tagline would attract many tourists.

Click here for some great Hakone sightseeing.