You may remember when I introduced you to my visit to Hakone last November. I’m going to show you one more precious view from the summit of Mt. Komagatake today.
Please look at the photo below. You can see two kinds of water surfaces. What are these? They are the lake and the ocean. The one in the front is Lake Ashinoko. On the other hand, the one in the back is the Pacific Ocean. It’s a rare view, isn’t it? As far as I can remember, there are several places, where we can see both a lake and the sea in Japan. For example, we can simultaneously see Lake Saroma and the Okhotsk Sea in Hokkaido Island, but they are connected each other. In other words, the difference in elevation of these water surfaces are zero meters. In contrast, the difference in elevation of water surfaces between Lake Ashinoko and the Pacific Ocean is 723 meters. Don’t you think the water could easily leak from the lake? According to specialists, Lake Ashinoko is a caldera lake in the Hakone mountains. It means that the lake is surrounded by the hard and dense volcanic rocks. I enjoyed this unique view from Mt. Komagatake.
Well, I can't be written off here as this is a transportation blog. Taking this opportunity, I'm showing another gondola, “Ashinoko (Number 1)”. Along with “Komagatake (Number 2)”, “Ashinoko” was built by CWA in 1986. It can accommodate up to 101 passengers. Komagatake Ropeway has been operated by automatic control system since 1990.
