2 posts tagged “japan”
We still have 1000+ photos to go through, but thought I would post a sampling of them.
We did get to dive :)
Tokyo at night
Sakura (Cherry Blossoms)
Fugu (Pufferfish)
It's going to be hard to summarize our trip to Japan in a single blog... I'll try to hit the highlights, then post pictures with descriptions as we filter the 1200 pictures we took. My new banner is Mt Fuji as taken from the Observatory on the 24th :)
19/20th of March
We left Atlanta on the morning of the 19th of Mar and arrived in Japan the afternoon of the 20th (dateline & 14.5 hour flight). Upon arrival we spent about 1 hour in the lines for customs and immigration. Marrisa & Rick met us at the airport (it was great meeting them in person, finally). We then hung around waiting for Ellenor and David to arrive.
After David arrived, we found out that Ellenor would be coming on the 21st due to passport issues. We headed toward our hostel, the Ace Inn.
21 March
We got up in the morning and headed to the fish market after
meeting up with David’s friend Don and his friend Alice. It was interesting, and we had some very
good, very fresh sushi. We walked around
some and went by a Kubuki theatre. We
then headed to Ginza district to see the
shops/sights. David and Marissa headed
to the airport to get Ellenor. Rick,
Samma, & I walked around seeing sights, including a visit to Starbucks for
Rick to feel like he was on vacation too…
Once they got back from the airport, we met up with Don & Alice
again, and went to dinner before heading back to the Ace Inn for the night.
22 March
We got up and headed to Otsuki to spend some time in Marrisa & Rick’s neighborhood. We had dinner with their friends Sato-san & Ureko-san. Samma & I had brought Chateau Elan wine (Muscadine & Peach) and pecans. Sato-san loved the pecans, and Ureko-san served up an excellent dinner including beer & sake. We stayed at Chez MathewsWoods.
23 March
We puttered around Mt Fuji area. We visited the temple and pagoda at Chubu and
had some spectacular views of Mt Fuji.
We also visited the kimono museum.
We went to an Onsen for a wonderful bath. When we got back the Chez MathewsWoods, I
cooked corn-pon to take to school in the morning. Samma wanted to take treats to Rick’s class
that we were visiting.
24 March
We got up and headed
to school. Rick had a plan that had the
students asking us simple questions and writing down our responses. It was fun and the kids were great. After school, we headed to a small tourist
trap village that make fresh buckwheat soba.
There were several springs in the village and I saw several cave
entrances and was “jonesing” to jump in and see what there was to see. We rode to the foot of Mt Fuji and visited
the observatory (German Brewpub there had good beer) & the temple where the
goddess of Mt Fuji lives (also the start of the trail if you want to climb the
mountain). After that we drove around
the lake for some sunset shots of Mt Fuji, then met up with Marissa’s boss for
Houtou, a local specialty. We stopped by
a department store and I purchased a nice knife.
25 March
I got up early to fix corn-pon for breakfast, but had to
wait for Rick & Marrisa to get some oil as I didn’t get the word & used
the rice syrup purchased the night before to start the breakfast. Made horrible corn-pon… After breakfast, we
headed back to Tokyo and checked in
at the Tokyo Hostel. We hung out with
Don that night.
26 March
We got up in the morning and headed to the Imperial
Palace to visit the East
Garden (only part of the Palace open
to the public). In the evening we went
to a tourist area at had an nice pagoda and temple. Samma bought me a jambi (sp? – Japanese PJs),
and I picked up a Noh mask for Cathy at the Dive Outpost.
27 March
We visited the “worlds largest/busiest crosswalk” and it was
wild to see the mass of people. We also
visited the Tokyu Hands – a “big” DIY store.
We met Don for dinner at a place he had been trying to get us too. We had all you can eat grilled meat. We had to do the grilling and only had 90
minutes at the table, and were allowed to order as much meat as we wanted in 70
minutes.
28 March
We got up and headed to Kamakura to
see the temples/shrines there. We took the bus out to a temple, walked up
to it and enjoyed the view. After that, we walked to another temple that
had a great bamboo forest. After that we walked back to the main road,
ate and then spent a little time on the main drag (it was an awesome cherry
blossom filled street). While walking, I found a liquor store that had some
good hand crafted beer.
When we left Kamakura, we headed to Atami for the night. The hotel we stayed (Aiola Hotel) at had a bath, so we indulged before heading back to the room for more beer. I bought extra in Kamakura and we had all bought some good handcrafted beer in Tokyo the night before.
29 March
Samma & I got up early, packed and headed down to the lobby for our diving adventure. Thomas (from Sweden) the owner of Japan Underwater Explorers picked us up and took us to the boat. They had a drysuit for Samma rather than a wetsuit, so there were some issues, but all in all we had a good time. Dive 1 was on a wreck, dive 2 was a sea cave :) After the diving Thomas took us to the train station where we ran into the rest of the group and traveled together up to Yokohama.
We checked in to the hostel at Hayashi Kaikan a part of the Yokohama Hostel Village and headed to Chinatown to see the sights and eat.
30 March
We visited the Raumen Museum. We took the Shikansen (Bullet train) back to Tokyo, and that was cool! We visited the fashion district to gawk at the people. Then had supper at Mysterious “Neo Tokyo Fooding Bar”. It was fun but a bit smokey. We stayed at the Ace Inn that night.
31 March
We were free in the morning to look around, and after checking out, we headed to Ueno to see the park. It was raining, but still a wonder way to spend the morning. The cherry blossoms were great. After spending time in the park, we caught the train to Mitaka to visit the Ghibli Museum. The museum was interesting. There were some awesome exhibits, including the workshop where he worked on his drawings.
After the museum, we headed back to Tokyo to eat and find a place to stay -- Love Hotel night ;) Since one of the only things left on our list to do was Fugu (Blowfish), Marissa & Rick took Samma & I to a Fugu restaurant. We ordered a mixed batch of Fugu -- sashimi, fried, grilled, pickled skin, and boiled. It was good fish, Rick & I each got pieces that had a little poison on them and ended up with numb tongues for about 45 minutes.
After that we headed to the Love Hotel district. Samma & I picked the Hotel Sonnau for our stay. It was interesting with a blacklight in the tub room.
01 Apr
We got up in the morning and headed to Ueno Station (our meeting place). Samma & I visited the the Ueno Zoo to kill time. It was a nice little zoo. They had Pygmy Hippopotamuses -- very cool. We then headed back to the station to meet up with everyone else and get our luggage out of the locker. At noon we headed to the airport to check in. Our flight left Tokyo at 3:30PM in the afternoon, and landed in Atlanta at 3PM in the afternoon of 01 Apr, having flown 12 hours and lost 30 minutes of time on the first. We got home at 6PM and were in bed at 9PM ending the longest April Fools Day of my life :)
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