Hectic Travel

Tokyo Home Sweet Home

So back to our sweet abode, we had finished our 1 month half way trip around Japan!!!!!!!! An awesome time, amazing experience and so relieving to get out of the hustle and bustle of Tokyo and get into the real Japan!!!!

This trip was such a significant part of our travels, as we always had ambitions to go to every part of Japan! This trip covered most of those plans.........

Our half way trip trail

....... now we have to prepare for our next trip ahead in a couple of months. We are still to venture to the islands of Kyushu and Hokkaido…. And then Korea!

Thank you Ami, Megumi and Toshi san, who had taken care of us and were ever so helpful with accommodation and generous in every way!!! Arigatogozaimashita!!!!

Campaii to Japan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Konbanwa Nagoya!!

After our long detour to Himeji we finally made it to Nagoya in the early evening. Exhausted from our travels we chilled in our hotel room for a bit and slowly got ready to hit the town.

Firstly we started with some suggestions from Andrew (our Aussie flatty who used to live here). We decided to go to the Red Rock first for some Aussie grub. Something we have been craving now for 9 months!! A yummy steak was in order and didn’t fail to meet expectations…. Any decent steak was great right now!

Once again, Jap-glish never ceases to amaze

A few drinks later, we noticed an old, fat balding Australian guy was trying to pick up these 2 Japanese chicks. So after a long time we started chatting to the girls in offer to help them. We chatted to them for a bit but they still left with him anyway…so go figure!

After hearing that the other recommended place, Heavens Door, had recently closed we went in search for another bar. As in the rest of Japan it’s difficult to find normal bars, this time we lucked out a little and found a place called My Bar. A normal small bar with some 90s house music playing.

We befriended 2 Japanese guys at the bar and that hit off the rest of our night. Lots of sculling and drinks later we decided to go back to the Red Rock for happy hour which was between 3-5.30am, something we lightly promised ourselves to do.

Our new best friends for the night

A guy who can't handle his alcohol in the middle, the communist on the right

From here it’s very blurry, but faint memories of Sophi stating her opinion on China lead to one of the Japanese guys stating he was a communist. Just lucky we were all drunk enough for no awkwardness to occur! Cam on the other hand had gone to find an ATM, and outside he was picked up by a hooker! Very funny as Cam was slow to catch on at first due to the language barrier.

The rest is a blur for all but one of the Japanese guys was spewing in the bushes and still smiling, this meant it had been a good night and time to end it!!

Bastard of a hangover

The next morning resulted in waking with a rude, rude, rude hangover and the day was spent recuperating in the hotel room in order to be fit and ready to meet Megumi for dinner! Luckily for us the weather was horrible and raining so no guilt was felt staying in bed.

Megumi is one of Sophi’s old au pairs she used to have as a child. Megumi has kept in touch over the years with frequent cards and visits to our old Beecroft home. Megumi and her husband of 5 years lived in Sydney together for 4.5 years before moving to Nagoya into their new home.

Megumi and her husband, Toshi, kindly invited us to dinner. They both work for travel agencies, Toshi as a consultant and Megumi as a tour guide. This means that they travel overseas each month, their next destination is to Cambodia in 2 days then Italy next month.

Megumi and Toshi

After a half hour drive to Ichinomiya from Nayoga, it was great to see a beautiful Japanese home that was a normal size!! A beautiful modern building. Megumi spoiled us by cooking tempura, katsu don and chicken teriyaki, followed by lots of fruit, desserts and more food!

It was great to catch up with Megumi and to get to know Toshi. Toshi himself grew up in America so his English is also fantastic, definitely helps! We shared lots of photos of our trip, their wedding and Megumi pulled out some old photos of her stay with Sophi’s family from when she was 10 years old! What classic photos!!

After sooooo much food they dropped us back at our hotel and we farewelled them till the next morning when they would pick us up at 9am to go for some travelling!

The traditional and the beautiful

At an early 9am, we met again and headed straight off to Gojyohacchiman, an hour and a half north of Nagoya. It was beautiful to get into the country side to the traditional towns. This particular town is nestled in the valley of some beautiful pine mountains.

Can't remember the full name of the place. Here it is in Japanese

In the country riverside

Firstly we went to an original ‘Food replica workshop’. For those who have been to Japan will understand the plastic models that are displayed in basically every restaurant window. For the others who haven’t been to Japan, in most windows are plastic models of what’s on the menu. Luckily for travellers this definitely helps to make selecting food a lot easier!

All fake... just like in all the restaurant windows

Astro boy, your so strong

Magic

At this workshop you were able to make some tempura models! Unfortunately it was too busy for us to make any, however it was great watching them make it. Instead we just bought lots of samples!

The true way of making fake tempura!

Fake sushi in the process

We then visited the castle there which was much smaller than Himeji but still substantially big, even though it was considered to be a ‘very small castle’!

Another white castle!

Being cheddar cheesey

A bug looking dome

So countryside: Town nestled in the valley

Toshi explained that the narrow winding streets of traditional towns, was for the protection against enemies. If the enemy were to attack or stampede into the city they would come in narrow groups and get confused with directions. It’s very interesting to think that historically Japan has so many castles and techniques for the enemy, however today it stands at peace with everyone.

Beautiful old cobblestoned streets

For lunch we then headed to a nearby restaurant hidden in the mountains. This restaurant was in a world heritage site building, a VERY traditional Japanese building which served ishiyaki (stone BBQ). It was huge, delicious and very traditional!

The heritage buildings that housed our restaurant

Huge place. All on the floor. Real Japanese stylin'!

Bibbed up and ready to go

Yes. The food hangs from the roof!

Vending machines: just everywhere really.

After feeling delirious from over feeding we jumped back in the car and drove another hour and a half north to the famous city of Takayama. Takayama is well known for the old traditional section that is still preserved to this day.

The bridge that leads to the Old Town

More old streets

This little guy was every where, another good luck charm
... of course we bought 2!
Sophi a true sucker for stuff

The temp had really dropped and we decided to get some coffee. To our delight we went into a very traditional Japanese café. A place where we would normally not enter due to being total gaijins and the menu usually in unreadable kanji. It was great, with the old earthen stoves in the middle of the floor with the pot hanging from the roof. Here we tried the dessert dish of an-machi (red bean and rice stuff).

A small door for small people

Traditional Japanese cafe.
No wonder we could never find a normal one!

For once we lucked out.
These 'famous' flowers are out once a year

After warming up a bit we walked around Takayama some more, buying souvenirs and drinking sake.

So red

The old sake sign:
A big straw ball outside the shop front

In the ground brewery

The sake we tried. One was white and yoghurty

We then headed to a foot onsen nearby, where we were treated to some boiling hot natural onsen water. Very relaxing and warming (next mission is to go to an outdoor onsen in the snow in winter).

So ridiculously relaxing

Now there's a stick women

Awww...

Toshi who had kindly driven all day then made the 2 hour drive back to Nagoya for some dinner. After going to a few different restaurants around Nagoya we finally found one that didn’t have an hour wait! With it being Sunday lots of families were out and about clogging up all the restaurants!! With a gorgeous view of Nagoya city we supped on some yummy Italian.

Thanks Megumi and Toshi!!

Nagoya is a beautiful modern city with lots of high rise buildings only being 1 – 6years old, creating finally a beautiful city scape, much more beautiful than Osaka which ultimately proved to be quite an older style city with dirty streets. We farewelled Megumi and Toshi who had been way too generous to us!! Thank you so much we will never forget it!! We decided to extend our trip a little longer and booked an extra night at the hotel, yay!!

A lazy day

With original plans to go to Nagashima Spaland it was decided in the morning (because Sophi slept in again) to postpone it till the next day. For the day we just jumped on the train and checked out Nagoya city, and tasted some of the local cuisine; nishimen (yet another form of noodle, this time flat and broad).

We looked around Nagoya station area, with its new buldings and interesting architecture.

PHOTOS

We then wanted to go shopping so we headed back to the famous Sakae area, which ultimately being just like a mini Ginza, packed full of the same repetitive department stores; boring. We had read that the area was filled with boutiques, but we struggled to find any, apart from the Japanese boutiques, which is a Louis Vuitton store that is not connected to a department store.

For our last night on holiday we wanted to spoil ourselves a little so we booked dinner at a Brazilian BBQ restaurant. We ate 10 types of meat, and endless buffet foods.

The weather had turned good for us on our last day away from home. We packed our belongings and checked out of the hotel, and took the 45 minute bus trip to Nagashima Spaland. This is a theme park in the middle of nowhere really, which, in summer has a huge water park that is open too.

As we walked through the gates we saw that the park was partnered with Peter Rabbit. This apparent connection seemed completely unauthorised and really, once inside, there was no sign of the rabbit again (strange Japanese).

Being Spring still, and a weekday, the place was pretty much deserted. We didn’t get into the park until about 1pm due to having lunch and whatever. The park closed at 5pm so we didn’t think we had much time. We were wrong. The longest we had to wait for a ride on anything was 10 minutes, and every other wait time was 0 minutes. The park had a roller coaster that was ridiculously high, bigger than any we had seen before.

This coaster is the longest in the world, has the 3^rd highest drop of any coaster and is the 4^th fastest coaster. We swallowed hard before making the decision to try it out. When we got into the queue, we saw a guy doing maintenance on the front of the carriage. Really doesn’t instil much confidence at all. Before going to the park we had read some reviews, one in particular jumped to mind. They had said that when they went to the park, this ride was closed because the wheels kept flying off while it was going, so to see a guy hammering the front wheels really made our stomachs turn. We took a u-turn and decided to go on the other rides.

The entire day we were completely dizzy! Soooooo many rides! Never been to an amusement park with so many good rides! The good thing with this place you cut out all the time wasting stuff on the rides in Disney and just get right to it! So the rides tend to be little quick, but you can do it all the more times!!

We headed back to the steel dragon, and attempted it! This roller coaster was the best!! Over our time in Japan Cam has slowly been facing his fear of heights, and this was the ultimate test. Surprisingly he wasn’t shaking too much. Reaching the top of this was pretty amazing, and then the drop was so intense. We have both agreed that Cam’s fear is now gone. The next step is now skydiving!

In the late afternoon the weather had started turn and we could feel a storm brewing, so we decided to make the journey back to Nagoya then to home sweet home to Tokyo. As it was going to take a good few hours we thought best to do it before last trains in Tokyo!

We got the shinkansen back and were back in Tokyo in no time. The only huge difference was that it was damn cold in Tokyo, about 11 degrees!! We had been so lucky with the weather all through our trip with maximum a couple of days of rain in the latter part. Frrreeeeeeezing!

Just can't get enough of Kyoto

All the hotels in the Kansai area were booked out for the 3^rd and 4^th of May due to Golden Week, so we were without accommodation for the night as we had left our first shit hotel and moved to another one. Our plan was to go to Kyoto and spend the night in a Karaoke room or a 24 hour internet café.

We got to Kyoto, and did a quick ask around at some Ryokans and hotels for available rooms, and we were in luck! We found a hotel right next to the station. It was a bit expensive, again, due to Golden Week, but it was well worth it.

We meet again Astro Boy

Killer reflection

Really, where are we? Japan or New York?

Kyoto tower at its glory

We had wanted to check out Kiyomizu (translation: todays water) Temple since last time in Kyoto, so we jumped on an incredibly crowded bus, and walked up the hill in the heat with thousands of other Japanese to see the temple. When we reached the top of the street and the entrance, we realised it was definitely worth the walk. This temple is right up the back of Kyoto nestled into the trees in the mountains. It is very beautiful looking out at the trees from the balcony. Some Japanese people can be very frustrating as they are oblivious to their surroundings, so when a place is very crowded they occasionally walk into you or just push you out of the way or stand in front of you while you are taking a photo.

The entry gate after a killer walk... yet still more to come

Beautiful kimonos everywhere

The bell

This guy went to a cave party last night!

The view and fresh air

Kyoto snap happy

Hint to anyone: Don’t go to Kyoto during Golden Week! It is just too crowded and not worth it. Don’t get us wrong, we had a great time but there are better times to go.

We spent the afternoon strolling around the Gion area looking in the shops and people watching.

Ladies clad in Kimonos strolling through the shops

Always making toys of everything, this time gyozas (dumplings)

We had a great Chinese dinner in a restaurant looking over the river (Sophi had been looking forward to this for a long time) and finished the night at an izakaya for a few drinks.

Our restaurant on the riverside

Check out the funky hair do (top right)

Let's get a closer look..... Dried Chicken... beer????

The next morning we planned to go to Fushimi Inari Taisha shrine (lots of Torii gates) but the weather had taken a bad turn, so we changed our minds and decided to go to Nara instead.

Historical Nara

A day in Nara was very quick and we recommend that you spend 1 – 2 days there if you have the interest in traditional Japanese culture. Nara being the first capital of Japan in it’s hey day still nurtures the traditional Japan in its temples, museums and galleries galore.

As our day had started late we were limited to what we could see. We started off with the National Museum which focused on Buddhist artefacts. Nara originally being the end of the Silk Road meant that there was lots of other oriental influences which ended up in Nara.

Buddhas Galore

Some gorgeous deer (much healthier than those on Miyajima) were roaming the parks. Deer’s historically were the messengers from the gods so therefore are kept around the places of worship.

To Sophi’s delight we realised that the art exhibition that she had wanted to see was actually in Nara. So we headed to the Prefectural Art Museum to see the famous woodblock print (Ukiyo-e) artists. The most famous for this medium was Katsushika HOKUSAI (1830s).

The Great Wave Of Kanagawa – 1831

The other famous Ukiyo-e artist was Utagawa HIROSHIGE. Renowned for his ‘100 views of Edo’.

Winter time

Always an amazing feeling to see the originals of the greats. We scoffed down some delicious food at a nearby French café. Almost tasted like home!!For the last bit of our day trip we planned to go to the world heritage Temple Todaiji with the Great Buddha. However sadly the weather took its first bad turn of our trip and it started to rain. So we tried to get back to the station as quickly as possible. Nara is not a place to be sightseeing in if it’s raining due to long outdoor walks.

So Cam jumped on a bus to ask for directions and the bus driver had closed the doors before Sophi had got on! With a look of horror on Sophi’s face the bus started to pull away. With the help of some friendly Japanese, they told the ass hole bus driver to stop after failing to listen to Cam. Lucky, as Sophi had no phone or money on her!

Thank god for Osaka, a great place geographically to base yourself if you wish to do some travel around Kansai area (Western Honshu). An hour later we were back in good ol’ Osaka and decided to head out for the local cuisine of Osaka okonomiyaki. Delicious. Osaka okonomiyaki doesn’t have the noodles like Hiroshima; instead it has less cabbage, lots of rice bubbly things and is cooked a lot slower.

Due to the recent visit to Universal Studios some oldies were in need to be watched, so we ended the night with watching Back to the Future….the first night of them all!

Hiiiiiiiiiiiiii Kobe!!!

Finally we made it to Kobe! A gorgeous city – definitely has the best city water view (although part of it’s still a port) – it doesn’t seem like the Japanese will ever understand how to display the waterfronts with the best beauty.

Space like entrance to the fashion museum

Something has landed

We arrived late in Kobe at 3pm. So we dashed through the Kobe Fashion Museum, Kobe Artists Museum and the Western housing district. The fashion museum was great, it showed some classics by Dior, Scaparelli, Yves Saint Lauren and many more. It crossed the areas of fabrics, history, famous designers, colour and structures. It displayed some great photos and background on famous fashion photographers including originals of Madonna and Niki Taylor among others.

One of the things that added to the beauty of Kobe was the old European buildings that have been preserved there, originally established by settlers who came to Japan at Kobe port.

European style streets

The main Western house still left standing after the earthquake

Cobblestones... almost feels like something normal

Bassey!!! But in Japan!! (my old dog)
This ones for you Dad

Benny. We found you

Dog sculptures. Cute

A great amount of admiration has to be given to the Japanese. They have down pact the ability to rebuild their cities fast and beautifully in such a short time. It was hard to believe that the horrendous Kobe Earthquake (Great Hanshin Earthquake) had occurred 13 years ago (where approx. 6500 people lost theirs lives). Another extreme example is Hiroshima.

Aftermath of the Kobe Earthquake 1995

With the sun setting we headed to the port area for some dinner and a beautiful view of the city. YUM!!! We had the best buffet (tabehodai) in Japan so far!! This definitely beats all the previous winners. It consisted of seafood, a lot of massive crabs and everything else you could imagine! Quality and variety in one.

To top this was the beautiful scenery of watching the sun set over Kobe Bay which is famous for the romantic setting. It proved itself to be true.

Awaiting the sunset

After delirium induced by over eating we took a stroll to the Kobe Port Tower then headed home to Osaka,

Lovers in romantic Kobe

Feasting on seafood buffet

Some more great English

Kobe Port Tower. Another original landmark, a tower

Random manga statues on the way to the station

Shopping + Baseball + Grog = A great day!!

After 4 days of solid travel it started to catch up with us again. So after waking at noon we made an executive decision not to go to Himeji Castle and instead go shopping and then the baseball. A decision well made!!

We're on TV!

We spent a few hours spending money then headed to the baseball at Osaka Dome. This was a much more impressive stadium than Hiroshima in size, facilities and the fact the whole baseball field was indoors. However, this proved to be a let down in the atmosphere.

Osaka Dome. Very domey.

The fans: always patriotic in their fan gear from head to to

Cheering for the home team

For this game we saw the Osaka Buffaloes vs. Chiba Marinas. As last time we went for the home team which at first really lacked the fun going attitude (definitely nothing like Hiroshima!!), mainly because we were losing! Although after observing the crowd we realised that not many people were drinking at all except us (silly Japs!) so Cam and Sophi carried on drinking. As usual we created our own fun and the Buffaloes made a great come back from being 5 runs behind to a win by one point in the extended inning!

Surely you could find a better job if this was the uniform!

Chiba Mariners fans jumping like little penguins

You really have to give it the Japanese, watching a game live the guy in front of us was also watching the whole game on his TV on his mobile. So Japanese!! Really wasted and pumped by the win, the rest of the night was a bit of a blur. A good night was had!!

Universal Studios Japan: TAKE 2

Excited anticipation

Rahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!! Welcome take II

After another decent sleep in we made our way for a second intake of Universal Studios. The beauty with going to theme parks numerous times, you can cut out all the crap and spend all day on the good rides. Straight off we hit the Hollywood Dream rollercoaster, with a few interceptions with the cute and cuddly characters

Bubba.... you're heaps bigger

The forgotten panther

Universal and Sesame St some how go together

We followed that by doing the best rides – Shrek, Jurassic Park, Spiderman and Back to the Future numerous times throughout the day. Jurassic Park which consists of an ending with giant splashes left us well and truly soaked from head to bottom.

Saturated. Cam gets into the dinos this time...

At least this guy gets to ride one

The one thing we missed on our first visit was the Land of Oz, mainly due to the fact it’s for kids and that there is one ride. The rest are stage shows, so this time we went and saw the short musical version of ‘Wicked’. This was great; half in English and half in Japanese.

How fluffy and cute

They can be really cruel with the uniforms can't they!

Can's getting into to J-style!

After running around doing what we could, 7 hours flew by and the next thing we new it was the end of a well spent day. On the way out along Universal Walk…. And interesting Japanese performer was doing some great tricks – something we will definitely use for party tricks when we return home!!

Buggered. We went to our hotel to pack up the end of our 12 day journey in Osaka. Goodbye Osaka hello Nagoya!!

Himeji Castle - Finally!

We had put off going to Himeji for almost 2 weeks now; after a while sightseeing just gets a little boring. This was our last chance to fit it in anywhere, so we went backwards from Osaka to Himeji to check out the biggest castle in Japan. After visiting temples, shrines and castles continuously they kind of lose their uniqueness, but Himeji really is amazing. It is 6 storeys and was built in 1333-1346, and then destroyed and rebuilt in 1580. It comprises of 82 buildings and was designed with many confusing pathways to disorientate enemies. The stairs leading up to the top floor are really steep, and we imagine, very difficult to climb if trying to attack it. We skipped the garden as we needed to catch the train to Nagoya.

The largest castle in Japan

Built for war and defense, was never once used in battle

Sanmurai - iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!

The view from the damn highest point

Massive

Old ladies obviously ready to hit the beach

We have developed a love for the Shinkansens in Japan. Although they are expensive, they get you where you need to go quickly and frequently. We calculated the cost and time of an express train to Nagoya from Himeji: 4+ hours and $60, Shinkansen: 83mins $79. You can’t beat that for value!