Return to Japan

Time for my celebratory turning 30 trip to Japan! Again! I know I only went about eighteen months ago but unexpectedly, I persuaded my friend Robbie to join me for a return trip.

We started in Tokyo and although I'd been there before, Robbie hadn't. We covered a lot of ground in the two days we had to explore the city. We visited a few temples, Japanese gardens and explored areas like Akihabara. We even met a little Japanese man in Shinjuku station who joined us for a trip to Harajuku shrine telling us lots of fun (yet confusing) stories about the Japanese Emperor and Japanese history in general along the way.

Shinjuku park

Tokyo station

After a few days in Tokyo, we activated our 7 day Japan Rail passes and caught the Shinkansen (bullet train) to Osaka. Getting the Shinkansen was something I'd wanted to do for a while and was something I didn't have the opportunity to do during my previous visit. A journey of about 300 miles took just under three hours and ran exactly to the schedule set out for it. An opportunity to embrace my inner train geek and have a cheeky nap.

Once in Osaka, we spent our first day exploring the city. Osaka is a fairly industrial city but had a rebuilt castle and a large aquarium to explore. If you're a regular reader of my occasional blog, you'll know that I love a good aquarium. The aquarium was apparently one of the largest in Japan and featured various marine creatures including otters, capybaras, sharks, rays and jellyfish. The castle was a replica of one that was bombed during the war. The queue for the lift was too long so we chose to climb up the seven flights of stairs to the top level. It nearly killed me despite my improved level of fitness but there was a nice view of the city from the top which made it worthwhile.

View from Osaka Castle

Using Osaka as our base, we spent the next few days taking day trips out to other places of interest. Starting with Kyoto. I went to Kyoto last time I was in Japan but the Golden Pavilion was still just as impressive the second time around. We also headed over to the Silver Pavilion and explored the Philosopher's Walk which featured several other temples and shrines. It ended up in the middle of a suburb of Kyoto where we found an overcrowded commuter bus to take us back to the station. Forty minutes standing uncomfortably close to other people is a little bit awkward for me.

Golden Pavilion

Silver Pavilion

The following day, we went to Nara. Nara was apparently the capital of Japan at one point and is known for it's free roaming deer and temples. The deer reminded me a lot of the monkeys I saw in Malaysia. They were very friendly and were particularly interested if they thought you had some food for them. When I got some special deer food for them, I found myself surrounded by several deer who in their enthusiasm tried to head butt me to get to the food.

Buddhist temple in Nara

Meeting one of the Nara deer

By this point, we were getting a bit tired of temples and shrines. Shocking I know but there's a point where you reach overload. To take a break from this, we spent the next day in Himeji. Himeji Castle had only just reopened after a five year refurbishment so we picked the right time to go. It was probably my favourite place that we visited in Japan. We got tickets to explore both the castle and the nearby Japanese garden. Part of the fun of the castle was removing shoes to explore inside before climbing some wooden staircases in socks and trying not to fall over onto other tourists. The view when we got to the top of the castle was worth the potential accident risk. Getting back down the stairs was equally scary but luckily I didn't display any clumsy behavior and cause chaos.

View from the castle

View of the castle

The next day, we caught the Shinkansen back to Tokyo for our final two days in Japan. We spent the last day visiting a cat cafe (essential for any trip to Japan), exploring a few areas and picking up various souvenirs. Ended up spending far too long back in Akihabara helping Robbie decide between different manga/anime figurines.

New friend at the cat cafe

Next month, I am off to Paris for a few days to celebrate my birthday. I'll try and remember to write an update which is at least as enthralling as this one once I get back.

Japan part 2 - Kyoto

After a less than comfortable night in Tokyo bus station, we finally got to start our eight hour journey to Kyoto at 11.30am the following day. Having not got a great deal of sleep, I was hoping for a nice and comfortable bus so I could spend most of the journey napping. Sadly, my height let me down. 5ft8 is apparently quite tall in Japan which meant limited leg room on the bus and a slightly uncomfortable trip for me. After a longer journey than planned, we eventually reached Kyoto at around 8pm and were totally worn out.

The following day we started exploring the city. After Tokyo, Kyoto turned out to be a lot less busy and was much easier to explore on foot. We also made a few friends at the hostel we stayed at who told us about the better places to visit and where to get good food from.

Within walking distance of the hostel we were staying in was one of the larger shrines in Kyoto. There were lots of Japanese lanterns and areas for praying as well as some nice park areas to wander around.

 

 

We also visited Nijo Castle.  I think it was built for the imperial family at some point in the 17th or 18th century. The floorboards were designed to creak so that you could hear any potential assassins waiting to pounce on you. Nowadays, there are no potential assassins (forunately) so we explored the castle in peace. Japanese castles are not the same as those found in the UK. There is a moat of sorts but no battlements or turrets. Here is a picture to illustrate my point...

 

There were also extensive grounds around the castle, my favourite part was here...

 

 

Probably my favourite part of Kyoto was the Golden Pavilion or Kinkaku-ji. I'm not sure when it was built but I think there is actual gold used on the Pavilion. It probably looks good even on really bad days. The day we went was fairly dull but even then, the pavilion was impressive.

 



I felt with both Tokyo and Kyoto there was a lot more to explore than what we managed to see in our time there. I really enjoyed Japan and am now quite keen to go back to revisit Tokyo and Kyoto as well as new places like Osaka.

Sorry it's taken a while for me to post this. Turned out that I wasn't too good at handling the jet lag after I got back to the UK. On the first day I got back, I woke up at 2am. This wasn't too much of a problem as I'd booked the day off. Unfortunately, each day afterwards I woke up at stupid times and had to drag myself to work despite how tired I felt. I drank more coffee on my first day back in the office than I normally would in a week.

Japan part 1 - Tokyo

I've always wanted to go to Japan. I can't quite explain why but it has always been on my list of places to go. When my sister announced that Japan was the final leg of her travels in Asia, I decided to go for it and booked my flights.

We started in Tokyo. It's a massive place with a train system that I could never quite grasp. There are lights and people everywhere, everything I expected of the city.

The first evening we met one of my sister's friends who is teaching in Tokyo. He took us to a restaurant where you cook your food on a hot plate in the middle of the table. We cooked these savoury pancake type things. Not quite sure what was in them but they tasted great.

The following day we met my sister's friend again. Our first stop was a Japanese cat cafe. Not what you're probably thinking... In Tokyo, a lot of people live in flats where they are not allowed pets. As a result they visit a cat cafe to get a chance to play with the cats and feel like they have a pet for an hour or so. It was a strange experience but one we all really enjoyed. Probably took a few too many pictures of cats though.

 

 



After getting very attached to the cats, we moved on to Asakusa to visit one of Tokyo's larger shrines. It turned out to be huge and really busy but very impressive. There were loads of people visiting just to reflect and pray.

On the Saturday, we took the train to Hitachi-Ushiko to meet with our former Japanese neighbours from 1988. They invited us into their home for Japanese tea and cake before taking us to Koubuntei. Koubuntei was a good two hour drive from their house so it was a struggle to stay awake for the whole journey! At Koubuntei, there is a 17th century (or so) house and park. We took a tour of the house with our Japanese friend translating before having a wander around the gardens. It was all very pretty.

Once we got back to Tokyo, we went to the Imperial Palace Gardens in the centre of the city. The gardens were really pretty and surrounded by the sky scrapers of the city. It reminded me a lot of Central Park in New York.

The snow hit on our final day in the city. The day we were due to get the night bus to Tokyo. We decided to spend the day exploring the shops and hoped the snow would ease in order to allow our journey to Kyoto to go ahead according to plan.

Unfortunately, when we arrived for our 10.45pm bus, we were told it was cancelled due to the snow. Leaving us with no alternative but to book onto one the following day and spend the night in the bus station waiting room. Not comfortable at all! Particularly as we got woken up at 5am and told to leave the bus station for an hour.

My next entry will be all about Kyoto and what we did when we eventually did manage to get there!