JAPAN 5: Return of the David
So David arrived at our hostel at 7 in the morning, before the lobby was even open. I let him in, and we basically just went back to sleep until 10. We set out to try and see the golden pavilion and some zen gardens, but there were no direct bus routes. I`m realizing that if I want to get David to do something, I can`t be shy about it, I have to go to him and straight up tell him what is happening. We left late, got off the bus way early, and never really even had a chance of getting to the golden pavilion. Fortunately, we found something just as good (if not better).
We found this temple (something like the dragons of heaven and earth temple, or something) and it had an AMAZING Zen garden. It started as being really well cared for, but then transitioned to being wild woodlands in the background. It was huge, and had a lake full of koi. I took lots of pictures, and I think most of those turned out pretty well. We ended up walking most of the way home, which took a good 2 hours or so. The neighborhoods were really awesome, and I`m pretty happy about the way tho whole day turned out.
That night we got drunk and David and I played GO.
The next morning, we got up later than we meant to and caught the shinkansen to Hiroshima. Because of poor planning and getting up late, we only had 3 1/2 hours there. We went out and got some Hiroshima Yaki (basically Okinomiyaki with yakisoba noodles) which was super good, but cost us an hour. We finally made it to the Hiroshima peace museum, which was pretty good, but kind of had a bad feeling about it... like they were sad for the wrong reasons, I guess. But I feel that way with most human interest stories.
So then we hopped back on the shinkansen going the other direction, and then hopped on another train 40 minutes later, which took us down to matsuyama (another 3 hours) on Shikoku. We have pretty much given up the idea of biking around down here, it is rediculously hot and humid. If we do end up biking this trip, it will be in the north, methinks. Oh yeah, so David took a boat directly here, because it was faster and cheeper for him, but we had rail passes, so the trip cost us nothing. So now we are staying at what has been consistantly voted the best youth hostel in Japan, apparently. I disagree, but it is pretty cool. We basically just went to bed last night, and then this morning we got breakfast and went back to bed. Then one of the workers came in and told us we had to change rooms. We were super pissed because they had woken us up, but we went to our other room without a fuss. Not quite as cool, but still a good room.
After we finally got up, we went out and window shopped for a while. We got lunch (sashimi for me, and this wierd shrimp tempura for Deborah. It was kind of a disaster, as the shrimp were not peeled, and so chewing them was really wierd, and Deborah got the inside of her throat cut up a bunch. We then went to this bath-house which is supposedly the first one ever or something, and was only for the Emperor originally. We spend $15 each for a quick bath (which was pretty nice, admittedly) a little tour, and some tea and sweets. We`ve been relaxing a while now, and David and I are about to play more GO. Should be fun!
Oh, I forgot to mention... though we have not seen any live ones yet, there are spiders that are bigger than my hand up here, and we certainly have seen a lot of corpses. I`ve never really been arachnophobic, but for these guys, I make an exception.
We found this temple (something like the dragons of heaven and earth temple, or something) and it had an AMAZING Zen garden. It started as being really well cared for, but then transitioned to being wild woodlands in the background. It was huge, and had a lake full of koi. I took lots of pictures, and I think most of those turned out pretty well. We ended up walking most of the way home, which took a good 2 hours or so. The neighborhoods were really awesome, and I`m pretty happy about the way tho whole day turned out.
That night we got drunk and David and I played GO.
The next morning, we got up later than we meant to and caught the shinkansen to Hiroshima. Because of poor planning and getting up late, we only had 3 1/2 hours there. We went out and got some Hiroshima Yaki (basically Okinomiyaki with yakisoba noodles) which was super good, but cost us an hour. We finally made it to the Hiroshima peace museum, which was pretty good, but kind of had a bad feeling about it... like they were sad for the wrong reasons, I guess. But I feel that way with most human interest stories.
So then we hopped back on the shinkansen going the other direction, and then hopped on another train 40 minutes later, which took us down to matsuyama (another 3 hours) on Shikoku. We have pretty much given up the idea of biking around down here, it is rediculously hot and humid. If we do end up biking this trip, it will be in the north, methinks. Oh yeah, so David took a boat directly here, because it was faster and cheeper for him, but we had rail passes, so the trip cost us nothing. So now we are staying at what has been consistantly voted the best youth hostel in Japan, apparently. I disagree, but it is pretty cool. We basically just went to bed last night, and then this morning we got breakfast and went back to bed. Then one of the workers came in and told us we had to change rooms. We were super pissed because they had woken us up, but we went to our other room without a fuss. Not quite as cool, but still a good room.
After we finally got up, we went out and window shopped for a while. We got lunch (sashimi for me, and this wierd shrimp tempura for Deborah. It was kind of a disaster, as the shrimp were not peeled, and so chewing them was really wierd, and Deborah got the inside of her throat cut up a bunch. We then went to this bath-house which is supposedly the first one ever or something, and was only for the Emperor originally. We spend $15 each for a quick bath (which was pretty nice, admittedly) a little tour, and some tea and sweets. We`ve been relaxing a while now, and David and I are about to play more GO. Should be fun!
Oh, I forgot to mention... though we have not seen any live ones yet, there are spiders that are bigger than my hand up here, and we certainly have seen a lot of corpses. I`ve never really been arachnophobic, but for these guys, I make an exception.