Japan trip report, day 8
September 3, 2007
We slept a little late. Definitely needed that. We didn't get to any panels before the end because we went to the post office to mail some of our stuff home to us. Even using the 3-week shipping, it still cost over $100. Ouch! Worth it not to have to schlep all that stuff, though. [Of course, not so worth it after finding that only half of it made it home to us. :(]
We peeked into the closing ceremony already in progress, but were confused and a bit bored, so we ducked out and got a last few minutes of net time. And then -- it was over. And I nicked a Japanese poster for Stardust, since I figured it was fair game at that point. :-}
We ran into ladykathryn and _nicolai_ on the way out and ended up having lunch with them at the Hard Rock Cafe in the Queen's East/Landmark area. It was nice to hang out with them, but I have to say that I hadn't really missed that kind of food. After lunch we parted ways with them, and we rode the diving roller coaster at the amusement park. For such a little coaster, it really packed a punch.
We went to the World Porters shipping center to try to find a mailing tube for my drawing and poster, but didn't see any. However, we did buy all kinds of groovy tourist crapola, including some awesome Engrish T-shirts and the most adorable Totoro music box. Then we pulled ourselves away and walked back to our hotel via Rinko Park, packed up our stuff, checked out early, and trudged over to Sakuragicho-eki to reserve tickets to Kyoto.
We managed to get on the wrong train at first and went several stops out of our way, but fortunately we had enough time to correct our error and to buy an ekiben before boarding the shinkansen. I didn't get to eat it on the train, though, as the motion lulled me to sleep for most of the trip. I awake about 20-25 minutes before we pulled into Kyoto-eki.
Finding the correct direction in which to head for Ryokan Ikoi-no-Ie wasn't hard, but finding the correct street was. Japanese cities are full of little alleys off main roads that are mostly residential. This is where our ryokan [actually, more like a minshuku] is, on one of those alleys. And it started to rain a few blocks before we got there, too. And we arrived to find that they had need of guests who wouldn't mind having room reservations shuffled around a bit. We had booked an ensuite room, but agreed to take a room with shared bath instead. A discount of JPY10,000 helped. We did get to stay in the nicer room for our first night, at least. After settling down and cooling off, we ate the ekiben meal and drank plum wine, got some cold drinks, onigiri, and ice cream from the nearby 7-11, watched some really weird Japanese game show (hide-and-seek for money...when hiders were found, the seeker detonated firecrackers in the backs of vests worn by the hiders. Sheesh!) and fell over.
We slept a little late. Definitely needed that. We didn't get to any panels before the end because we went to the post office to mail some of our stuff home to us. Even using the 3-week shipping, it still cost over $100. Ouch! Worth it not to have to schlep all that stuff, though. [Of course, not so worth it after finding that only half of it made it home to us. :(]
We peeked into the closing ceremony already in progress, but were confused and a bit bored, so we ducked out and got a last few minutes of net time. And then -- it was over. And I nicked a Japanese poster for Stardust, since I figured it was fair game at that point. :-}
We ran into ladykathryn and _nicolai_ on the way out and ended up having lunch with them at the Hard Rock Cafe in the Queen's East/Landmark area. It was nice to hang out with them, but I have to say that I hadn't really missed that kind of food. After lunch we parted ways with them, and we rode the diving roller coaster at the amusement park. For such a little coaster, it really packed a punch.
We went to the World Porters shipping center to try to find a mailing tube for my drawing and poster, but didn't see any. However, we did buy all kinds of groovy tourist crapola, including some awesome Engrish T-shirts and the most adorable Totoro music box. Then we pulled ourselves away and walked back to our hotel via Rinko Park, packed up our stuff, checked out early, and trudged over to Sakuragicho-eki to reserve tickets to Kyoto.
We managed to get on the wrong train at first and went several stops out of our way, but fortunately we had enough time to correct our error and to buy an ekiben before boarding the shinkansen. I didn't get to eat it on the train, though, as the motion lulled me to sleep for most of the trip. I awake about 20-25 minutes before we pulled into Kyoto-eki.
Finding the correct direction in which to head for Ryokan Ikoi-no-Ie wasn't hard, but finding the correct street was. Japanese cities are full of little alleys off main roads that are mostly residential. This is where our ryokan [actually, more like a minshuku] is, on one of those alleys. And it started to rain a few blocks before we got there, too. And we arrived to find that they had need of guests who wouldn't mind having room reservations shuffled around a bit. We had booked an ensuite room, but agreed to take a room with shared bath instead. A discount of JPY10,000 helped. We did get to stay in the nicer room for our first night, at least. After settling down and cooling off, we ate the ekiben meal and drank plum wine, got some cold drinks, onigiri, and ice cream from the nearby 7-11, watched some really weird Japanese game show (hide-and-seek for money...when hiders were found, the seeker detonated firecrackers in the backs of vests worn by the hiders. Sheesh!) and fell over.