One of the highlights of my autumn 2008 trip to Japan was a weekend spent in Hakone, the beautiful mountain resort near Tokyo. There, my friends and I stayed at a traditional ryokan (bed-and-breakfast), enjoying the hot springs and visiting the famous lake.

I recently realized that I never did get around to uploading all my photos from my trip to Japan a few years back... here are my photos from Tokyo.

Some more photos from my trips to Japan. These were taken in December, 2004, and are of Kamakura, one-time capital of Japan.
( I think I managed to turn the captioning on for the slideshow )

I realized that I still haven't sorted through and edited most of the photos I took during my trip to Japan 18 months ago.

In response to a recent post by fenikkusuken, a Kyoto photo album ( Read more... )

For those of you who follow my travel blog entries, I finally finished captioning and editing my Turkey photos from my trip last May. ::embarrassed cough ( Read more... )

This journal is being written from a tiny ryokan, or traditional Japanese inn, located deep in the mountains of Hakone, about 90 miles from Tokyo.

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The end of our twelfth day in Japan finds us back in Tokyo for a night, staying at a lovely business hotel near the Shinjuku train station, which Nick booked for us via the Internet from Kyoto. We had tried to extend our stay at the Kyoto business hotel by one more night, but they were booked up. ( Read more... )

I slept in and made a somewhat more leisurely start this morning, since Hikone Castle was less than an hour away by train. ( Read more... )

Bright sunshine and blue skies this morning, so we made an early start. Lori had expressed an interest in touring some of Kyoto’s famous garden spots, and with the weather smiling on us, it seemed like a nice day’s outing.
Our first stop was Nijo Castle, only two blocks from our hotel. Its moated and walled precincts enclose a lovely 17th-century ( Read more... )

I woke up this morning to the sound of rain, and the sight of gray skies. This did not bode well for our planned walk through the old neighborhoods and temples of the renowned Higashiyama district that runs along the base of Kyoto’s eastern hills.

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