Hotel Kokubuso Kirishima

... tässä kävellessä vastaan!?

Tämä tiistaipäivä aloitettiin heti komealla aamulenkillä, kiipeämällä ylös Shiroyama vuorelle. Ylös olisi päässyt myös bussilla, mutta eihän me mitään sellaista tarvita ...tai sitten ei vaan tiedetty? :-)

Aika harvoin on tullut näissä kiipeilyhommissa pettymystä ja nyt voi taas sanoa, että jumankeuta! Ylhäältä avautui siis niin huikea näky, ettei mitään rajaa! W-A-U! Aivan kaupungin edessä kohosi odotetusti, mutta paljon ...

... päässä kotoa! :-)

Niin, tämä reissu Tokiosta Kagoshimaan oli kokonaisuudessaan melkein tuhat kilometriä, vaati neljä junanvaihtoa ja kyllä nyt on istumalihakset kipeänä, siis hyvät ihmiset sentään! Kaikista junista, tämä viimeinen (Tsubame Shinkansen) oli ehkä hienoin ja viihtyisin. Lyhin vaihtoaika oli ainoastaan 3 minuuttia ja pisin 7, että siinä ei todellakaan ollut aikaa asemalla ihmetellä, vaan oli mentävä tuli persuuksissa! Onneksi osaan Hiraganat ja Katakanat nyt jo ...

... my window has sliding wood shutters, which are totally effective at blocking light, a brilliant idea for a sunny southern city. The price of the room (only 4,900 yen, or roughly $50 US, booked through the Rakuten Travel website) includes a free breakfast. The breakfast buffet shows a lot of pride and care--they serve little citrus fruits and something like a sweet potato which I think are both local specialties, plus the ...

Also heute gings wieder mit den Shinkansen (hier ist plural gemeint... aber Shinkansens gibts ja nicht!) Richtung ganz süden, nachdem wir nur etwa 1 1/2 Std. geschlafen haben. Nach Sendai 川内 in der Nähe von Satsumasendai. Bin drauf gekommen das ich im Flugzeug scheinbar meine Handy Earphones vergessen habe, deshalb bin ich froh das ich meine PSP auch mitgenommen hab. Also musik hören und alles vorbeirauschen lassen... wobei wir zum schluss mehr in tunnel gefahren sind ...

... nearly 2 hours in there compared to my 15 minutes. The following day we crossed to an island called Sakurajima which is dominated by an active volcano. In the volcano museum we got talking to a French mother and daughter and ended up spending the whole afternoon with them just chatting and dipping our feet in scorching hot foot spas overlooking Kagoshima. The best moment was when Fernet (the 80 year old mother) told us that her first lover was English and she'd ...

... Kelly w*s the only one *mong us whe spoke J*p*nese, so we relied on him to find us * pl*ce. He didn't find * rest*ur*nt right *w*y, inste*d we stopped by * b*r to *sk for directions *nd ended up st*ying bec*use there w*s sumo wrestling on the TV. We w*tched for *nother hour or so until the b*rtender c*me up to Mike *nd s*id something. App*rently we h*d dr*nk them completely out of beers *s well. She told us th*t she h*d some in * truck on the w*y but we decided th*t we h*d dr*nk ...

... and home made fish cake. All was delicious. After reaching an elegant sufficiency and a buzz from the shochu, we said our good-byes to the Kagawa family as they were staying at extra few days and we caught and early flight to Kagoshima for our one nite in Kagoshima. Iida-san and Ohma-san planned our dinner in Kagoshima. Basically, we had two dinners: Kagoshima "kuro buta" - black pig shabu shabu and Kagoshima ramen. Iida-san ...

Welcome to our chronicle of Kagoshima, the southernmost city on the island of Kyushu in Japan. We arrived at the train station after taking the historic Kyushu limited express train, an old train line that crosses the mountains of the island. We figured out that this was a historic train when we saw all of the other passengers snapping pictures in front of the train cars....so ...

Woke up rather later than planned to a very blustery, cold and wet day in Tokyo-reminds us of somewhere else in the world! Worked out the chain of hotels we are staying in is near us so checked that out - very good, and free ...

... airport was the smallest one I had ever used. Anyway, some parts of the island was designated as a UNESCO's World Natural Heritage Site and so really beautiful.

Our first destination of the island was Shiratani Unsuikyo Forest. We took a bus from Kamiyaku town hall, which had only several passengers. It was lucky that we could left our bags at the log house of the entrance. The forest in the movie Princess Mononoke was modeled ...