Wel City Tottori

... listata maailman hienoimpien junareittien listalle...

Takaisin Osakassa oltiin viimein kello 20.30 aikoihin ja käytiin vielä nopeasti pyörähtämässä Osakan-aseman lähellä olevissa valtavissa kaupoissa, etsimässä hiukan kaikenlaista tavaraa jatkoa varten. Nyt on pakko alkaa latautua jo tulevaan...

Jaahas ja tästä alkaa nyt todellinen humuviikonloppu! Tiedossa on kolme päivää silkkaa juhlaa, joten päivityksissä saattaa esiintyä pieniä viivästyksiä... :-)

... 8221;. Ja nyt kun juna tuossa kiisi ohi vihreänä siintävien peltojen, niin siellähän se aamukaste ja sumu leijui! Ei ollut mitään pötypuhetta näköjään se teksti! Olisi aika hienoa jos pystyisi pelkästään maistamalla tunnistamaan eri alueiden teet. Ehkä juuri ja juuri nyt pystyn tunnistamaan Senchan, Gyokuron, Machan ja Genmaichan toisistaan. Niin ja Kiinalaisen teen taas erottaa siitä, että se loistaa pimeässä tai pakenee kun koitat juoda sitä. Fosfori ja ...

... an English menu, and ate there. It was a nice dinner, a few bits of sashimi, some edamame beans, some yakitori etc. We headed back to our hotel through the constant rain to our hotel. Tottori is a fairly nondescript town and we were there on Sunday which meant that many shops were closed, which made it even more boring and provincial. It kind of reminded me of Slough in its pure drabness.

... Our food however was not the easiest meal we have both ever eaten. We are quite adventurous eaters, even Daniella as she is a bit new to eating fish, there were just some really weird foodstuffs put in front of us here. Some we could not decipher what on earth they are, just that they came from the sea and dont taste that good. We enjoyed our old favourites such as sashimi, tempura , beef and crab, but there were just too many things we did ...

... but end of the end, I decided to return to Oregon so I can watch the Beaver games in person. I will catch the night bus to Osaka and then fly to Thailand on Thursday morning. Maybe it hasn't sunk in yet as I still have a lot of things to do before I go but I will soon be in the land of smiles with the temperature in the 90's (30's C), a big differnce of freezing weather and snow of Tottori. Let the journey begin!

It is the night before I begin the first leg of my trip and I am not packed yet. I am waiting my clothes to dry before I pack them away. The other day I bought all the train tickets from Tottori to Kyushu, around Kyushu, Nagasaki to Tokyo and finally Tokyo to Osaka before arriving back in Tottori on January 2nd. It cost a bit but I think I saved some money by buying everything ahead of time ...

Greetings to the first entry of my big trip. It is ten days before I start the first leg of my trip to Kyushu. It will be my second visit to Kyushu as the first one was in 1995. I am planning to go to Fukuoka and then head to Yufuin in Oita prefecture and then contrinue down to Kagoshima and onto Nagasaki. The trip is part of the plan to visit all the prefectures in Japan which will be down to 1 after the trip leaving only Fukui..

... the flight to China. Being in a country like Japan, it`s easy to feel isolated, and this was especially the case in the proceeding few days when all I wanted was to be at home. It was a case of grinding it out, keeping busy, and the three weeks would soon pass... It was a relief to leave Kyoto behind on Sunday as I headed for Amanohashidate on the west coast, voted one of Japan`s top three scenic attractions. The view of the 3.5km sand spit ...

... no idea what to expect, and they'll be here in 20 minutes! AHH! On Friday we visited Hikone Castle and had a JET barbeque in Nagahama afterwards. There was this amazing 10 year old kid Benjamin from New Zealand there. I couldn't decide if he was really mature for his age or if his accent was just making him seem well beyond his years, but he was awesome! Yesterday I went to Kyoto with a few other JETs. I'm tired today but it was fun!

... The original intent for our trip was to withdraw some money from Zach's account back in Michigan, and Kyoto had the cloest international bank. We ended up roaming around the streets looking at stuff, and it was really neat! We began to play this game of Where's Waldo with the other foreigners (gaijin). :) It was so exciting to see them, escpecially since there aren't many where Zach and I are living. The two most common places people seemed to be from were Germany and France.