Given that we had a bit more time in Kyoto, I had planned our time here even less than our other destinations, so we started with a visit to the tourist information centre, which we'd been told was very good in Kyoto. It may well be, but we could barely see it for all the people in there, let alone talk to anyone. So we gave up fairly quickly after grabbing a map and set about planning our own adventures.
Unfortunately public transport in Kyoto is predominantly bus, and taking the stroller on them is virtually impossible. Fortunately we had been fore-warned about this, and even more fortunately Kyoto is actually an eminently walkable city, and it looks like we'll enjoy some fine weather while we're here. So we walked from the hotel to the east end of the Nishiki market (about 30 mins) and then strolled through there, enjoying lunch in tidbits along the way - steam buns, battered prawns, potato cakes. Saw plenty of local produce (though not sure exactly how local) both prepared and un-prepared as well as sweets, crafts, and even a shoe store. Eli was most pleased that we bought some strawberries, though we opted for just the large ones, rather than the half-the-size-of-an-adult's-fist ones that matched the various other oversized veggies. Seems Japan grows quite a few strawberries and we're here in just the right season ... come to think of it I saw some neatly manicured agricultural rows out the window of the Hikari which could easily have been strawberries.
Then it was on to Marayuma park for more hanami. This was quite a different affair to Shinjukugyoen ... No ban on alcohol here, and an abundance of makeshift food stalls (half of which sold alcoholic beverages) making for a fete-like festive atmosphere (not that Shinjuku was in any way not festive, just in a more family-in-the-park kind of way). A broader cross-section of ages here, including some teens/young adults playing cards, or even sleeping out in swags (not homeless as far as we could tell). The weeping cherries here are gorgeous, and get lit up at night so we got to explore the park twice - once in each "mode." Eli of course was once again very popular and we stopped various times for chats and photos (and sometimes food for Eli) with other sakura-viewers ... a number of whom were from out of town (particularly nearby cities like Osaka and Nara). We enjoyed an Indian dinner and sampled the squid balls that are apparently something of a local specialty ... they could do with more squid and less batter in my opinion! A couple of what are called "obuns" in the Asian shops in Adelaide (hot, custard-filled disc-shaped things) finished things off nicely.
Then it was a lovely late stroll back to the hotel (about 45 mins) fortunately with Eli asleep in the stroller, walking along a small waterway (I guess one might even call it an aqueduct?) that runs parallel to, and one street in from the river itself. This had some beautiful cherry blossoms and lanterns along it in its own right and in our view was a much better alternative to a bus ride back to the hotel!
Having slept a little poorly while trying to share a king size bed, we decided that tonight Eli would live in a little less luxury and be forced to share his bed with his Dad. The reasoning being that the two boys are sufficiently robust in the sleep and equally mobile, so they could probably thrash around and wallop each other a few times without waking each other up, and leave the sensitive young lady of the house to have her beauty sleep by herself :)
Monday, April 1, 2013
Day 5 - Bessho Onsen to Kyoto
Today consisted mostly of train travel ... Much to Eli's delight! First the Ueda Electric Railway, then the Asama Shinkansen to Tokyo before transferring to the Hikari Shikansen to Kyoto. About 5 hours of actual train travel all up, but some time waiting in stations in addition, though we opted for more of this than was absolutely necessary since we weren't confident of being able to find our way from the Asama to Hikari in under 15 mins with a toddler in tow having never been in Tokyo station before!! And besides we thought an opportunity to buy some lunch etc might be handy :)
Of course this was preceded by making sure we checked out of the ryokan in time to make a repeat visit to our friend at Bessyo Esspresso for takeaways. We weren't sorry we did.
The train travel was fairly uneventful. This was our opportunity to see Mt Fuji out the window, which we did, but our view was rather hampered by the fact that (a) it was quite foggy and (b) we were on the wrong side of the train. We'll see how we go on the way back. Eli was a bit ratty by the end of it all, unsurprisingly, but again handled it all as well as could be expected really.
We had a twin room at the Kyoto Tower Hotel booked, I think because the twin rooms are a little bigger than the doubles, and we'd talked about wanting a cot for Eli. We'd been told they had cots (unlike the hotel in Shinjuku) but couldn't book them in advance and it would cost extra. So we asked on arrival, but they seemed very sceptical about being able to fit it... but said they would try of course. On getting to our room, we discovered why ... not so much because the room is particularly small, but because there are two unnecessarily large (king size) singles occupying a huge amount of it (and which can't be pushed together. And then when housekeeping arrived with the enormous wooden cot on wheels (it did fold a bit, but it was not the portacot we expected!) it all became very clear! We had decided by that stage, though, that with the beds virtually being double beds that we could probably share one, and Eli take the other (luxury!), and that the one area of floor space was probably more useful to us without being completely overtaken with the cot. So we never found out if the cot could be made to fit.
Dinner was at an Italian place near the restaurant. Kyoto seems to be the place to go for Italian in Japan, though this one didn't seem to know what garlic bread was, which was a disappointing omission for an Italian pizza/pasta establishment! The most notable thing about dinner was encountering an anti-nuclear protest along the way. Relatively small, but a very tuneful bunch :) and our understanding is that the Japanese are not really given to protest, so it was quite impressive regardless of whether you agree with the cause, especially considering the spread of ages represented.
Of course this was preceded by making sure we checked out of the ryokan in time to make a repeat visit to our friend at Bessyo Esspresso for takeaways. We weren't sorry we did.
The train travel was fairly uneventful. This was our opportunity to see Mt Fuji out the window, which we did, but our view was rather hampered by the fact that (a) it was quite foggy and (b) we were on the wrong side of the train. We'll see how we go on the way back. Eli was a bit ratty by the end of it all, unsurprisingly, but again handled it all as well as could be expected really.
We had a twin room at the Kyoto Tower Hotel booked, I think because the twin rooms are a little bigger than the doubles, and we'd talked about wanting a cot for Eli. We'd been told they had cots (unlike the hotel in Shinjuku) but couldn't book them in advance and it would cost extra. So we asked on arrival, but they seemed very sceptical about being able to fit it... but said they would try of course. On getting to our room, we discovered why ... not so much because the room is particularly small, but because there are two unnecessarily large (king size) singles occupying a huge amount of it (and which can't be pushed together. And then when housekeeping arrived with the enormous wooden cot on wheels (it did fold a bit, but it was not the portacot we expected!) it all became very clear! We had decided by that stage, though, that with the beds virtually being double beds that we could probably share one, and Eli take the other (luxury!), and that the one area of floor space was probably more useful to us without being completely overtaken with the cot. So we never found out if the cot could be made to fit.
Dinner was at an Italian place near the restaurant. Kyoto seems to be the place to go for Italian in Japan, though this one didn't seem to know what garlic bread was, which was a disappointing omission for an Italian pizza/pasta establishment! The most notable thing about dinner was encountering an anti-nuclear protest along the way. Relatively small, but a very tuneful bunch :) and our understanding is that the Japanese are not really given to protest, so it was quite impressive regardless of whether you agree with the cause, especially considering the spread of ages represented.
Thursday, March 28, 2013
Day 4 - Bessho Onsen
Full Japanese breakfast supplied by the ryokan this morning ... That bit harder to be adventurous and willing to try things first thing in the morning!! Especially since the tendency for salty and pickled foods is a far cry from how we normally start the day. Not to mention that it's at least 2-3 times the size of a normal breakfast. But we mostly got through it ... Parts were enjoyable, others less so, as always :) We weren't quite sure how Eli would go being confronted with yet another serve of rice (plus miscellaneous extras) when up to this point breakfast had been his point of relative normality, but he did remarkably well. I didn't quite follow/remember everything Rachel added into it, but she ensured it was sufficiently nutritionally balanced :)
The plan for the day was mostly to check out the local area, which has a lot of shrines and temples, though we didn't want to overdo that side of things given the plentiful similar opportunities to come in Kyoto. The other option was to check out Ueda city (where we got off the Shinkansen) and given our sudden desire for something a little more Western for lunch we thought this was a better bet in that regard. So the morning was spent visiting the Kitamuki-kannon temple, which stands next to a 1200 year old tree, looks great, and would probably mean a bit more to us if we could read Japanese!! The volunteer was very nice and enthusiastic and the bits of English he spoke were quite good, but I suspect they were mostly a few well-worn phrases, and he didn't volunteer any more information about the whole thing than telling us about the tree, getting us to wash our hands in Onsen water, and telling us how to get good luck/blessings by throwing coins into the trough. A group of primary aged kids found Eli very fascinating, and he was very patient as they squeezed his cheeks and stroked his hair!!
Wandering around the town was lovely, and made more so by the discovery of Bessyo Esspresso, a little espresso bar with a selection of roasted-on-premises beans, run by a friendly young local guy offering a "proper" selection of styles (though we differ in our definition of macchiato, but his version was a flat white so that was fine with me!). A sharp contrast with the mostly super-automatic espressos we'd found around Shinjuku, and certainly preferable to the filtered coffee that was on offer everywhere else in town.
Then it was back on the vintage Ueda Electric railway to head back into Ueda. We weren't really sure what we wanted to see there, but headed towards a large shopping centre in search of some food Eli would eat more easily than the soba & udon noodles that are the staples in Bessho, as the first item of business. This turned into an afternoon experiencing Japanese shopping mall culture, including a visit to the pet shop, which may yet turn out to be the highlight of Eli's trip! Just nobody tell him he can get that in Australia :)
On the recommendation of our friend from Bessyo Espresso, we headed back in time to see Anrajuka Temple before it closed. Apparently the octagonal pagoda is the only one of its kind left in Japan, and is listed as a National Treasure. He was also right that it is an incredibly serene locale .. A lovely way to end the day, and Eli got plenty of practice using stairs and his words "up" and "down."
Dinner again provided by the ryokan was a variation on the night before, but with a similar overall structure and themes. For some reason we were considerably less hungry this time than the night before, so both of us struggled a bit and neither of us finished our meals (they really are huge). After dinner both Rachel and Iain took it in turns to use the ryokan Onsen baths (Iain had also done so the night before) which was an enjoyable if slightly nervous experience for two people who like to be sure they're not offending others by not doing things according to the bath "rules."
The plan for the day was mostly to check out the local area, which has a lot of shrines and temples, though we didn't want to overdo that side of things given the plentiful similar opportunities to come in Kyoto. The other option was to check out Ueda city (where we got off the Shinkansen) and given our sudden desire for something a little more Western for lunch we thought this was a better bet in that regard. So the morning was spent visiting the Kitamuki-kannon temple, which stands next to a 1200 year old tree, looks great, and would probably mean a bit more to us if we could read Japanese!! The volunteer was very nice and enthusiastic and the bits of English he spoke were quite good, but I suspect they were mostly a few well-worn phrases, and he didn't volunteer any more information about the whole thing than telling us about the tree, getting us to wash our hands in Onsen water, and telling us how to get good luck/blessings by throwing coins into the trough. A group of primary aged kids found Eli very fascinating, and he was very patient as they squeezed his cheeks and stroked his hair!!
Wandering around the town was lovely, and made more so by the discovery of Bessyo Esspresso, a little espresso bar with a selection of roasted-on-premises beans, run by a friendly young local guy offering a "proper" selection of styles (though we differ in our definition of macchiato, but his version was a flat white so that was fine with me!). A sharp contrast with the mostly super-automatic espressos we'd found around Shinjuku, and certainly preferable to the filtered coffee that was on offer everywhere else in town.
Then it was back on the vintage Ueda Electric railway to head back into Ueda. We weren't really sure what we wanted to see there, but headed towards a large shopping centre in search of some food Eli would eat more easily than the soba & udon noodles that are the staples in Bessho, as the first item of business. This turned into an afternoon experiencing Japanese shopping mall culture, including a visit to the pet shop, which may yet turn out to be the highlight of Eli's trip! Just nobody tell him he can get that in Australia :)
On the recommendation of our friend from Bessyo Espresso, we headed back in time to see Anrajuka Temple before it closed. Apparently the octagonal pagoda is the only one of its kind left in Japan, and is listed as a National Treasure. He was also right that it is an incredibly serene locale .. A lovely way to end the day, and Eli got plenty of practice using stairs and his words "up" and "down."
Dinner again provided by the ryokan was a variation on the night before, but with a similar overall structure and themes. For some reason we were considerably less hungry this time than the night before, so both of us struggled a bit and neither of us finished our meals (they really are huge). After dinner both Rachel and Iain took it in turns to use the ryokan Onsen baths (Iain had also done so the night before) which was an enjoyable if slightly nervous experience for two people who like to be sure they're not offending others by not doing things according to the bath "rules."
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Day 3 - Shinjuku to Bessho Onsen
As I wrote on Facebook:
"A day of contrasts.
From Shinjuku Station (which Wikipedia lists as the world's busiest transport hub, taking >3.5m passengers per day) to the tiny, relaxing town of Bessho Onsen.
From the Shinkansen to the vintage Ueda Electric Railway (think old-style Glenelg tram but still with paper tickets and stamps).
From Western style accommodation to a Japanese ryokan (futon bedding and yokata robes), with a lovely welcome of cake and thick green tea."
Perhaps the big achievement for the day was successfully navigating the trains to get here ... Shinjuku-Omiya by JR Shonan-Shinjuku line, Omiya-Ueda by Nagano Shinkansen (Asama), Ueda-Bessho Onsen by Ueda Electric Railway. Feel like we kind of get how it all works now, but devoted a lot more of the day to the train travel than was absolutely necessary to allow for stuff-ups (of which there were none). So we got to see Omiya station a bit (actually quite nice). Iain also successfully purchased the tickets to Bessho Onsen on an entirely Japanese machine ... before noticing the button in the top right to switch into English!
Thoroughly impressed with the ryokan so far. Very warm welcome and thorough introduction by a woman with very good English ... They had said they speak English but this was quite a relief, especially given that things work a little differently here. She was, of course, quite taken with Eli, especially when he was dressed in a yukata.
Dinner was amazing, but HUGE! And made that bit more challenging by trying to feed/stop a deliriously tired Eli from destroying things ... And it felt like virtually the whole room was fragile in some way! You never really appreciate how useful high chairs are for keeping kids in 1 spot until you're eating on the floor! Another shining moment for downloaded episodes of In the Night Garden. Also sampled some local red wine, which was nothing special but nice enough - probably better than the stuff from Wauchope!!
Now watching him sleep on his futon and trying to decide whether to go down to the Onsen. :)
A few small reflections from today:
- being in the Japanese Alps doesn't mean you don't use solar PV
- you know that Australia doesn't get much rain by the fact that we don't have umbrella hooks next to sinks & urinals in public toilets. Either that or we're simply not as civilised :)
- Eli is being incredibly good at being willing to try new things. The thick
Green tea we got on arrival at the ryokan being the prime example today. But tiredness aside, he has also been incredibly accepting of his altered routine & surroundings, and typically very interested in whatever new things he encounters.
"A day of contrasts.
From Shinjuku Station (which Wikipedia lists as the world's busiest transport hub, taking >3.5m passengers per day) to the tiny, relaxing town of Bessho Onsen.
From the Shinkansen to the vintage Ueda Electric Railway (think old-style Glenelg tram but still with paper tickets and stamps).
From Western style accommodation to a Japanese ryokan (futon bedding and yokata robes), with a lovely welcome of cake and thick green tea."
Perhaps the big achievement for the day was successfully navigating the trains to get here ... Shinjuku-Omiya by JR Shonan-Shinjuku line, Omiya-Ueda by Nagano Shinkansen (Asama), Ueda-Bessho Onsen by Ueda Electric Railway. Feel like we kind of get how it all works now, but devoted a lot more of the day to the train travel than was absolutely necessary to allow for stuff-ups (of which there were none). So we got to see Omiya station a bit (actually quite nice). Iain also successfully purchased the tickets to Bessho Onsen on an entirely Japanese machine ... before noticing the button in the top right to switch into English!
Thoroughly impressed with the ryokan so far. Very warm welcome and thorough introduction by a woman with very good English ... They had said they speak English but this was quite a relief, especially given that things work a little differently here. She was, of course, quite taken with Eli, especially when he was dressed in a yukata.
Dinner was amazing, but HUGE! And made that bit more challenging by trying to feed/stop a deliriously tired Eli from destroying things ... And it felt like virtually the whole room was fragile in some way! You never really appreciate how useful high chairs are for keeping kids in 1 spot until you're eating on the floor! Another shining moment for downloaded episodes of In the Night Garden. Also sampled some local red wine, which was nothing special but nice enough - probably better than the stuff from Wauchope!!
Now watching him sleep on his futon and trying to decide whether to go down to the Onsen. :)
A few small reflections from today:
- being in the Japanese Alps doesn't mean you don't use solar PV
- you know that Australia doesn't get much rain by the fact that we don't have umbrella hooks next to sinks & urinals in public toilets. Either that or we're simply not as civilised :)
- Eli is being incredibly good at being willing to try new things. The thick
Green tea we got on arrival at the ryokan being the prime example today. But tiredness aside, he has also been incredibly accepting of his altered routine & surroundings, and typically very interested in whatever new things he encounters.
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
Day 2 - Shinjuku (Tokyo)
Day 2 started off well with Eli happily sleeping in until 7.45am, which equalled some very pleased parents, especially since we seem unable to go to bed before 11pm. Having breakfast included in our hotel stay meant that at least one decision was taken out of our hands, but we were still left with 4 choices of breakfast location within the hotel. The breakfasts offered were 'American style' and Japanese buffet, Asian buffet, 'American style' breakfast, and Japanese breakfast. We chose the combo buffet and were not surprised when we didn't really like much of the food provided, but at least it was easy and free, and they had coffee!
After breakfast we returned to our room to have showers, and in Eli's case a bath, and then we headed out for our first taste of 'Hanami', cherry-blossom viewing festival/season. We ventured to Shinjuku Gyoen with about a million other people, and Iain successfully faced the scary lines and even scarier ticket machines to gain entry to the park. It seemed that this park was the place to be for hanami and we saw many mothers and children, families, grandparents, and after a while office workers on lunch breaks. The place was so crowded that even though it spans beyond visible range, there was barely a spot available next to any flowering cherry blossom tree. It was beautiful though, so many trees and they were basically all at full bloom, people taking photos everywhere, and everyone just relaxing, enjoying a magnificent (even at times hot!) day in the fresh air and then gorgeous views. Once again iain braved the language barrier and got us a lovely 'bento' lunch, consisting of various types of sushi, rice, pickled vegetables, and possibly egg?! But whilst Iain was proving his abilities to point and pay, Eli was suddenly overcome with attention and at one stage we had about 5 people surrounding us wanting to have a photo taken with Eli. Rachel was too scared of not getting Eli back from his admirers to take photos of the crowd, but it was still quite the experience. Eli unwillingly obliged and waited for them to finish man-handling him and taking photos after which Iain returned and we sat down and had a magnificent lunch under the non-existent shade of a flowering cherry-blossom tree adjacent to a lovely wide grassed area full of many other families.
After lunch Eli was wanting to get up and play with all the other kids, so being the rambunctious young thing he is, he just ran up to some other kids and started running after them. Some of the children were much more willing to play with Eli than others, but Eli wasn't put off and just kept chasing them :) this behaviour also led to more photos with strangers, some of whom spoke English and one who had even lived in Australia studying English, how fortunate we are that most Japanese people can speak English!
After all the fun and games we continued to walk around the park, stopping to take photos of more cherry blossoms and nice ponds/ducks/bridges and anything else that took our interest, then it was time to leave and find coffee to keep the adults going whilst the little one slept. Our afternoon ended up being a shopping adventure, where we went to the train station to figure out how to exchange our JR rail passes for actual tickets to get to Bessho Onsen the following day and then attempting to find a place where we could sit down for coffee to discuss which trains we then had to book in on. Coffee was easy to come by, a place to actually sit down and drink it was not. This wasn't really surprising considering that Tokyo is probably the most (?!) crowded city in the world and therefore space is at a premium, but considering how much Iain and I enjoy our cafe culture back home, it's quite hard to go without when on holidays. We did eventually find somewhere which gave us a seat and even a place to put the pram (next to the table!) whilst Eli slept, and the coffee was pretty good too!
We decided to walk back to the hotel after finalising our ticket purchases, but decided to go a different route to see more of the city; this choice was ultimately a good one, but it did lead us to getting back to the hotel relatively later than expected. Whilst walking Iain noticed a sign for 'Bic Camera' which is a very big electronics goods store in Japan, having a couple of things we wanted to buy we headed on over. After finding our goods in the multiple-storey shop, which in itself was quite a task, we bought our goods and left the store. Then we realised it was getting close to dinner, so Iain defaulted to google to help us find somewhere with Japanese food that was a bit more authentic that the fast-food Japanese we had the night before. This led us to a region not specifically a restaurant, where we ended up in a relatively small but actually quite large (for Tokyo) restaurant which looked after us very well, especially Eli. The people in the restaurant didn't speak much English and the menus were all in Japanese (completely understandable since it is Japan!), so one of the staff just asked if we wanted 'Sashimi'; knowing what it was Rachel asked for sushi instead, because of Eli, but we ended up with sashimi anyway. So that was one of our adventures for the night, the other was Sake, obviously not for Eli! It was good, but not overly interesting, but still another Japanese adventure ticked off our invisible list of things to do in Japan. Btw Eli ate the rice from the sashimi and was given a glass of orange juice. That was his first juice experience and quite a funny one too, he didn't look like he enjoyed it very much but kept going back for a little bit more... When we left the restaurant one of the staff gave Eli a 'transformers' mask. He loves the mask, calls it a hat, but wears it on his face and enjoys fogging it up with his breath. Rachel also accidentally stole a face washer from the restaurant, and feels very bad about it too!
After breakfast we returned to our room to have showers, and in Eli's case a bath, and then we headed out for our first taste of 'Hanami', cherry-blossom viewing festival/season. We ventured to Shinjuku Gyoen with about a million other people, and Iain successfully faced the scary lines and even scarier ticket machines to gain entry to the park. It seemed that this park was the place to be for hanami and we saw many mothers and children, families, grandparents, and after a while office workers on lunch breaks. The place was so crowded that even though it spans beyond visible range, there was barely a spot available next to any flowering cherry blossom tree. It was beautiful though, so many trees and they were basically all at full bloom, people taking photos everywhere, and everyone just relaxing, enjoying a magnificent (even at times hot!) day in the fresh air and then gorgeous views. Once again iain braved the language barrier and got us a lovely 'bento' lunch, consisting of various types of sushi, rice, pickled vegetables, and possibly egg?! But whilst Iain was proving his abilities to point and pay, Eli was suddenly overcome with attention and at one stage we had about 5 people surrounding us wanting to have a photo taken with Eli. Rachel was too scared of not getting Eli back from his admirers to take photos of the crowd, but it was still quite the experience. Eli unwillingly obliged and waited for them to finish man-handling him and taking photos after which Iain returned and we sat down and had a magnificent lunch under the non-existent shade of a flowering cherry-blossom tree adjacent to a lovely wide grassed area full of many other families.
After lunch Eli was wanting to get up and play with all the other kids, so being the rambunctious young thing he is, he just ran up to some other kids and started running after them. Some of the children were much more willing to play with Eli than others, but Eli wasn't put off and just kept chasing them :) this behaviour also led to more photos with strangers, some of whom spoke English and one who had even lived in Australia studying English, how fortunate we are that most Japanese people can speak English!
After all the fun and games we continued to walk around the park, stopping to take photos of more cherry blossoms and nice ponds/ducks/bridges and anything else that took our interest, then it was time to leave and find coffee to keep the adults going whilst the little one slept. Our afternoon ended up being a shopping adventure, where we went to the train station to figure out how to exchange our JR rail passes for actual tickets to get to Bessho Onsen the following day and then attempting to find a place where we could sit down for coffee to discuss which trains we then had to book in on. Coffee was easy to come by, a place to actually sit down and drink it was not. This wasn't really surprising considering that Tokyo is probably the most (?!) crowded city in the world and therefore space is at a premium, but considering how much Iain and I enjoy our cafe culture back home, it's quite hard to go without when on holidays. We did eventually find somewhere which gave us a seat and even a place to put the pram (next to the table!) whilst Eli slept, and the coffee was pretty good too!
We decided to walk back to the hotel after finalising our ticket purchases, but decided to go a different route to see more of the city; this choice was ultimately a good one, but it did lead us to getting back to the hotel relatively later than expected. Whilst walking Iain noticed a sign for 'Bic Camera' which is a very big electronics goods store in Japan, having a couple of things we wanted to buy we headed on over. After finding our goods in the multiple-storey shop, which in itself was quite a task, we bought our goods and left the store. Then we realised it was getting close to dinner, so Iain defaulted to google to help us find somewhere with Japanese food that was a bit more authentic that the fast-food Japanese we had the night before. This led us to a region not specifically a restaurant, where we ended up in a relatively small but actually quite large (for Tokyo) restaurant which looked after us very well, especially Eli. The people in the restaurant didn't speak much English and the menus were all in Japanese (completely understandable since it is Japan!), so one of the staff just asked if we wanted 'Sashimi'; knowing what it was Rachel asked for sushi instead, because of Eli, but we ended up with sashimi anyway. So that was one of our adventures for the night, the other was Sake, obviously not for Eli! It was good, but not overly interesting, but still another Japanese adventure ticked off our invisible list of things to do in Japan. Btw Eli ate the rice from the sashimi and was given a glass of orange juice. That was his first juice experience and quite a funny one too, he didn't look like he enjoyed it very much but kept going back for a little bit more... When we left the restaurant one of the staff gave Eli a 'transformers' mask. He loves the mask, calls it a hat, but wears it on his face and enjoys fogging it up with his breath. Rachel also accidentally stole a face washer from the restaurant, and feels very bad about it too!
Monday, March 25, 2013
Day 1 - Shinjuku (Tokyo)
Arrived at the hotel around 11:00am by the time we found our way there. Unfortunately found that early check-in is simply not something they do (at this hotel at least) so our dream of getting Eli down for a nap was smashed. But dropped the luggage and took Eli out in the stroller, trying to find lunch and nappies. He was asleep within 1 block.
Eased ourselves into things with a pseudo-Western lunch at Miami Garden ... But Eli wasn't satisfied with pizza, so we got him sushi afterwards! Quick stop at the pharmacy to get nappies where Iain was concentrating so hard on getting the brand of nappies that had been recommended on the Internet that he forgot that the pink packet with the little girl on the front is probably for girls. Oh well. Half the people here think he's a girl anyway :)
That still didn't get us to check-in time, so we had a bit of a poke around the grounds of the Shinjuku Government building (virtually across the road) and the adjacent Chuo park. We were disappointed to find the playground was shut (couldn't really tell why), but Eli made the best of a bad situation by finding the chain that shut us off from the playground just as fun to hang from, swing, and make noises with as the actual play equipment. Quote of the day on the way back to the hotel from Rachel: "That bike was weird - it was branded Panasonic, and had some crazy-arse lock on it that like totally stops the whole mechanism or something." Iain - "Rachel, I think you've missed the major feature of that bike." We'll blame it on the lack of sleep.
A 3-4 hour nap in the afternoon did everyone a lot of good, then it was back out to find some dinner. Went back to the alleys we'd found at lunch, but had a lot of trouble deciding which place to actually go. I think Eli decided for us in the end, sending us to the strangely Canadian-sounding (to us) "Ringer Hut" where we realised eventually that we had to order our food from the teller machines by the front door. Quite a challenge even for Rachel with the help of a waitress, but we fairly promptly ended up with two ENORMOUS bowls of soupy, laksa-y (but salty not spicy) stuff with egg noodles (is that what miso is?) and a somewhat smaller bowl of crispy noodles in thick sauce, which Eli had a good go at despite the very low level of familiarity. He did tire of them before finishing (but then so did we!) but proceeded to help Rachel with her dinner for some time ... Though when we thought he was done but he wasn't, he certainly let us know - pretty sure everyone there had their eyes on us for a second there.
Eased ourselves into things with a pseudo-Western lunch at Miami Garden ... But Eli wasn't satisfied with pizza, so we got him sushi afterwards! Quick stop at the pharmacy to get nappies where Iain was concentrating so hard on getting the brand of nappies that had been recommended on the Internet that he forgot that the pink packet with the little girl on the front is probably for girls. Oh well. Half the people here think he's a girl anyway :)
That still didn't get us to check-in time, so we had a bit of a poke around the grounds of the Shinjuku Government building (virtually across the road) and the adjacent Chuo park. We were disappointed to find the playground was shut (couldn't really tell why), but Eli made the best of a bad situation by finding the chain that shut us off from the playground just as fun to hang from, swing, and make noises with as the actual play equipment. Quote of the day on the way back to the hotel from Rachel: "That bike was weird - it was branded Panasonic, and had some crazy-arse lock on it that like totally stops the whole mechanism or something." Iain - "Rachel, I think you've missed the major feature of that bike." We'll blame it on the lack of sleep.
A 3-4 hour nap in the afternoon did everyone a lot of good, then it was back out to find some dinner. Went back to the alleys we'd found at lunch, but had a lot of trouble deciding which place to actually go. I think Eli decided for us in the end, sending us to the strangely Canadian-sounding (to us) "Ringer Hut" where we realised eventually that we had to order our food from the teller machines by the front door. Quite a challenge even for Rachel with the help of a waitress, but we fairly promptly ended up with two ENORMOUS bowls of soupy, laksa-y (but salty not spicy) stuff with egg noodles (is that what miso is?) and a somewhat smaller bowl of crispy noodles in thick sauce, which Eli had a good go at despite the very low level of familiarity. He did tire of them before finishing (but then so did we!) but proceeded to help Rachel with her dinner for some time ... Though when we thought he was done but he wasn't, he certainly let us know - pretty sure everyone there had their eyes on us for a second there.
The Journey (there)
The planes were a hit (whoosh!!) and I'm pretty sure that at least by the end of it, Eli had worked out that we were in a plane, flying through the air. Nice visiting friends and family on the way through Sydney, and Eli generally handled it well, even sleeping a bit at James & Claire's.
The Sydney-Tokyo leg was somewhat less enjoyable, but could have been a lot worse ... Mostly just due to lack of sleep. Probably should have known that having Eli go to sleep within 30 mins of take-off (which was at 10:30pm) was too good to be true!! 1-2 hours later he was woken by turbulence &/or other passengers and proceeded to basically refuse to go back to sleep for at least another 2 hours ... The massive over-tiredness consisted of shrieks/screams at the drop of a hat if something wasn't right (eg not having milk, being told he should drink the milk we got especially from the attendants, or having the milk he didn't want taken away from him), cycling through fun giggles, soft cuddles (especially for mum), and periodically noticing out the window that we're flying ("payne ... whoosh!!" - complete with arm movements). In a bid to save the other passengers, "In the Night Garden" on the ipad was wheeled out, initially to strong resistance until the first appearance of Iggle-Piggle and the penny dropped. Best $9.45 we ever spent. Some number of episodes later he was finally asleep, and we even got an hour or so ourselves. Rinse and repeat when we all woke for a reason I don't recall.
By the end, Eli was on ~5 hours sleep, Rachel & Iain 2-3. Which probably didn't help matters when we hit turbulence just out of Tokyo on (for Eli especially) tummies with unfamiliar breakfasts. Eli couldn't keep it down (but wasn't horribly messy) and Rachel left the plane feeling pretty queasy. Subsided pretty quick, helped along by getting promoted to the top of the immigration queue care of Eli. Picking up pocket wifi and getting the train tickets we wanted was remarkably painless, and a deliriously overtired Eli spent most if the ~2 hour train ride train-spotting and calling out "allo-allo-allo!" to them :)
Probably the hardest thing was finding which way to go to get out of Shinjuku station to get to the hotel!!
The Sydney-Tokyo leg was somewhat less enjoyable, but could have been a lot worse ... Mostly just due to lack of sleep. Probably should have known that having Eli go to sleep within 30 mins of take-off (which was at 10:30pm) was too good to be true!! 1-2 hours later he was woken by turbulence &/or other passengers and proceeded to basically refuse to go back to sleep for at least another 2 hours ... The massive over-tiredness consisted of shrieks/screams at the drop of a hat if something wasn't right (eg not having milk, being told he should drink the milk we got especially from the attendants, or having the milk he didn't want taken away from him), cycling through fun giggles, soft cuddles (especially for mum), and periodically noticing out the window that we're flying ("payne ... whoosh!!" - complete with arm movements). In a bid to save the other passengers, "In the Night Garden" on the ipad was wheeled out, initially to strong resistance until the first appearance of Iggle-Piggle and the penny dropped. Best $9.45 we ever spent. Some number of episodes later he was finally asleep, and we even got an hour or so ourselves. Rinse and repeat when we all woke for a reason I don't recall.
By the end, Eli was on ~5 hours sleep, Rachel & Iain 2-3. Which probably didn't help matters when we hit turbulence just out of Tokyo on (for Eli especially) tummies with unfamiliar breakfasts. Eli couldn't keep it down (but wasn't horribly messy) and Rachel left the plane feeling pretty queasy. Subsided pretty quick, helped along by getting promoted to the top of the immigration queue care of Eli. Picking up pocket wifi and getting the train tickets we wanted was remarkably painless, and a deliriously overtired Eli spent most if the ~2 hour train ride train-spotting and calling out "allo-allo-allo!" to them :)
Probably the hardest thing was finding which way to go to get out of Shinjuku station to get to the hotel!!
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