Flight to Tokyo December 16th 2013
Up at 0330 on Monday – I thought that I had given up that behaviour since I retired. Elly, Daniel and I headed out to the airport to embark on our Japan Adventure.
A pleasant enough flight to Tokyo/Narita via the Gold Coast ensued.
Our landlord for our apartment in Tokyo had advised us to take a “Limousine Bus” to one of the hotels then take a short taxi ride to the apartment, rather than taking the “Narita Express train to Tokyo station then a longer taxi ride from there.
Since the bus was going to take an hour and a half and cost nearly $100, we decided to check out the Narita Express, and with the help of a nice JAL flight attendant, we bought train tickets.
As it turns out the tickets were not much cheaper, but the Narita Express would only take 36 minutes, instead of 90 minutes, and we would have had to wait longer for the next bus anyway.
With all that done we headed down to the departure platform and waited for the 1848 train to arrive.
The train marked “For Tokyo” pulled into the station well before it’s departure time of 1848, so we heaved our bags in and took our numbered seats. I settled in to wait for the departure time, when the doors suddenly closed and off we went!
“It’s the wrong train” I shrieked, and I was correct.
We had managed to find ourselves on a standard stopping all stations train which subsequently took an hour and three quarters, instead of 36 minutes to transport us to Tokyo station! Good start!
ATMs don’t work here! – or at least most of them, for international cards, which we found out after having arrived with a token number of Yen. Now we faced the real possibility of stranding ourselves a long way from the apartment with insufficient cash.
Don’t worry, we worked it out, and found the apartment, which is really nice and spacious.
After settling in I realised that I couldn’t find my bank access card, which I needed to get money from the non-existent ATMs. I searched everywhere in vain, thinking that I must have left it in the taxi as I was fishing around for paperwork in my pocket – bugger! I knew that if I rang and cancelled the card, they would cancel Elly’s as well, and we would never be able to get any cash.
As I was lying in bed about to nod off, I had a brilliant idea; maybe it dropped on the road as we left the taxi. I leapt out of bed, threw on my clothes and scampered outside. Amazingly there, on the road was my card!
Tokyo December 17th
This morning we began our orientation, finding out how to make our way around and get to the places we wanted to go.
But first we had to find a Citibank, which, we had been advised, was the only bank which had international ATMs, along with Post Offices and 7Elevens, if you can find them.
We found Citibank. Hooray. We are now solvent; at least until our maxed out Amex bill hits the letterbox, and we have only just started!
Daniel has taken over as chief navigator, and is doing a great job relieving the pressure from me. We worked out how to get day tickets on the Tokyo Metro, which is a really extensive system, you can get to anywhere from anywhere.
We walked through the Hama-rikyu Gardens, which are just beautiful, with typical Japanese manicured trees, and extensive lakes and tea houses, with the city buildings just adjacent. This used to be a walled section of Tokyo, which was in the era of the shoguns and onwards up until immediate post war to entertain the dignitaries in the tea rooms on the lake.
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| Hama-ryku Garden |
From there we took a river cruise to get a more extensive view of the city followed by a walk to Senso-ji temple, which is a large multi temple area, completely rebuilt after being burnt down once or twice in its lifetime.
Daniel and I have noticed that a very large number of historical buildings have been destroyed by fire over the years. That’s what happens when you use mostly wood to build things. There was also a market like atmosphere, with scores of stalls selling a multitude of items and food.
We popped into the National Science Museum, and, guess what they have out the front – a full size model of a whale! Bit much!
On the way home we had a look at the Ginza, but happily didn’t do any shopping, just had a beer,
then headed back to Roppongi where we are staying, and visited a Lonely Planet recommended local restaurant, which was quite special; lots of noise as the two chefs were yelling in synch, repeats of the orders yelled out by the circling waiter. The customers all sat at a U shaped bench surrounding a section in front of the chefs, which was full of all the fresh ingredients. When an order was placed, they would lean across and collect the fish or whatever they needed, and then sit back and place it on the fire, all this as they yelled unintelligible (for us) chants together. How it all worked I have no idea, but everyone seemed to get what they ordered. When the chefs had a dish ready, they would lean forward with the dish sitting on the end of what looked like a pizza paddle used for sliding pizzas in and out of the oven. I even had some Sashimi to show how versatile I am.
After dinner I asked Elly whether it was expensive – she said “yes”. We have fallen back into our “Norway” mode, where Elly pays all the bills and I don’t get to see them or worry about them.
Nice weather, around 12 degrees, but some rain coming, apparently.
Nikko Wednesday the 18th December.
Last night I was a little out of the loop, as Elly and Dan plotted our activities for today, due to the fact that I was trying to write the blog and stay awake at the same time. All I knew was that we were heading to Nikko, a small village about 2 hours by limited express train, which has several shrines and pagodas in close proximity.
Elly was doing her usual Sargent Major trick in the morning, herding us out of the apartment without even a coffee!
Navigator Dan was then in top form, sorting out how we were to find our train. We finally did find ourselves at the correct station, but it was all very confusing. We were lucky to find a really helpful staff lady who spoke good English, and sorted it out for us. Limited express train for 100 mins, then change trains for another 10 minutes, then bus 2C and get off at stop 82! Easy! She took us to her office, filled out all the forms, special package, including all trains and bus, then adding extra for the limited express train, giving us a 20% discount for the express train because we were adding it to the package. I knew that!
Rice crackers and coffee on the train kept us going until Nikko. Friend Sue White had sung the praises of this trip, and rightly so. We did note the small cemeteries for each village as she mentioned, and it was good to see some high ground appearing as we approached Nikko, with signs of snow. We are going skiing next week and have been concerned about lack of snow. This was a different area of course, but it was good to see some white mountains.
From Nikko station we took the bus to the first shrine, Rinno-ji Temple, which was actually a large recent building with a picture of the temple on its facade. It turns out that the whole thing is being renovated (read rebuilt). They have organised it pretty we’ll though, such that you can wind your way through around the blocked off sections and still see a lot of what was in the temple. Not quite the same atmosphere though. This is a massive exercise which must be costing a fortune!
I won’t bore you with details of individual temples, other than to say that they are all magnificent, and vary in age, some having been initially constructed in the 700s AD and others in the 17th century. Needless to say, many, as mentioned previously, have been in the “Rebuilt because they had burned down” category.
These temples were all set among magnificent cedar trees, some of which are hundreds of years old.
As we walked amongst the trees and temples and pagodas, it began to snow lightly, gradually becoming heavier. It was so beautiful and peaceful and quiet, and there were almost no people other than us. I am sure in summer it would be a different story.
We returned to Tokyo to find it raining, so ducked in to the first restaurant we saw, and had a very nice, inexpensive meal and a beer, which, Elly has just informed me was about one tenth the price of last night’s meal. That is scary considering, as I have previously mentioned, I am not supposed to know about how much things are costing.
Tokyo Thursday 19th December 2013
There are a few things I have noticed, here in Japan; apart from the tendency to play with fire, leading to the almost certain destruction, and subsequent rebuilding of almost all significant structures over the centuries, the Japanese heat almost everything you can sit on. The toilet seats are the most complex of devices, with all sorts of controls and settings, not only for heat, as I found out yesterday when I entered a cubicle, and the toilet lid opened, as if to say “Welcome”.
Daniel says that the toilets here have more class than arse!I also noted a complex toilet hand basin which had 2 outlets on its rear side, and one larger one at the near side. The idea is that you place your hands next to the rear left outlet, and they get squirted with soap, then you move them to the right outlet, and they get a dose of water. Once that is done, you bring them to the near side and hot air dries them for you, no separate drier required!
The taxis are great here, most being what I would guess to be vintage 1980s Toyota Crowns, in beautiful condition, with their external rear vision mirrors mounted two thirds of the way along the front mudguard towards the headlights. I remember my first car, a Ford Anglia, which didn’t have external mirrors, so I bought a pair and mounted them the same way. That was before they became standard equipment and door mounted.
I don’t know whether these are extremely well preserved cars, or whether they make them in that design as taxis, as with London taxis. In any case, you don’t see any dirty ones.
This next section written by Dan because I didn’t want to get out of bed at 4 am.
Tokyo Friday 20th December
For Elly and Dan it was 4am wake up to make it to the Tsukiji Central fish market in time for the tuna auction tour. Boarding the first train of the day on the Tokyo metro, we made our way to the enormous hangar where 15000 sellers and restaurateurs buy and sell up to 450 different types of sea faring creatures.
Unfortunately for us, no one mentioned that the tours were closed from December to February. So we began our own self guided tour. Handed a map by the guard and instructed which areas we were prohibited to go to, we set about breaking seven of the nine rules of the fish market. The only ones we were adherent to were number 5. ‘no prams or babies’ and number 6. ‘No large groups’.
We weaved our way through the tiny stalls as they set up for the morning trade. I having to push and pull Elly out of the way as she looked through her camera lens oblivious to the motorised carts flying past. Tuna the size of a small dining table lay across large chopping boards as they were expertly cut with what appeared to be more like a samurai sword than a knife.
Well into the depths of the prohibited zone we came across the tuna auctions. Here, hundreds of tuna lay on the warehouse floor with crowds surrounding it making their bid. Only then were we busted by the tuna market police. Taking it upon themselves to escort us out, Elly continued to snap away on her camera feigning a foreigners ignorance despite their excellent English!
Following this we made our way to the world renowned sushi stalls on the outskirts of the market. One stall in particular had a line bending around the corner. Having waited for 20 minutes without the line moving an inch, we settled on the second best sushi bar. Raw fish at 7am requires some mental preparation but it was undoubtedly the best sushimi we have ever had.
End of Dan’s submission.
Today, following Elly and Dan’s Fishmarket Adventure and near arrest, we set off in the rain to have a look at the International Forum, which Elly wanted to check out, because it looked an interesting piece of architecture, which it was, but didn’t take up too much of our time.
It was then on to the Imperial Palace gardens, the Palace itself only being open to the public on 2 occasions during the year, our arrival not being one of them, amazingly enough!
The gardens were in almost winter mode, but there were still some trees in their late autumn colours, which were just beautiful, set in typical Japanese fashion among manicured hedges and trees.
There is an army of workers on ladders all over the gardens and also outside the walls, trimming these trees by hand, like hairdressers trimming one’s hair.
We entered the gardens via the Eastern Gate, which was a massively fortified double gate which, I gather, no longer closes, but would have been a very effective way of keeping the baddies out.
The gardens are surrounded by a massive stone wall about 20 metres high made up of enormous stone blocks carved to fit without mortar – how did they do that?
We walked for a while, but the weather was miserable, and we were getting cold , so we decided to head for shelter at the Tokyo National Museum. This was quite good, although 2 of the floors were closed due to renovations to earthquake proof the building. Amazing history in this country, with some artifacts from 3000 BC.
We decided that on the way home we should visit Shibuya, a particularly popular and busy intersection, supposedly one of the busiest in the world, where masses of people are poised to cross when the lights change. It was now dark.
It was an amazing sight when we exited the underground; the whole intersection was lit by enormous TVs installed in the walls of the buildings, all with typical Japanese in your face advertising and animated cartoon figures, all advertising something, but I doubt very effectively, with all the other TVs blaring as well.
With the rain drizzling down, the whole scene was massed umbrellas facing off against each other waiting for the lights to change.
We perched ourselves up on the first floor in a Starbucks, which must pay a fortune in rent to overlook this intersection which has become such a tourist attraction. Needless to say, Elly was there taking about a hundred photos.
We then headed down to the food basement of one of the department stores and bought some supplies to take home for dinner. The food floor in the department stores is overwhelming and everything looks delicious. Of course we oversupplied even after putting several items back. Back at home we watched, appropriately, Lost in Translation, on Dan’s computer. If you haven’t seen it, it is a pretty good representation of the culture differences a tourist faces.
Tokyo Friday 20th December
For some reason, Elly and Dan wanted to visit the Sumo wrestling museum, so we did! Actually they really wanted to see a Sumo wrestling match, but they are not on until January.
Adjacent to the Sumo museum was the Edo Museum, which hadn’t figured in Elly’s master plan for today, but looked to be worth a visit. It turned out to be excellent.
Edo is the name of the settlement which grew to be the centre of all things in Japan, and was eventually renamed Tokyo. There were detailed displays of how Edo was laid out, mock ups of houses of the time, a fully functioning bridge, and city buildings etc. lots of school kids visiting as well.
Further to my theme of burning things down and rebuilding them, I read that in Edo, they had a fire which wiped out almost the whole place, about once a year! They did make some attempt to reduce that statistic by burning alive anyone found to be an arsonist.
There could be an argument, I suppose, that some of the fires may have been caused by flaming arsonists.
Navigator Dan took us on an excursion to a beer museum. The beer is called Yebisu, and it was established in the 18 hundreds using German beer making techniques. It became a success, and eventually the railway station and the town that grew from it were named after it, being call Ebisu.
They museum itself was a non event, but it is a landmark at Ebisu, which is now on the city underground route. I (Elly butting in) say it was palatial and we tasted 3 different beers. Prior to the beers we went to the Tokyo photographic museum which had 3 different exhibitions- a French and 2 Japanese photographers- most inspiring.
Speaking of the underground, it is a fabulous system, with something like 13 main lines, and covers a massive area. The ticket machines have an “English” button which makes it relatively easy to buy the tickets, which would otherwise be impossible. It is initially a bit confusing because there are 2 separate companies sharing the system, so you have to make sure that your ticket covers the lines you want to use.
Ritual seems to play a big part of life here, with lots of uniformed “guards” at entrances to buildings etc, but I am impressed with people such as Station Masters, who blow their whistles a lot, and perform a highly complex choreographed procedure with each train departure. Lots of rapid arm movement, as well as flowing actions to see the train off into the distance.
Some of the guards on the trains do a similar, highly disciplined performance at each station as well.
I also noticed at one intersection, a traffic cop making extravagant arm signals and blowing his whistle profusely, and standing rigidly to attention in between, whilst being totally ignored by the motorists who were happily obeying a perfectly good set of traffic lights.
This afternoon Dan took us on a walking tour, which started at another all singing all dancing intersection at shin juju, with the streets absolutely ablaze with lights, from advertising, from restaurants, from anywhere.
The city is currently lit up like the proverbial Christmas tree, with fairy lights on everything that doesn’t move and trees with lights all over them. It really is a fabulous sight.
We called in to a building which was completely full of gaming machines and raucous electronic music. Which reminds me, the sound of traffic lights here is like a twittering bird. I keep thinking that I am hearing a bird, when I am crossing a road under an overpass with ten thousand trucks driving past and a train overhead. Then I realise it is the twittering green light. But I digress.
Our next area was the gay area, where Elly chatted up a pair of drag queens, and Dan and I moved away because we thought she was going to ask them to pose for a photo with us.
Then onto the Love Hotel area, which is full of, actually quite respectable looking hotels, with signs advertising “Resting Rates” and “Staying Rates”.
After that we moved to a very narrow street area, which was full of bars, mostly up a very steep staircase to about 6 chairs. We found one on the ground level, which we could barely squeeze into, because there was already one person there. We shuffled around and had a cup of Sake each, before heading home.
There was some confusion about where we could find a subway station for which we had a day pass, so Elly said we should just jump in a taxi. ” it won’t cost much”. $30 dollars later we arrived back at the apartment.
Tokyo Saturday 21st 2013
Alan piked and decided to have the morning at home and be the one to greet Michael should Dan and I be late from our escapades. Dan and I headed out early to hear the Taiko drumming at the Meiji-Jingu Shinto shrine. Unfortunately we missed the drumming but saw a traditional wedding take place at the shrine with all the pomp and glamour. The magnificent wooden shrine is surrounded by sprawling forest.
Next we went to Takeshinta-Dori , a lane way crowded with young locals dressed in Goth and Lolita styles, made up and parading, mingling and browsing the subculture bazaars. I loved the wild things on display and bought Alan a glitzy number. Even Dan couldn’t resist the outlandish fashions but he restrained me buying a black top with large tiger and zips for Michael!
Time goes so quickly and since we were to meet Michael at our apartment we headed off via a department store to buy food. So many choices- it takes forever. Loaded up we decided to head back with all our bags and not go to Government offices on 45 floor for the free view, however we took the train in the wrong direction and ended up at the Government building. Tokyo is massive. Now home and waiting for Michael to awake and guide us to the Tokyo night life..
Tomorrow we take the bullet train towards the snow for 5 days skiing.
Train to Nagano Sunday 22 December 2013
This morning we realised how much baggage we have between us. We decided that it would be a pain to have to walk to the subway station, let alone negotiate steps and line changes, dragging our bags, so we elected to take a taxi, or, should I say 2 taxis – 4 people plus big bags plus carry bags, backpacks and Elly’s camera bag.
We were to board the Shinkansen, ( Bullet train) to Nagano, 1 hour 40 north west of Tokyo, then bus for another 1 hour 30 to Nozawa Onsen, which is a spa town and skiing village.
The boys have been sweating on the snow reports for the last week, and have been worried about the lack of snow, being so early in the ski season. However, this morning’s report gave the good news that it had been snowing all night and things were looking good.
Our instructions from the lodge in which we were booked were: get off the bus at Nakao bus stop, and we are 250 m up the hill. So we did that, walking up the main road (up hill), dragging our bags, in heavy snow – very beautiful, but no sign of the lodge.
Dan volunteered to go into a shop and enquire, and as usual, they were very helpful. It transpired that we were walking up the wrong hill. So back to the bus stop, snow getting heavier, turned 90 degrees left and walked up that hill.
There we came to our lodge which sits alone, right at the base of 2 ski lifts, completely surrounded by snow, which made carrying our bags interesting. Once at the door we were greeted by Johnny, an Australian, who showed us our rooms, and told us he would show us around the area, and show us where to hire ski equipment.
This was amazing service, as he escorted us through town, showing us where to go to get all we needed, and left us to sort out the equipment hire
The lodge, called the Kenashi Liftside House, is a beautiful, modern building on 3 levels. We are on level 2. On level 1 is a Qantas flight attendant and her husband. We each have bathroom and kitchen facilities on our levels, but can share if we wish. Upstairs on level 3, is a penthouse for the owner. The vista from our living area and bedrooms is just magnificent.
Johnny is interesting, he lives in Bali, where he teaches surfing and yoga. He is living here for a few months, looking after the lodge and keeping things in order.
Tomorrow morning he is going to ski with us to show us the mountain, so we can get our bearings, but before that, he is going to get us up to give us a yoga lesson before breakfast. He is one of those supremely fit looking individuals with a physique to die for. I asked him if his yoga lesson would give me one of those, and he said yes, if I kept doing it. As I speak he is bringing the yoga mats up for tomorrow.
Mike and Dan have gone to a local Onsen, which is a traditional Japanese bath, segregated and completely naked. Johnny showed us a video demonstrating all the etiquette and rules that you need to follow. They have now just arrived back, and said it was really good.
I think we are in the best lodge here, in the best position, so we should have a great few days.
Nagano Monday 23rd – Friday 26th
Our first day skiing was fun, in clear weather, and with Johnny showing us the ins and outs of the mountain.
That evening it snowed, and kept snowing during the next day. Which has set the mountain up with a good initial cover on which to build.
I managed, on the second day out to wipe out 2 members of the family; first of all I managed, with no skill at all on my behalf, to crash straight into Michael, when he was simply minding his own business. This caused me to go sprawling, but Michael somehow managed to stay vertical.
My next target was Elly, as I glided over the rear ends of her skis, sending me, missile like into the snow. Fortunately we wear helmets, so I only had a bit of whiplash, whilst Elly also remained vertical and unscathed.
On Christmas Day we had a good ski in the morning, but received the news that Elly’s mum was in hospital, so that dampened things down somewhat, and we are keeping a close eye on that, hoping that she will improve.
In the afternoon, while the boys kept skiing, Elly and I took a bus tour to see the Snow Monkeys, which are something new to me. It is an hours drive from here, then a half our walk through a magnificent snow covered forest, to see about a hundred of these monkeys living in the snow, along the river. Obviously an ancestor some time ago discovered hot spring water there and decided to settle.
It is so funny watching them as a few lower themselves into a purpose built spa, just like we would, and just sit there watching the world as they soak up the warm water. They don’t get concerned at all with the people standing around watching, they just go on with their lives.
Back home for another day of skiing and for Elly to take the camera out for some photos in beautiful weather, because more snow is forecast. At 9 am each morning, the loudspeakers all over the mountain burst forth with stirring inspirational music, and I’m sure it must be just like this skiing in North Korea, as we picture the youth being inspired to ski for the advancement of their country. In actual fact it’s probably some Japanese pop tune.
The village of Nozawa Onsen is very picturesque, and we have spent a good deal of time walking through it, particularly in the dark evenings looking for restaurants. Unlike some of the other ski resorts in Japan which are virtually overrun by Australians, this place is very quiet, without the usual après ski watering holes etc. There are a good number of Aussies and other nationalities here, but it remains very much Japanese in style and culture.
I have found that it can be difficult if it is necessary to follow Michael and Daniel down a ski run, because, everything will be quite normal for a short time, and then one of them will turn 90 degrees and head off into some powder snow, and the other might break off in the other direction, eventually to join up again further downslope, whilst conservative old dad wonders whether he is still on the right trail.
We have just received the dreaded bad news that Elly’s mum Mary/Marysia/Mimi has just passed away today, so we will be terminating our Japan Adventure and returning home. We will be home Saturday early afternoon and Michael will come with us.
Sorry to say this will be the last posting for this blog.