Canadian mport: Japan Part 3

This is only about 4 weeks overdue, but better late than never I guess! The rest of our time in Japan was fantastic. We caught the Shinkansen back to Osaka where Ryan and Darryn met us at the station and took us back to the hostel where convention was. Travelling with Rhino is great since he knows all the good food places and local tips! We had lunch at a little back alley Okonomiyaki restaurant – round a few narrow alley ways, up a long, narrow flight of stairs and into a tiny little restaurant where our luggage took over about half of the room! The food was great though.

The convention was fantastic and we met so many nice people. Afterwards we spent a day in Kyoto and Nara, which are two of the older, more traditional cities in Japan. We got our fix of temple, shrine and castle viewing, and also some beautiful traditional gardens at one of the temples.

The next day we headed to Himeji to see the famous Himeji castle. I think it was quite stunning but I managed to get a cold and a stomach bug at the same time, which combined with not having slept at all the night before meant I was pretty much past even caring how beautiful it was! You know I’m feeling pretty down when I can’t even be bothered to take photos! And I don’t think I was much fun to travel with – just ask Dazza! ;-)

That afternoon we headed down to Hiroshima and met up with Dalton McGuinness & Jim Ludlam, who are there at the moment. We spent the afternoon at the Mazda factory (where I lay down and had a sleep while the others did a tour!) and the Hiroshima Peace Park, which is at the site of the atomic bomb. They have a museum there which was really interesting (and horrifying!) – lots of actual remains from the bomb eg remnants of clothes kids were wearing at the time, a charcoal tricycle that a little boy had been riding, and stone steps with a ‘shadow’ of the person who had been sitting there and was vaporised by the bomb.

Deer at the park in Nara

This one one got a little too friendly with my lens...

Rhino chatting up some Japanese kids - they thought it was awesome seeing this tall blond guy speaking in Japanese!

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I think they were seeing if they could work out how the squeaky floorboards worked in the castle - they were there to stop intruders, since you could hear the moment anybody stepped on any of the floorboards, regardless of how softly you walked.