Category: japan 2018

Perhaps you’ve been following the news about the main fish market in Tokyo. There has been discussion for years about the market not being big enough or modern enough. The tourists love it, but they get in the way. After years of discussion and planning the wholesale market was moved to a new location at Toyosu, where there is a viewing gallery to keep the tourists off the floor. So – you can still see what is going on but not be down in it all.

However – there is another fish market in Tokyo, the Adachi market. It is only open to the public six times a year – on the second Saturday of odd numbered months. Guess what last Saturday was.

When we arrived the tuna was already being prepared – the big cuts were made and they were working on breaking things down for sale. It is quite a process to see them with the big knives cutting through the fish in one cut, them taking the smaller knives for the finer work. The lineups were huge. Unlike the wholesale market people could buy here and they were. We saw folks going off with fish in their backpacks, or small rolling coolers.

Not quite the variety of the big commercial market, but it was sure fun to be able to get in and get a good look at what was on offer and what people were buying.

After our rain free visit to Asakusa it was a soggy day in Electric town. The morning started well – we went to the Origami museum. Our online reading said that the master might be there – he dropped in when he felt like it, but either way it was worth a visit. It sure was! And the master was there, holding court at his work table on the third floor. He was a telling jokes and stories and making things – without even looking at his hands or the paper. Chat chat, fold, fold and there be a maple leaf, or a boar. 2019 will be the Year of the Boar and boars with golden tusks are showing up everywhere.

Bill and I took a little workshop and learned some basic techniques

Now just have to practice for many years and we can produce magical things without looking!

We swam our way through the rain to a ramen shop – you can always count on ramen on a wet day!

I was gong to say cold wet day, but it is not cold. Quite the contrary. We’re finding it quite warm – low twenties, high teens for the most part. The transit is crowded – and hot and even the shops seem overheated to us. And then we’ll be walking along and see some westerners in down puffer jackets and we look at each other and say ‘Australians!’ And it always is!

Akihabara, or Electric Town, is an area with a warren of little shops under and around the train tracks that specializes in all the components to make things electrical. Need to fix an old telephone – there’s a shop for that. Transistors – check. Cathode ray tube – yep. Robot parts – got ’em. Over time the anime people moved in, so there are areas devoted to various animated characters. There are also a lot of maid cafes – and on this day that meant a lot of rather bedraggled young women dressed as maids handing out fliers.

I’m rather light on photos for that day – too busy managing my umbrella in the crowds!

It is always a pleasure to be in Tokyo. Everything about it is amazing and So Much! Adding to fun this time around is the fact that my brother Bill has joined us for the Tokyo portion of our trip.

I like to start a trip to Tokyo with a visit to Senso-ji Temple. The ancient city of Edo, the predecessor to Tokyo, was founded here on the river bank long long ago. On our previous trips it has always rained – hard – on our visits to the Asakusa district – but not this time!

We started on the roof of the Asakusa Information Centre for the long view. The entrance gate is at the lower left, with a long row of shops leading up to the temple itself.

Kids of all ages!

We pulled our fortunes – if you get a good one you keep it, if not you tie it to a rail to leave the bad fortune behind.

It was a beautiful day in the neighbourhood!

Because the weather was so nice there were quite a few people in traditional Japanese clothing – just because!

Sometimes travel days are pretty intense. We made the transfer from Okinawa Island to Hakone and it went something like this:

Walk to the Naha Monorail – fly Naha to Tokyo Haneda – hand off luggage to delivery service – monorail to train station – train to Shinjuku train station – another train to Hakone/Yumoto Station – bus to Hakone Village at Lake Ashi. Arriving before 3:00 pm check in time!

We visited Hakone on our first trip to Japan in 2009 and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. But there was one thing we didn’t have time to do – take a boat ride on Lake Ashi. But this time we were ready. It is just over an hour from Shinjuku to Hakone – Yumoto on the direct train. It is called the Romancecar. It’s not like it was painted pink or decorated with hearts…. But we did get a pretty nifty bento box:

Yes, I know that it is the kiddy bento. Still good!

Hakone is in a national park that contains, among other things, a volcano. From Hakone-Yumoto there is a trip on a scenic railway, a funicular railway and then a gondola to get to the top. And, if you have time, a gondola ride down the other side to the lake. This time around we took the bus around to the lake and perched for the night. And in the morning:

Is that a pirate ship? Oh yes it is!

That is the Victory. Her sister ship arrived in the morning with a full load of scurvy mates:

The ‘Captain’ dropped by for a photo shoot:

And then we went up on deck to check things out:

Once we had made it safely to shore (no gun battles between ships today) we headed back up and over.

The thing to do at the top is hop off to observe the works and have volcano eggs.

Of course Hello Kitty is there, getting her egg on. Crates of eggs are lowered in wire baskets into the hot water emerging from the volcano where they are boiled up – and their shells turn black!

The egg theme is big up there! As you can see it was raining quite briskly – time to catch the next gondola and continue on our way.

Funicular (or cable car). Followed by another train ride on a very old electric train. And then the Romancecar back to Tokyo.

I mentioned earlier that we used the luggage delivery service. It is quite common for people to use the service to move their luggage about, especially when travelling by train. We left our luggage at the airport and took our knapsacks with overnight items. Our original plan had been to go to Lake Ashi, take the round trip lake excursion and then take the bus back for the train. Once we got there we realized it made more sense- and more fun – to go the route we did. Which we couldn’t have done with our larger suitcases. And when we got to our hotel in Tokyo our bags were waiting for us in storage. Worked like a charm!

There is a huge aquarium on Okinawa Island – at one point it was the world’s largest – since superseded by Atlanta and then China. But still very worthy. It is at the other end of Okinawa Island, which turns out to be quite a way from Naha. And I’m not sure it would be a good idea to tackle a right hand drive car and be unable to read the signs. So – we took a tour. Got a chance to see just how many fancy beach resorts there on the west side of the island (answer – a lot!)

First stop – pineapple farm.

Next stop – butterfly farm

And finally – the aquarium. It is part of a huge complex with several exhibits, but we were all about water. Like the Osaka aquarium there is a huge central tank with a walk that spirals around it. The main attraction is the central tank, but around the outside are smaller displays and exhibits. It was all really well done. I like it when an institution keeps to its location. Rather than trying to show us everything about all the oceans they kept it to their area, for the most part.

But this is what we came to see:

Huge whale sharks, schools of mantas. The diver in this picture is not on the other side of the tank – she is directly below the shark which is really that big.

We were there for feeding time, which was so interesting:

After several days of adventures in and around Ishigaki we flew to Okinawa Island and settled for a brief stay in the city of Naha. I had said that Ishigaki was sort of like Hawaii – if so then Naha is sort of like Waikiki. The main shopping street is packed with tourist shops – even for Japan it was heavy in souvenirs.

Note the stack of purple potato confectionaries lower right corner. There was even a Coach store to keep that Waikiki feeling.

We visited Shuri Castle, the ancient seat of power for the islands. The castle, and most of the island’s structures, were destroyed in the Battle of Okinawa. The castle has been rebuilt and in fact the rebuilt outside was being re-lacquered while we were there.

And then, as a contrast to the ancient city, there were these guys:

Yes, that is a go cart. And yes the driver is dressed in a costume. This is a thing here – flocks of go-carts, people dressed as Super Mario, Minions, Nemo, you name it. Travelling at speed with the traffic…. We’ve seen them hurtling through the traffic in Osaka, Naha and Tokyo. Given how safety conscious the Japanese are this seems beyond crazy to us, but it is obviously very popular.

One of the excursions to take from Ishigaki Island is a trip to Iriomote Island, the second largest of the Okinawan Islands. We arranged our tour with Ishigaki Dream Tours, and they took very good care of us. Of the total group of about fifty people we were the only English speakers. We were issued an audio guide to tell us about points of interest along the way, and the tour managers kept a pretty close eye on us – moving us to the front of things where they could make sure we didn’t wander off on them.

Part one of the trip was a forty minute boat ride to Iriomote Island. The reefs around the islands are very close to the surface – I was grateful for the skill of the captain as we zoomed between the small islands and atolls on the way.

The ‘Super Dream’ was a very comfortable ride. Once we arrived we transferred to smaller boats for a ride up the river. Iriomote Island is very mountainous, so though large it is lightly populated. Yesterday we kayaked amongst the mangroves, today it was power boat and a much bigger river. We made a stop to see a living natural treasure – a 400 year old tree in the forest.

The Looking Glass Mangrove has these huge buttresses at ground level – small trees grow out of them once they are a distance from the main tree.

After the river tour we headed up the coast for what was advertised as a cart ride to Yoba Island. Turns out that the island is across a shallow stretch of about 400 metres and we would ride in carts pulled by water buffalo. Like so:

This fine gentleman was our driver.

Part way over he pulled out a sanshin, the local guitar, to sing a song that most people on board knew – or at least knew the chorus to.

Yoba island is very small and p;retry much taken up with a botanical garden. We had tine to wander and admire the flowers, and visit a butterfly house. And eat lunch:

All delicious, even though parts were mysterious. The meal included the famous Okinawan purple potato (which is hiding behind the tempura in this picture and really, I should have taken a picture before I ate it because it is a shade of purple that is hard to believe. But it tastes just like a potato)

We caught the afternoon water buffalo back to the main island and returned to the ‘Super Dream’ to carry on to island number three – Taketomi Island. Which is very tiny and not much above sea level. Here we transferred to bikes to ride to explore the island.

Those sandy roads and even a slight hill made for a bit of a challenge. And then there I was, riding along, watching for cars and what do we come across but:

More water buffalo! They have the right of way!