We left Kyoto and headed for Osaka on Saturday, which, it turns out, is only an hour away by train. Also, why did we decide that five days in Osaka was a good idea? Oh yeah, that’s because EVERY RYOKAN IN NARA OR ELSEWHERE WAS BOOKED. So we said fuck it. We’ll take it easy for our last few days – eat all our favorite food, see some sites, take a day trip or two. So that’s what we did….
We went to Kobe! It’s an easy 45 min ride from Osaka on the train, and there’s plenty to do to fill at least a day trip. We did the obvious (and gaijin) thing and ate the beef, then ventured up the nearby mountain. Terrible ketchup and not nearly enough fries for this Frenchman, but the burger was good. We decided to head up the fancy ropeway in Kobe, which took us up the mountain to an herb garden, forest, and…
Amanda already wrote a bit about Kurama, but it’s worth a second mention because it’s great (and I took videos)! Less than an hour from Kyoto, you can get there via the JR Eizan line, which winds through lovely tree-covered mountains. Once you get to Kurama Station, walk up the hill to the entrance and either hike 30 min to the top or pay 200 yen per person to ride the funky cable car. We rode up and hiked back down…
After a long journey, we arrived in Kyoto on Monday evening. Tuesday, we set out to explore the sites of the city. Our first stop was Higashi Honganji, a temple right near our hostel. Kyoto has a much more traditional feel to it, so we wandered around the streets exploring random temples and shrines, and just taking in the sights. We also had a delicious tsukemen lunch. The next day, we went to Arashiyama, which is west of Kyoto and…
Hokkaido was incredible and I want to call out a few highlights that weren’t really mentioned: We ate something called Jingisukan (named after Ghengis Khan), which is lamb meat that you cook on this grill on your table. It was delicious. And yes, we are eating mammal on this trip. It’s too hard to avoid in Asia. The fall colors. They were just starting to appear, but what we did get to see was worth it. Visiting an onsen. Even…
On our second day with the rental car, we visited the Sounkyo Onsen Village, another part of Daisetsuzan National Park, to see what we could find. I apparently didn’t quite know where we were going or what we were doing. Whatever. The village itself was lovely, though we really were interested in getting lost for a while in the nature of Daisetsuzan National Park. We took the gondola (they call it a ropeway) up the hill for some better views….
We’re officially in love with Hokkaido. Everyone should come here, twice. On second thought, one thing we loved was the feeling like we’d gotten off the Gaijin trail. We only saw a few white people in the several days we spent around the parks and onsen villages. So stay away! Most western tourists probably only make it to this island for the famed ski resorts, not for the national parks, like amazing Daisetsuzan. We’ve been using Asahikawa as a base…
On Tuesday, we packed up our things and headed to Tokyo Station to catch the Shinkansen to Hokkaido. The Shinkansen is the infamous Japanese bullet train. Our particular train goes as fast as 320km/hr (that’s 200mph). It was so fast! Service to Hokkaido just began in March, so the trains are new and pretty cushy. We definitely did a lot of “oohing” and “ahhing” over the speed and things flying by through the window. Here’s a video of my husband…
On our first night in Tokyo we ducked into Fuunji, a tiny ramen place near our AirBnB in Shinjuku. I thought it was good, but I wasn’t sure if this was because it was our first meal in Japan, or if we were just really hungry. Amanda, on the other hand, knew we had found something special. It was the dipping noodles (or tsukemen), not the ramen, that blew us away. It was so good, we went back on our…
We landed on Tokyo on Thursday afternoon. After customs and the Narita Express into Tokyo, we got to our Airbnb and then went out to find dinner. OMG. We went to this place called Fuunji Ramen. They have tsukemen. HOW HAVE I NEVER HAD THIS BEFORE?! We were so excited and hungry that we forgot to take pictures. The head chef is this J-Rock dude who swings the noodles around. It’s a tiny hole in the wall and you order…