The Purple Penguin

Well, starting up a new blog for the next trip. As it’s a surprise for Joe can’t say where we’re going. But we are going somewhere nifty. Promise. At the end of November. So why have I set this up this early? Well, I think Joe was getting nervous about how it would all work. So here I am, at half past 11 on Saturday (the clocks have yet to go back) trying to think of something to type.

Ha! Blogging from the airport. They have internet terminals at the airport! We are ready to fly out – well, physically ready. Mentally I think we could stay another week or so. But the flight leaves in a bit so we’ll see you soon!

Oh dear, last day of holiday. This is a relaxing day, just walking about and checking e-mail and generally doing not much. Going to have to repack the bags tonight and make sure we’re ready for the flight tomorrow morning. Rich, you may just be surprised at how much can be stuffed into your rucksack! We are flying out tomorrow morning, details for those of you who may be interested: Virgin Flight number VS901 leaving Narita Airport at 11:00 and arriving at London Heathrow at, err, around 16:00 – there isn’t a time on the ticket!

Had a great day yesterday. Went to Disney Sea rather than Disneyland – a bit smaller and not as many rides, but it was different and we had a good day. Managed to keep ourselves busy there all day. It was a very easy day and very few people. The longest we had to wait for a ride was about half an hour and by the afternoon we were just walking onto anything we wanted to ride. However, it becomes very clear how much Disney rides rely on narrative when you can’t understand the narrative! Still we enjoyed the sheer fun of the place even if we didn’t always know exactly what was going on. We also had one of the best meals we’ve had this trip. We ate at the only Japanese resturant on the site and went all out – starter, main course and pudding. Joe had mackeral starter, sushi main course, and pink blossom cheesecake. I got the sushi starter, pork cutlets, and a mixed desert plate which had a cake (similar to a pound cake), rice balls in red bean sauce, some chewy squares of something that we never quite figured out, and fruit. Lovely. A really nice way to end the holiday.

We’ll probably update this one last time once we’re home, but we’ll see some of you soon!

Hello from Tokyo! Well, we’re nearly at the end of the holiday. Too short. We want to stay here for a while!

The north was nice. The sleeper train was the worst we’ve been on for sleeping. No compartments, just four bunks with curtains; annoucements were made until 10pm; we stopped in loads of stations with bright lights, loud announcements, and music; at 6.30am a loud announcement was made and about half an hour later they came around and moved our bedding so sleeping in! Gosh. But getting up that early meant we saw a bit of the coast from the train window which was nice. Straight through Akita with no time to look around and off to Kakunodate. Kaunodate was a nice little town with streets of saumari houses still as they were about 250 years ago – except most of them are now tacky tourist shops. We spent half a day there, saw one saumari house which was very nice. The family still live in it and we were shown around by a 12th generation decendant of the family. He apologised for his English then gave us a tour in excellent English! After that we decided we didn’t need to see any of the other places so we walked down to the river and walked along the cherry avenue which was lovely even if there were no blossoms. Very nice half day. Then we were off to Lake Tazawako. We stayed in an onsen (cheap onsen) and the baths there are sulpher so everything smelled of sulpher. Tazawako is very spread out so we had to use the bus to get anywhere – it’s sort of two resorts: the lake for summer and the mountain for skiing and baths in the winter. We were in the mountains so had to travel down to the lake. Spent a day at the lake doing a bit of walking and took the sightseeing boat round the lake. It’s a beautiful blue, quite striking agains the green and with mountains all around. Joe says ‘it was interesting’. We did a 1.5 km walk to see ‘Frog Stone’ and not a froggie anywhere around it! But it was a nice walk.

Then off to Kawaguchi-ko to see Fuji-san. We came up and actually saw Fuji – no cloud! We got an excellent place right on the lake with a view of the lake and Fuji – wonderful. We also found a wonderful little place to eat where we could see Fuji and the lake and drink loads of saki. Watched the clouds move in to cover Fuji and by the next morning we couldn’t see it at all. Took the bus up to 5th station where we got to see all the tourist shops. Met a Swiss bloke on the bus who was going up the mountain a bit, said he didn’t know how far. We headed down Yoshida trail. And down. And down. It was a bit longer than the woman at tourist info had said. We finally lost the trail at a road, found the main road down and a bus stop with a bus due in 10 minutes – the last bus down off the mountain. So we caught it and who should be on it but the Swiss bloke we met that morning. Turns out he climbed to the summit – it should take 4 to 4 and half hours but he did it in 2 and a half hours! Gosh. Must have run up and back down again to catch that bus. It was a beautiful walk and we got to see the snow on Fuji – up close like.

We are now in Makuhari just outside Tokyo. Disneyland tomorrow. But today we’re heading back into Tokyo to see the Greenpeace office, maybe.

Back home on Sunday. May be an update on Saturday but definitely one when we get back.

Well, we’re fairly well sorted now – our last week. We are just now getting ready to head up north where there may not be any internet access. If we can find computers we’ll keep you updated! Joe is waiting at the train station while I get this done. We have our last couple of days planned as well – we are heading down from the north and going to the Fuji five lakes area. We have been told we can’t climb Fuji so that’s something for next time. Then we are off for – Disneyland Tokyo! Oh dear. Expensive but pretty much all is included and it will be our last blow out. Then we have a day in Tokyo before flying out. Not enough time! We want to stay longer!

I’ve gotten an e-mail complaining that we’ve not said anything about food or TV. So here goes –
Russia: yummy cabbage rolls, blinzis, pelmeni (sort of like ravioli but more meat and less pasta served with sour cream or in soup), smoked omul (bought by our house stay by Lake Baikal so hopefully not contributing to the decline), stews, so-so food on the train. TV was MTV, loud MTV, no make that very very loud MTV. In Russian.
Mongolia: dried mutton stew with noodles, weird pizza, more pelmeni. No TV.
China: even more pelmeni, noodles, food that reminded me of take aways at home! Hong Kong movies (Joe gets the remote and . . . )
Japan: the best meal by far was at the ryoken where we actually had to take a photo of the table! We have had noodles, sashimi, even more noodles, tempura, fast food Japanese style. Baseball and more Hong Kong movies (Joe moves for that remote very quickly).

We actually haven’t been eating loads since we’ve been here or even on our travels (so you think we’ve looked at TV?!) – we’ve been too busy looking at stuff and having a good time! Not to mention travelling. Which reminds me – I really must get back to the train station before our train leaves!

Hello from Kyoto. I hope this computer doesn’t start doing Japanese again – I was happily typing e-mails and next thing I know the stupid thing won’t type in English any more – just Japanese! But it’s a free Internet place so I can’t complain – well I can but shouldn’t.

We are having a wonderful time still. We went to Joe’s tacky tourist place, Beppu, and were very disappointed. Hardly any neon at all, no groups of people wandering around from bath to bath in yukata and geta, and only a couple of huge tour groups with megaphones and banners. But lots of ticky tacky tourist shops. And the two hot springs we saw were interesting even without the huge tourist groups – though they did have the loudspeakers going. So we saw Blood Hell and Sea Hell – hot pools for looking at rather than bathing in. Blood Hell was, as the name suggests, blood red. It was also steaming and bubbling and quite impressive looking. Sea Hell was deep cobalt blue and with more action in the way of geysers spraying out. It also had a basket of eggs cooking in it! We didn’t bother with the baths, though the sand bath looked interesting. We then went to Kinosaki which the opposite of Beppu – very upper class spa town with loads of lovely ryoken and bath houses. We stayed in our first ryoken and I’m impressed. Want to stay in more, but they are expensive. However, you get first class treatment. We came in and were taken up to our room which was huge – entry area, another area (dressing?) with full length mirror and cupboards, a small sitting area overlooking the garden with table and two chairs, and a huge main room with low Japanese style table – the table was moved at night for our futons to be put out. We were taken up and sat at the large table in the main room where we were given tea and sweets, signed the register, and had the woman explain the system and the baths. We then changed into our yukata (a dressing gown, informal kimono) and went and tried the ryoken bath which was HOT! We then put on geta (those wooden sandals) and clumped around the small town looking at the bath houses and the other tourists wandering around in yukata and geta – all of these were Japanese, there were no other gajin there, so the wooden sandal bit wasn’t a trick to make western tourists look funny; everyone looked funny! We then went back for dinner (dinner and breakfast are included in the price). We had dinner served in our room and it was huge and wonderful. We then tried the baths which were nice, but I’ve decided I’m a bath wimp – they were far too hot for me. Joe managed a couple of good soaks and boy were we clean when we headed back to the ryoken to go to sleep. Our beds were all made up for us (in the other Japanese style inns we’ve been staying in we’ve had to do our own futons) and we got a very good night sleep. When we got up our futons were put away and breakfast was served – interesting breakfast. Salmon, soup, rice, boiled tofu, egg with ginger. Again loads of food. The ryoken also delievered our bags to the tourist information place so we could go to the coast! Unfortunately, instead of the beach we got directed to the ticky tacky tourist Marine World – including trained seals and dolphins. Oh boy. We skipped going into the place but walked around the outside getting shots of the Sea of Japan and coastline.

The unfailing Japanese Rail system failed – we were generally hanging around the station waiting for our train and having ice cream when we got shoved onto a different, slow, local train. As we don’t speak the language we weren’t sure what was going on – mind you the Japanese seemed confused as well. Even the JR staff seemed a bit confused and not too sure what was happening! What should have taken about 2 hours 40 minutes and one train took nearly 4 hours, three trains, and a bus – Joe thinks he saw (from the bus) where the tracks were washed out, or rather the bank under the tracks were washed out. It was a hot confusing ride and we were worried about getting into Kyoto after the tourist information had closed. We thought we’d have to use the TIC which closes at 5, but it turned out that there is a local tourist information for the city and they stay open until 7pm! They also book hotels which was good. Unfortunately nothing could live up to what we’d stayed in in Kinosaki and this one definitely doesn’t – a boring ol’ western style bland hotel. (sigh)

However, the Nijo Castle in Kyoto is wonderful! Nightengale floors really do sing. They don’t squeak. It sounds lovely, even with hoards of Japanese school children stomping across them. And the paintings on the walls and ceiling! It is a beautiful palace. We’re going to see if can get into the Imperial Palace – if we make it to the office!

We move on tomorrow night – have a sleeper to Akita and then on to Kakunodate in the north. We aren’t getting as far as the northern island, we’ll have to do that next time – but we are getting into the middle of Japan and a bit to the north. This also means we’ve gotten to use a sleeper train in every country we’ve been in. Gosh.

Hello from Hiroshima! We are having a great time, though I’m still having trouble with the keyboard. Joe told me to describe these internet places so here it goes: The machines are in little cubicals, only one person. So in the last place while I frantically typed trying to finish in half an hour, Joe walked around and had a look. The walls were covered in bookshelves full of various books, magazines, newspapers; there was a rack at the front with DVDs; and behind the counter were playstation keypads and games. They are truly media centres rather than internet cafes. They also have various sized cubicals – from open style desks as we have at home in our internet places to small individual cubicals, to larger cubicals with beds! This place is very similar but you have to ‘join’ so poor Joe is downstairs looking at the CD\DVD shop. I shudder to think what we may be bringing home!

The Osaka Aquarium was wonderful – including the baby whale shark in the large tank. It didn’t look cramped at all, though I’m sure given a bit of time it will be way too big for the tank. Unfortunately their environmental message got a bit lost in the gift shop where they were selling sea shells, coral, and turtle shell.

Sorted out the trains fine – actually it was pretty easy. We got to Himeji and spent about two and half hours wandering around the castle and surrounding area. Most of it spent in the castle which was very impressive. We actually got to go inside the West Bailey and through the Long Corrider. You have to take off your shoes when you go into the buildings and they are lovely wooden floors. We also went into the main tower, right to the top – 6 flights of steep slippery wooden stairs – and saw the shrine and got our brochures stamped to show we went to the very top! Beautiful view.

Then on to Hiroshima. We’d done the classical, don’t miss this castle so today we did the classical, don’t miss this shrine – Miyajima, with the ‘floating’ torii. If you’ve seen photos of a Japanese shrine gate, you’ve probably seen this one. We did that perfectly – got to the temple while the tide was still pretty much high and stayed long enough for the tide to go out enough that we could walk out to the torii. There were hoards of tourists and loads of tacky little tourist shops – the main items appeared to be anything carved out of maple (including rice paddles which they claim were invented there); little maple leaf shaped cakes with various fillings (loads of little shops with the cake making machines in the windows – fun to watch); models of the gate; and loads of little deer (stuffed, carved, on jewlery, etc.). There are deer on the island, protected species and boy don’t they know it! My t-shirt got nibbled! They expect to get fed and deer cakes are sold as soon as you get off the ferry – Joe and I passed which was why my shirt got nibbled. The shrine is lovely – tour groups obviously pay to go to worship there so we got to see a Shinto ceremony. We also saw the floating No stage, but it wasn’t floating as the tide had gone out! We did not however attempt to climb this mountain or ride the cable car up – guess we learned a couple of lessons from Purple Mountain!

Last night after we got settled into our hotel – oh yes, Japanese style hotel. So we have to take our shoes off to enter our room, have tamati mats on the floor, and slept on futons last night. We also have a bath downstairs, but it looks more or less like a bath at home only covered and much deeper. I’ll have to try that out tonight. Once we got settled we headed out to see Peace Park. It’s very nice at night and quite sobering. We’ll see the museum tomorrow. And from that we’re heading to the most tacky tourist awful destination in Japan – Beppu! Should be a bit of a contrast.

Yes, we are still having a wonderful time. Only 14 days to try all the new stuff!

YEA! WE MADE IT! We are in Japan and I’m sitting in a tiny little cubical trying to deal with an unusual keyboard layout. Any mistakes are due to the keyboard. No honest, they are.

The ferry crossing was fine. It was interesting going up the Huangpu River out of Shanghai. Our room was quite comfortable and there were very very few people on the ferry. Joe reckons no more than 15 people. So very quiet except for the infant in the next room. We could see Japan from the afternoon of the second day so spent some time on deck and a lot of film got used. Got to watch the docking this morning as well, then sat and waited and waited and waited to leave the ship. Got to watch Mr Bean though so it wasn’t too bad. Immigration was easy, but customs was tough. We got loads of questions about our travels and then our small bag was searched. Joe has been saving loads of those little plastic zip lock type bags for some reason – you know, the ones that drug dealers use to sell their product? So that was a bit interesting. We also had to show our airline tickets, but he evetually let us loose in Osaka! Where we promptly got lost. Headed out in search of the shuttle bus and found a train station instead. Managed to figure out where we were and where we were going but then couldn’t figure out how to get the ticket. Finally a woman stopped to ask if we needed help and showed us that we had to put the money in the machine first, then chose the ticket. Oh. She was heading our way, at least through the two stops where we would have to change trains so she went with us and showed us where to go. Very nice. Then gave me a lovely fan.

We have found in general that the people here are much nicer than in China and it’s much easier, even just to walk around. Much more relaxed.

So we are checked into a hotel for a couple of nights, have seen Osaka Castle, are now walking around the hang-out area of Osaka looking for a celebratory drink, and generally enoying ourselves. Tomorrow it’s the aquarium and more looking about and then we are off again on Saturday. Hopefully will continue to find Internet places and keep everyone informed!

Yea, found an place to post that’s about a quarter of the cost of the hotel internet access.

Top travel tip for China: if you go through Beijing don’t admit it or you won’t get a hotel anywhere. Joe finally told the Ramada in Nanjing that we’d just flown in from Ulan Bator, so we spent the couple of days there sneaking in and out so we wouldn’t have to give a flight number! We got our train in UB and I must say that Deluxe First Class is not as good as First class on the Trans-Siberian – also felt much more insecure. The Chinese method of finding their compartment is to just walk down the train opening doors at random. If they see something interesting – like a couple of brits having a cup of tea – they just stop in the door and stare. So we had to keep our door closed and locked; however, that didn’t completely help as at one point someone *unlocked* the door, had a look, then closed and locked it again! On that train the little British Gas Metre key we’d brought came in very handy as did the straps – we locked everything and wrapped the straps around the door to keep the nosey Chinese out. However the last bit of the train journey is pretty spectacular as you go up into the mountains and along the Great Wall. We even stopped at a station that had wonderful views of the Wall and everyone got out to get photos. It was interesting as there were very few tourists on the wall, if any. The car parks were nearly empty.

Don’t know if Beijing (where we haven’t been, honest guv) was empty or not as we have nothing to compare it to. But we hurried to Tiananmen Square and got a few photos before our train left for Nanjing. We spent very little time in Beijing (and according to Joe we weren’t there at all). The train to Nanjing was nice. We travelled soft class which is pretty nice even if it is four bunk. I got a bit worried when we were put in with a Chinese bloke who got out his beer and cucumbers, cranked the music up, and started loudly munching on his cucumbers – all I could think of was a kappa! But Joe got to talking to him and he was quite nice. He even rang his mate who spoke English to help us fill in one of the numerous health forms we had to complete – his English was very basic. Turns out he works for China Nuclear Industry in the Construction. From what we could make out he’s an engineer building Nuclear Power stations! oops. Joe broke protocol and didn’t offer one of his business cards as we were getting on with him. We got several health checks there as well and a bit worried as they kept taking my temperature: come in and take it (with a nifty little thingy that they aim at your forehead), have a bit of a chat, go away for a chat, come back and take it again. Finally they came in specifically to say that I was ok. Gosh.

Nanjing was pretty, though loads of building work going on. All cheap accommodation, i.e. dorm type, in China is closed so we’ve had to bust our budget a bit on hotels. However, we have found places to stay which is a bonus. Even if Joe has told porkies to get the rooms. We saw the bell and drum tower in Nanjing, had some good meals, drank tea, and did loads of walking. Oh yes, if you order a four fruit frappe in Nanjing you get a huge plate of ice covered in, yep, four fruits (I think they were prunes, apple, watermelon and loads of red beans) with a drizzle of vanilla. We also went to the top of Purple Mountain! Made a few mistakes however. We went to the park and walked along the Ming Walls which were impressive and the park was quite nice. Loads of people out exercising, playing, walking, riding bikes, generally out having a good time. Then we made our first mistake and went into the wrong park which was simply a sculpture garden. Took ages to find our way back out again as there was construction going on. Finally got out and found our way to the cable car for the mountain where we made our second mistake and bought a ticket for only one way, deciding to walk back down. Cable car is a bit posh as it gives the idea of a nice little car to sit in; this was actually a chair lift with only a little bar. Quite a long ride up, about half an hour, and we were about the only people on the thing! We passed only about 2 other groups going down. It was lovely going up as the mountain is covered in forest and we were riding along at about tree top level looking down at the path below us. However, the really good views were going the other way. Made it to the top and walked around looking at the view, then headed down past loads of little statues and grottos and scary dark caves with models in them. And here’s the other mistake – the path is not at all well signposted (even the Chinese were getting lost) so we did some scrambling around on the mountain trying to find our way down! By the time we got to the bottom we were too knackered to do anything else so I missed seeing the Ming Tomb.

Then we got the train to Shanghai – hard seat this time which was actually nicer than British rail standard. Three and half hours later we were in Shanghai. I’d booked a hotel before we left Nanjing and what a hotel! First however, we had to go through the health checks, many forms and had our temperature taken. Also had to show our tickets from Nanjing, but he seemed willing to believe that we’d arrived in Nanjing from Ulan Bator and we didn’t have to mention the train at all. We’re also not allowed to have a key to our room, so every time we go into the hotel we have to report to our floor attendant and fill out an ‘egression report’ and have a health check. The hotel we are in is the former Astor House and the lobby is still quite impressive. The lift has an operator, no buttons just a lever, and the lobby on our floor looks pretty normal. But once we’re past the floor attendant’s station it gets very impressive: the whole thing opens out to a medievel banquet hall. It sours up to the glass roof, with a gallery running around at the next level. Down the centre of this is benches with ‘gas lamps’ beside them, and the brass room signs are on hooks outside the door. Apparently ‘Albort Einstein’ stayed in a room a couple of doors down from us. The room is also impressive – huge – we have a entrance lobby, with walk-in closet, huge main room and, not quite my marble bathroom with huge marble tub, but pretty close!

The first day in Shanghai we got our ferry tickets, so we are ready for Japan. We have even seen our ferry in port here and it should be a comfortable journey. We done a lot of walking – up and down the Bund as our hotel is at one end, just over the bridge. Any time we go into any building we get our temperature taken. We’ve even been on the Bund Tourist Tunnel which is definitely an interesting experience. A very interesting experience. People’s Square was fun and the Shanghai Museum is lovely. The Square seems to be where everyone hangs out – they were skating, flying kites, blowing bubbles and just generally hanging. We sat and watched and then walked along getting stuff on sticks. So Joe has had his meat on a stick. And I got a dumpling. We’ve also been down to the Yu Yuan Gardens though we didn’t go into the gardens themselves, just the shopping area around them. Had more dumplings, but a different sort, for breakfast – they were freshly cooked as well. You could stand there and watch the people making the dumplings – there was quite a queue and for good reason as the dumplings were very good. We also headed out one night to try the ‘food street’ near our hotel – wild. The neon was so bright you needed shades, there were fish tanks every where, and people keep approaching you to come in and say ‘English Menu’. The resturant we finally chose said ‘English Menu’ but it wasn’t really. Anyone know what ‘Four flowers on a mountain’ is? Or how about ‘Four happy vegetables’? Those are just the two I can remember, there were loads of others.

I’m shopped out so glad that we’re sailing tomorrow morning. Up early and to the port which is only about 15 minutes from our hotel, which is why I chose it, but boy I’m glad I did. I would certainly recommend going there if just to see the place! So another update when we finally get to Japan.