The Fish Market

Today we rode the subway to the famous Tsukiji fish market. Even though we left the hotel on a non-peak time, the subway was very crowded. Since it was not rush hour, they didn't have to use the pushers (people who are paid to push people onto the subway to maximize the greatest number of people into the smallest amount of space). It is hard to believe that it could have been any more crowded, but Junko said that what we experienced was not too crowded! Tourists are no longer allowed to watch the fish auction, but we did get to visit the wholesale market. It was huge and contained any type of fish or shellfish that you could imagine. I will include a picture that I took of an octopus. After going through the market, Junko treated us to sushi. There were raw tuna, conger eel and fish roe sushi, along with egg cakes on one tray. The other tray had bite sized tuna, cucumber and plum sushi wrapped in seaweed along with a sort of fried tofu stuffed with rice roll. Some of us were more adventurous than others on trying the different items - thank you Kelly! We then went to the Edo-Tokyo Museum which was a history of the city of Tokyo from the 17th to the 20th centuries. It was a lovely museum. The picture of a kabuki actor was part of one of the exhibits. We took the subway again (much less crowded by this time) to the Tokyo Metropolitan government building observatory to get a 360 view of the city. It was a bit cloudy today so we could not see super far into the distance, but the wonderful variety of the architecture of what we could see was fabulous. By the way, Amy, we could see the Pfizer building very clearly. The observatory is on the 45th floor of the building at 660 feet. On the way back to the hotel, John, Lana, Kelly, Pat (a fellow traveler), and I stopped to explore a 100 Yen store (similar to a dollar store in the states). It was huge! There were 5 floors of "stuff". I picked up a few goodies for the grandkids and then we got back on the train. Kelly, who had researched the store and studied the map, did a wonderful job of getting us back to the hotel. There are so many exits from the train station, it would be easy to become confused and lost. We all did a bit of laundry in the hotel laundromat and then went out to dinner at a local restaurant called Jonathan's. There was no English menu, but there were pictures we could point at to order. We are in for the night, but will get up early to walk. Tomorrow the rest of the group (those who chose not to come on the pre-trip) will join us at breakfast.

A Day of Travel

What a busy day we had today! We started the day at 6AM by going for a walk around the hotel. We stumbled upon a Shinto temple which was very interesting. We came back and had breakfast at 7 and then went out again at 9 to start our new adventure. We took the train from our station, but our guide had purchased an additional ticket for us so we could ride on the top deck of a double-decker train car. We could see into people's yard once we got out of the city. This was a very comfortable and less crowded way to travel. When we got to Ofuna, we got on a monorail which was great for views of the surrounding area. We got off in Enoshima and then took a local train to Hase. Here we visited the Hase Temple with its gilt statue of Kannon and then walked around the beautiful gardens (one of which is pictured above. We then walked to the Great Buddha (see other photo). Absolutely stunning in size. At one time it was gilt, but that was many years ago. Along the way we saw groups of school children out for field trips to visit the temples. One group that we passed was from a private girls' school and their uniforms were navy blue sailor outfits and each of them had a bright yellow backpack on her back. Very cute! It reminded me of the childrens' story Madeline. We went for lunch at a local restaurant. We each had a bento box which is a highly lacquered box with compartments for different types of food. I know I won't remember them all, but there was a bowl of chicken broth with tofu, a bowl of rice, a small salad, salmon, pickled vegetables, a sweet potato ball with chicken, sesame covered mushrooms, and a coffee flan for dessert. All of the portions are small, but there was certainly plenty to eat. After lunch, we took a short train ride to Kamakura to visit a Shinto shrine (the earlier shrines were Buddhist). The train rided was interesting as it went along the Sagami Bay. There were many surfers out waiting for the big wave. The long walking road to the shrine was lined on both sides with cherry trees. Since it is fall here also, the leaves had turned yellow and a light orange. It was lovely, but I can imagine that the view is stunning in the spring when the cherry blossoms are out. The shrine itself was up a long flight of stairs and looked quite lovely with the red paint of the shrine against the green of the surrounding hill. We walked back toward the train station, but took a parallel street to the one we had walked down. This was the local shopping street: clothing stores, restaurants, souvenir shops, etc. We poked our heads in a few places before heading back to the station. We took the train back to the hotel and dropped our packs off before heading out to dinner which was on our own tonight. Lana, John, Kelly and the two of us decided on a restaurant not too far from the hotel. The dinners were good, but strangely, the meals did not come to the table all at once. In fact, Lana and I got our dinners after everyone else had finished - very strange (the cook may have forgotten our order). At any rate, the food was good and now we are ready to relax before bed. Tomorrow we are going to the famous Tokyo fish market so I will let you know how it was.

Japan - first real day out

Well, first about our room. It is fairly small with two twin beds (which we are used to from traveling in Europe). Even though it is small in size, it comes complete with everything: TV, fridge, closet, very small table and one chair. There are robes and slippers to wear in the room, but Dave can't begin to put his robe on as it is much too small. The tub in the bathroom is tall, but it does include a shower which is great. The toilet is interesting as it is also a bidet so you have to be very careful which button you push! We had a buffet breakfast which was interesting. One end of the buffet was traditional Japanese food: miso soup, rice, vegetables, pickles, raw fish, herbed cheese squares, seaweed and the other was American: mini-omelets, rolls, cornflakes with either thin yogurt or thick soy milk (it was hard to tell) which had large chunks of fruit in it. It was fun to try some of the different choices. I managed to eat it all except for the cornflakes with my chopsticks! After our meeting, we took a train to the Imperial Palace. On the way to the station, Junko took us to the "Times Square of Tokyo". Crazy intersection of streets with huge changing bill board on the building. After our train ride, we visited several Buddhist temples and looked in on a cemetery. There were over 100 temples at one time in that immediate area, but the number is down to 70. Junko told us when she was explaining the cemetery that all Japanese people must be cremated. We also took a walk through an old section of the city nearby where the houses were made of wood and the screens separating the rooms were of paper. From there we went to lunch at a very nice restaurant: small salad with greens, onions and marinated fish, broiled fish with scalloped potatoes, carrot and a small cooked green pepper. Desert was a small scoop of vanilla ice cream. We then went to the National Museum of Tokyo where we visited the exhibit which explained the progression of Japanese art. It was very informative and visually appealing. I took quite a few photos of 16-17th century kimonos - beautiful! We took another train back to the hotel just to drop off our stuff and grab a jacket. We then took a train down to a man-made island in the bay so we could see the lights of the city at night. Part of the train ride was on a traditional train and the second part was on a remote controlled one - no driver at all! Lovely sight of the Rainbow Bridge, Tokyo Tower and a small rendition of the Statue of Liberty which was a gift from France to Japan. We had dinner in a small restaurant which cooked Japanese style pancakes at an hibachi in the center of the table. One was with vegetables, beef and noodles and the other was just the vegetables. We also had a portion of noodles with cabbage and soy beans. Everything was quite tasty, but some of us could have done without the sauce which was combination of mayo and a thick flavored brown sauce. The appetizers before dinner were quite good: small cukes with sesame seeds and young soybeans. The train we took back was interesting as we traveled under the bay in a tunnel instead of on the bridge. We walked across to a convenience store just to look around. One of the items for sale was a bag of almonds with fish. Kelly seems interested in trying this so we will buy a bag tomorrow - Junko says it is good. We are now back in the hotel and will be going to bed soon as we still haven't caught up with the jet-lag. Tomorrow were are going to the other side of Japan to see the giant Buddha and walk through a park. Will try to publish some pix tomorrow.

Travel to Japan

We got to the airport at 4 AM but had to wait in line until close to 5 to get our luggage tags for the flight. We boarded the plane in the wind and rain - a little bumpy on the take off, but we were fine once we got above the clouds. Our flight to Chicago was uneventful and our gate to fly out to Japan was on the same concourse so we were very lucky. We only had to wait for about an hour for Kelly (Lana's daughter) to arrive from Tampa and then we all went into the Tuscany Cafe for breakfast. Our plane was delayed on boarding and then again on take-off as there were about 25 passengers from Boston who had been delayed by the weather and we couldn't take off without them. Once we got up, the flight was fine. Dave and I sat next to a couple from Philadelphia who were traveling to Taipei to visit her mother. The woman gave me some helpful hints on improving my chopstick routine. We arrived in Tokyo and were met by a travel representative after clearing customs and immigration. We rode a shuttle bus into the city and then took a taxi to our hotel. Our guide Junko Ito met us and showed us to our rooms. I will explain more about the rooms when I have time. We are due for a meeting soon and then we will have a tour of Tokyo.

Pre-Japan

Well, we are ready to start our new adventure. We drove to the airport in Providence and ate at Legal Seafood before checking in to the hotel for the night. Our flight to Japan is at 6:30 tomorrow morning so we have to be at the airport at 4:30 for check-in. This particular hotel had a deal going in which you can leave your car for up to three weeks for a total of $30! I just thought I would put a post on the blog before we actually start our trip. Will write again when we are in Tokyo.

Saturday February 6, 2010

What a dummy! I couldn't remember how to get the pictures to the blog, but now have figured it out. The scenic view is from the top of the road where we are staying (about 5 miles). We went up this morning to take pix as when we went up yesterday it was all fogged in. The views were glorious this morning. On the way up we saw a 200 pound wild pig with huge tusks. He was on the side of the road and then took off into the brush. Unfortunately the camera was in the back seat and we weren't quick enought to snap his picture. The other shot is of our CCC camp (at least the two buildings that we are living in). After breakfast we went up to the look out to take pictures and then took a hike into the woods. It gets quite cold at night - mid 40's and there is no heat in the buildings. My alarm clock has a thermometer and it was 54 in our room this morning! Needlesss to say it was hard getting out of the sleeping bag. By the time we got back from our hike, we were melting and came back to camp to change into shorts. The folks from NC are leaving today so got to say a last goodbye to them. We headed down the mountain (again didn't stop for pictures as the fog and mist had blown in) and by the time we got to town it was 77! We drove to Hanapepe and had lunch there. We then went to Salt Pond Park to dip our feet in the water - chilly, but not bad - definitely swimmable. We walked around for a bit and then came here to the BrewHouse at Waimea Plantation Cottage to use their wireless internet. I will continue to try to get one the blog with the dial up but did not have much luck yesterday. The plan is to do some more exploring this afternoon before we head back to camp. The cell phone does not work at camp so we will use email for the most part.

Friday February 5, 2010

We woke up fairly early this morning - hard bed and strange dreams. We had breakfast at the hotel - toast and fresh pineapple - yum! We packed up the car and headed off to the grocery store in Lihue as we heard that the one in Waimea was smaller. We bought all of the dry goods that we would need for the week and then headed out for Waimea. We went past the town for a while to see what was out near the end. The road actually does end on this side of the island because of the topography, but we didn't make it all the way to the end - we will save that trip for another time. We came back into town past an old sugar mill and stopped at a small local craft fair where we got lots of suggestions for eating from the local women. We ended up eating at a small cafe right next to the grocery store. They were advertising a Furlough Friday special breakfast for teachers as Hawaii has just voted to have no school on Fridays for the rest of the school year as a cost savings measure. Not far from the cafe there were a dozen people protesting the new law - most of them looked like moms who were against the loss of time in the classroom. After lunch we picked up our cold items and fruit and then headed up to camp. The road to camp is 15 serpentine miles! We have never seen so many twists in one road! It goes from sea level to 3600 feet. The views along the way are spectacular, but it was a bit hazy so we didn't stop to take pictures. I can see why they call it the Grand Canyon of the Pacific - very impressive and beautiful. We got up to camp (one of the pictures) and found that we have two buildings. One is a communal kitchen, dining/living room, and library and the other has a computer room (with dial-up) - I still can't figure how to blog on it and bunk rooms. We have a private room with a bunk bed and a single bed. There are another couple from North Carolina and their daughter who have the other two private rooms and then there are two Japenese students with their tutor from Switzerland whom we haven't met yet as they went to town and missed their ride up to camp. The couple from NC said they saw the boys at the beach, but not the translator - so who knows what happened. There is another small cottage behind the office and a couple from Alaska are staying there along with a woman from Oahu who is renting our her house for the winter to make money so is working for the camp for housing. We had soup for dinner as we weren't all that hungry. We then checked email and read for a while before going to sleep.