July 12, Kyoto, Nara

Today, caught the Shinkansen-bullet train from Tokyo Station to Kyoto Station. We boarded the 9:50am tain and arrived in Kyoto around 12:26pm, in just over 2 1/2 hours one way. We were picked up as our tour group, JTB tours. Our tour guide lead us to New Miyako hotel for a lunch, as provided by JTB tours, the food was quite good. Then afterwards, the tour picked us up and some other people from various hotels to the Afternoon Nara tour. We saw the tame yet feisty deer at Nara park, which is about less than 40 minutes from Kyoto station. The deer are very calm, but if you feed them crackers, ( you can buy some for 100 yen to feed the deer), they will surround you in numbers, so be aware...lol

The weather conditions were not very optimal, as it was light winds with light rain most of th day. The tour to Nara was quite nice, as we visited a few big large temples and the Nara park which supposively holds the 2000 deer. Later we checked back in the hotel after the afternoon tour ended. The hotel we stayed at was about a 10 to 15 min taxi drive from the Kyoto Station, at the Miyako Westin Kyoto Hotel, which is a nice hotel.

July 11th, Hakone

Today my parents and I got on the train, reserved seating on the "Romance Car". We reserved our tickets the previous day from the ticket booth, reserve/non-served seating for the Romance Car. It is a little extra, but in my opinion worth the extra money to spend for the "romance car" reserved seating. It is about $14 or dollars extra round trip per person, but you get a reserved seat, and it is 30 min faster each way. Hakone to Tokyo is about 1hr 30 min, probably close to two hours with the regular train. We left Shinjuku station around 9:30am and arrived in Hakone about 90 min later at 11am. We discovered the rainy weather all around, and how choppy the water was at Lake Ashi, where Mt Fuji lays ahead. But due to the cloud cover, seems to happy every time i visit Japan during the summer months, i could not view the magnificant mountain, that i can only imagine seeing. The boat on Lake Ashii which i have been on once 4 years prior, was currently closed due to the bad weather. The Ropeway was also closed down due to the weather. I have been on that one before as well. The scenery was very nice, and green, but it was quite rainy and a bit windy. We took the bus around Hakone area from the station. We grabbed lunch at a nearby restarant along the way, after we had gotten off from the bus. We had soba noodles with tempura for lunch. Later we caught another bus to get off to see the outdoor Picasso museum. This was my second visit to the outdoor museum. They gave out umbrellas to use at the museum, but not to keep. After we caught a tram to go up the hill, which was nice, great scenery all around. After we came back down, we were about ready to head back to civillization, to the big city of Tokyo. For what it is worth, Hakone which is about 90 minutes from Shinjuku Station, Tokyo, is a great get-a-way excursion type place to see more of the green lush country side of Japan. Mt Fuji is here, Lake Ashii, and plenty of outdoor onsens, and other outdoor nature type activities. It is away from the hussle and bussle of the big city of Japan. Personally, I think it is nice to visit and get away, as you see another side of Japan. I want to see Takayama, another countryside area outside of Nagoya area. But i prefer the big city environment of Tokyo, there is so much to see, do in Tokyo.

July 10th, 2007 Tokyo, Harajuku,Shibuya and more Akihabara.

Today me and my family decided to see Hakone the next day on the 11th. So today, i went off on my own and went to visit the areas of Harajuku, Shibuya and more of Akihabara. A lot of walking, browsing and shopping mainly in Akihabara. From the top, i took a picture of a Shoko Nakagawa advertisement poster she is a well known singer on anime theme songs, and a professional cosplayer. I also took more photos of other billboards of Japanese popstars on advertisments. I just love their advertisments, whether they at trainstations or on highrise buildings in Tokyo. Also, is photos of Shibuya, Takeshita mainstreet, and Harajuku Station. Takeshita mainstreet is right across the street from Harajuku trainstation.

Also, note that there is a photo with me next to a huge poster advertising a new Japanese drama airing at the time in early July, called "First Kiss". The main star of the Japanese drama is actress Mao Inoue, showing her "puckered kissable lips". Other gaijin nearby(outside foreigner) took a photo of me, just after i took a photo of them infront of some similar advertisment. This was all taken at a big trainstation, i believe in Shinjuku trainstation, one of the largest train hub stations in all of Tokyo.

July 9th, 2007 more Tokyo

Today my parents and i went on the Tokyo half-day tour. The shuttle bus came to pick us up around 8am and took us the the central tour bus stop area in Tokyo. We then left around 9am and went to Tokyo Tower, then to Imperial Palace, drove through Ginza, attending the Sensoji Asakusa Temple area, and ended at the pearl factory in Akasaka. I might note that we didn't spend a whole lot of time in each area, but the best tour if you want something fast and cover a lot of areas. To me it was ok, and i have seen the Asakusa Sensoji temple twice before, and this was my third visit. The front entrance of Sensoji temple leads through the Nakamise area, which has 90 different little souvenir shops, that sells anything from red bean pastry, little cellphone trinkets, keychains, paper lanterns, porcelin japanese dolls, and other souvenirs. I would say this is a must-see for any tourist coming to visit Japan. I do believe that Sensoji temple is the number one tourist attraction in Tokyo! After the tour, we went to Isetan, one of many big huge shopping malls throughout Tokyo and of Japan! In each mall, they have an underground or basement area where they will sell a lot of food, anything from pastries, fruit, fish, seafood, to sushi, and other foods you can think of. A term that i have heard that depicts these markets are "depachika", and the japanese know of this term well. The night time in Shinjuku is fantastic! and it reminds people from the movie, "Lost in Translation". My family and i finally chose a place in downtown Shinjuku at an Indian restarant. I would say the food was so delicious! Then i went to Kinokuniya to get buy some photobooks and look at other magazines. Afterwards, we headed back to the hotel around 9:30pm.