After living in Niseko and having enough snow to last me a life time and having completed three winter seasons in a row I was in desperate need of some sunshine.....
Being a ski instructor i'm not exactly a high earner so I was definitely planning a journey on a budget. My first way of sending money was to try out couchsurfing (
http://www.couchsurfing.org), a website where you can meet other travelers and contact people in places you are travelling to in order to find free accommodation on their sofas. I had heard about it before and met other users but had never had the guts to do it. This time I was convinced it was a good idea so I set to it and created myself a profile and searched for hosts in Okinawa, the most southern island of Japan.
I was lucky enough to be accepted by a local Japanese girl and her husband.
The first task was getting there; drive to Sapporo city, train from city centre to airport, flight from Sapporo to Osaka, one night sleeping in airport, flight from Osaka to Okinawa, monorail to central Naha. Fingers crossed my host would be at the station to meet me..... and she was, phew! I was fairly obvious with my big rucksack so we introduced ourselves and set off to the house to meet the rest of the family; husband Tatsu and the dog Bebe.
I am always amazed by the generosity of Japanese people. Namiko and Tatsu had only been in their current home for one month and I was already the thirteenth couchsurfer they'd hosted. To top it off, having only just moved to the island they hadn't yet found new jobs but still insisted on cooking for me and sharing their food. The first evening we had Tacco rice, and Okinawan favourite. The next day we planned to go to a Meetup group (
http://www.meetup.com/) to go walking in caves and have a pot luck party. We all prepared our food, collected another traveller, Yulianna from Russia, and set off to the meeting point.
The group was organised by Noel from the US military as they have a base on the island. Over one hundred people showed up for the day with an amazing amount of food.....
The majority of the group was formed by the US military...
Some of them were couchsurfers too...
We split up in to groups of around twenty five to go through the caves so after some great food and after the other groups had been through it was finally our turn:
The caves we were visiting had been occupied by Okinawans during WWII and at the end of the war three hundred of them had survived. As we entered the caves this suddenly became even more of an achievement than I had imagined, we literally had to squeeze between the walls of the cave opening below many stalactites.
The claustrophobic conditions lasted for quite some time....
until eventually we reached an open area where the Okinawans had lived:
After our journey through the caves we regrouped with the rest of the party and continued on to our next attraction; Bios on the Hill....
The gardens were beautiful and tropical and at the end of the day we finished with a group photo:
After saying goodbye to the others my hosts took me to the beach...
before we enjoyed some well deserved Japanese cuisine:
The next day I took a trip to the Shurijo castle
and toured the multitude of souvenir shops
That evening we were joined by another couchsurfer; Sashi from India.
He cooked curry and it we all exchanged travel strories, which only served to add more places to my travel wish list.
In the morning a trip on the monorail took me to Naha airport, then a flight to Osaka, and finally a bus to Naruto reunited me with my friend Naoko, who I had met whilst WWOOFing in Canada:
Again, a show of Japanese generosity, Naoko had only arrived back in Japan fairly recently so was only working part time and lived with her parents but they still insisted on having me stay and wouldn't let me pay for anything.
The first day we visited a traditional Buddhist shrine...
and went to and indigo dying museum. The next day we went to Tokushima city to Mt. Bizan where we had a view out to the ocean:
We went to Tokushima castle park...
and watched traditional Awa Odori dancing
After one more night in Naruto I took the bus to Osaka city to meet up with two of the staff I had worked with in Niseko; Dan and Trudy.
One of the things on my Japanese to-do list was to stay in a capsule hotel...so we did (
www.asahiplaza.co.jp/capcel/english.html):
The capsules had everything we needed; TV, alarm clock, towels, PJ's and when you were ready to sleep you just pulled down the blind. Perfect!
The first day in Osaka we checked out a shrine with a bit of a difference...
...saw some sumo wrestling...
...and went up the highest building in the city to see some amazing views...
The next day we visited Osaka castle...
and took a river boat cruise...
before we set off to our next destination; Kyoto!
The train journey was really quick and our hostel (Bakpak Gion) was right next to the station.
After a good nights rest Trudy and I were ready to go to our Maiko (apprentice Geisha) experience. I was a little disappointed Dan didn't want to come with us and be a Samurai!
We went a small studio (
http://www.maiko-henshin.com/english/recommend/index.html) where first they did our make up...
...then we chose kimonos and finally they put our wigs on and we looked like this....
They took and printed some really professional photos and we also had time to take our own.
After a morning of fancy dress Trudy and Dan went to a monkey park and I went in search of some traditional Japanese culture. I saw lots of shrines...
...temples...
...cherry blossom...
...bamboo...
...and tiny Japanese streets...
I felt like I definitely got my Japanese experience in Kyoto and my feet felt like they'd done a week of sightseeing in one afternoon.
The next morning I said my goodbyes to Trudy and Dan and made my way to Hikone to me my Couch surfing host; Emily from America.
Emily was working in Japan teaching English and had taken a real interest in Japanese culture so was able to share some really interesting information with me during our day of sightseeing. We set off on our bikes, complete with baskets and went to check out the lake.... it looked more like the ocean!
We checked out some shrines, visited the Japanese photo booths...
...met up with other couch surfers and headed to the castle...
Later we enjoyed some local cuisine...
including Okonomiyaki! Yummmm!
and enjoyed an evening of drinks and dressing up in kimonos :)
After a fun evening I had a good nights sleep before setting off on the train to visit my friend Tatsuya who I met WWOOFing in Canada.
I arrived at Nagoya station and was greeted by Tatsuya and his friend, We dumped my bags in a locker and set off for a full on day of sightseeing. First on the list was Nagoya castle...
The original castle had been burned down with only the foundation walls left behind so the castle had been rebuilt with a museum inside. One of the main features of the castle is the golden fish on the roof so there were lots of replicas in the museum:
By the time we finished in the castle it was getting late so we went to Nagoya's ferris wheel to check out the night lights...
...then we visited the tower...
...and finally Nana Chan, a huge mannequin; today dressed in her Air Asia hostess outfit!
After a good nights rest at Tatsuya's house it was time for my final Japanese destination; the big city; Tokyo!
A long bus ride and a metro trip later I found my host Mayu. Her flat was so cosy and we had a great time chatting and working out our sightseeing plans.
When I first set off to Japan I had a short 'to do' list. It consisted of:
- Skiing
- Try as many Japanese dishes as possible
- Stay in a capsule hotel
- Watch sumo wrestling
- Try Sake
- See Cherry Blossom
- Dress as a geisha
and....
8. Visit a cat cafe!
The only thing not ticked off by the time I reached Tokyo was the cat cafe and when I told Mayu I think she was as excited as me :)
Our morning consisted of sorting out my finances before I left Japan unfortunately but we managed this fairly quickly and set off for our non-stop tour of Tokyo.
First stop; Imperial Castle gardens:
Next; Asakusa temple and markets:
After a fantastic lunch we set off towards the Sky Tree Tower, the tallest building in Tokyo at over 640m:
Then we set off to complete my tick list via the world's busiest pedestrian crossing outside Shibuya Station:
...and then we were at a cat cafe!
To be honest the cats just wanted to sleep or avoid us but it was a nice cosy spot to relax and give our feet a rest before hitting Harajuku with its crazy fashion and amazing crepes:
And that was the end of my tour of Japan, a country that I would definitely love to visit again and a place that is full of culture, both old and new, crazy technology, polite and friendly people, and brilliant food! Good bye Japan, I hope we see each other again!
