Anniversary in Kobe, Fuji Q Highland and Enoshima

Here's a new post, with new stuff!

In February it was our seven year wedding anniversary, so we decided to go to Kobe for a long weekend to celebrate.  We also spent some time in Arima Onsen, a town known for its hot springs not far from Kobe.

Downtown Kobe with the mountains in the background.

Most of the time was spent relaxing and sightseeing.  We visited the Kobe earthquake museum, which was a sobering experience, but very informative.  A guide explained some of the phenomena around earthquakes and tsunamis including liquefaction.  We got given a booklet of "must do" earthquake things and shook our heads at how little we had done/were doing from the booklet.  

On another topic, here's something you may or may not know - Kobe is home to an enormous Gigantor statue, so we had to go check him out.

Kobe is a pretty chilled-out city, and is pretty international, with a long history of people migrating from  other countries there.  It's a bit past Osaka, so it takes a little longer to get to on the Shinkansen, but it made for a nice change from the hustle and bustle.

On the day of our anniversary we made the short trip out to Arima Onsen, with nothing on the agenda apart from sightseeing and soaking in the onsen at the hotel we were staying at.  

Arima Onsen can be reached by train or by cable car.  We decided to keep our sanity by taking the train there, but managed to fit in a trip on the cable car after we'd arrived.

At the top was a castle and legit snow, which we may have made into snowballs and thrown at each other.

It was a great weekend, and our morning soak in the onsen at the hotel set us up for the day of sightseeing out in the cold.  More photos from Kobe and Arima Onsen are here.

This month we went to Fuji Q Highland amusement park, with Japan's biggest and fastest rollercoasters.  Fuji Q Highland, as the name suggests, is located near the foothills of Mount Fuji, which makes for a great view from the ferris wheel and gives the whole place a dramatic backdrop.

As is par for the course with amusement parks on the weekend, the lines were massive for the popular attractions, so I managed to go on one rollercoaster and a few rides.  If I had been happy to wait for an hour per rollercoaster, I would have been able to go on more, but them's the breaks.  More photos of the THEME PARK.

Last thing for this update is our most recent weekend visit to Enoshima.  We only live about 45 minutes by train to Enoshima, which is great, because it is beautiful!

Enoshima island is a small island in Kanagawa, and is really popular in summertime.  Stalls are set up along the beach and people go to eat dinner and drink beer.  Given that summer's coming up and we're not far away, it's definitely something to keep in mind for us.  Apart from its beaches, Enoshima also has extensive shrine grounds, a lover's bell, a garden featuring international flowers, trees and plants, as well as caves that can be explored.  So, without further ado, here are some photos!

Walking over the bridge to the island

More photos of Enoshima are HERE.  I took a whole stack of photos.

Being that it's springtime here, it's sakura season, and we were in the thick of it during its peak.  To finish up, here's a few shots of what we get treated to for a week or so before it disappears again for another year.

And of course, there's more, here they are!

Until next time, take care of yourselves....and each other.

New Years in Nagoya and Birthday Snow

Hi!

With the best of intentions I set out to do a blog post back in January, and then things got busy, and they have only started winding down now.

It's the end of the academic school year over here, so exams are being sat, reports are being written, and the end of year graduation ceremony is going through the finishing touches.  This year is our first year 12 graduation for our program, so it's a bit exciting!

I'm going to have to do a mad recap because it's been more than two months since I last updated.

After Christmas we went to Nagoya to celebrate New Year's.  In Japan, Christmas time is generally a time when friends catch up, and Christmas Eve is one of the biggest date nights here.  New Year's Day is the time spent with family, usually in your home town.  In other words, it's the reverse of Australia.

Part One - Nagoya and Toba

We jumped on a shinkansen to Nagoya just before New Year's, and rang the new year in there.  While we were in the region we did/saw a few notable things:

Ate a Nagoya speciality that is delicious but not at all photogenic: Tebasaki chicken wings

Ate another Nagoya speciality that is regrettably endangered (found this out later, sorry eels!): Hitsumabushi - grilled eel

It's not surprising that eel is endangered here, this was honestly one of the most delicious things I've eaten since we arrived almost a year ago, and ordinarily I'm not an eel fan.

I had to lead with the food, because I am a major food tourist.  As well as the food we also had a look at the Nagoya aquarium, where I took a whole bunch of blurry photos.

More photos of Nagoya HERE

We also took a trip out to Toba, about 90 minutes by express train from Nagoya.  Toba is famous for a few things: pearls and oysters, a shrine that contains some sacred items owned by the emperor, and Meoto Iwa - the sacred wedded rocks set out in the water.

We had a look at the pearls and the wedded rocks.

In Toba, there is the Mikimoto pearl island and pearl museum.

Admission wasn't too expensive, and it included a pearl diving demonstration.

It's probably worth keeping in mind that while we were watching this pretty impressive display, the temperature was about 1 degree and the so-called sea breeze was more like a frigid wind.  The women doing the diving carried on like troopers, waving up at the crowd standing huddled in scarves, hats and gloves.

At the pearl museum, we saw a BIG PEARL

And an oceanic princess from Australia

Although they were replicas, they certainly were large.  We went to the gift shop but 1. I'm not a pearl fan and 2. Things are stupidly expensive at that shop.  The pearl diving demonstration was definitely the highlight of the visit, but the museum provided really interesting insights into how pearls are bred, farmed and treated.

After our visit to the pearl museum, we took a short train trip to Futami to go and visit Meoto Iwa, the wedded rocks.

OH MY GOD it was cold.

Jason's cold face

My cold face

Well worth the trip, Jason and I liked the little shrine entrance dooby thing sitting on top of the larger wedded rock.  It reminded us of the miniature stonehenge in This is Spinal Tap.

We made our way back home back to Tokyo on New Year's Day and had a couple of subdued days before work started back up again.  Great trip, and guess what, more photos HERE!!

Part Two - Jason's birthday and the snowfall

We spent Jason's birthday in Ueno, Tokyo so we could do things like stay out late in Shinjuku without worrying about catching a train and getting packed in shoulder to shoulder for the 25-30 mins it takes to get back.  Plus it's near Akihabara (electric town), win-win.

We hung out in one of our favourite bars in Shinjuku, where I discovered the best toy ever.

We went to the Gundam cafe in Akihabara.  Jason couldn't wait!

The food was bad OH NO

Jason got a free sundae for his birthday at the Biohazard cafe, and they sang for him too and it was fabulously embarrassing.

And then, as if it couldn't get any more BIRTHDAY....it started snowing

It was a bit of a struggle home through the snow, transferring trains and lugging big bags through snow drifts ain't all it's cracked up to be.  The shot above of the stairs was taken on the way up to our apartment door.

It was pretty spectacular seeing all the snow and how it made everything take on a dreamy quality.

The view from our balcony of the house over the road:

That's not all, but that's all for now.  More photos of the snow etc in Akihabara are here.

I hope to update again soon.  Until next time!