Blogs from Kanazawa, Ishikawa, Japan, Asia - page 2

Did I mention that our hotel has a 20 meter tall Godzilla head pertruding from it's 8th floor? And that on the hour it roars, flashes coloured lights and sprays a mist over the balcony? Sooooo Japan! Tourists watch from the street below, but the locals walk by without a blink of the eye. There are so many people here. The city stretches to the horizon with high-rise hotels, skyscrapers and department stores. A panorama from our 26th floor hotel is ALL city! There are 13,000,000 people in Tokyo! That's half the population of Australia in one city! And Shinjuku station has so many JR, metros, suburban and shinkansen lines intersecting beneath it that it blows your mind. There is something like 40 platforms! We got crammed into the train to Harajuku yesterday, and it wasn't ... read more

Kanazawa Monday 9 May 16 24 hours after leaving home we arrived in Osaka without hitch, apart from the plane being 20 minutes late due to a strong headwind. This caused a bit of a panic when we had to buy the train tickets to Kanazawa in an office with a big queue and four clerks who made a sloth look quick. We just got our tickets with no time to spare and rushed onto the train to Shin Osaka. Fortunately the train was late , although my previous faith in Japanese railways has now been irretrievably ruined as it was also late into Shin Osaka. Luckily again the connection to Kanazawa waited for us and we set off almost 10 minutes late. The plane landed through a misty grey sky with falling rain. Welcome to ... read more

So an early breakfast and off to the train we go to have a day in Kanazawa. It seems we are really lucky as the train station only opened in March this year, previously you had to take a bus for over an hour after you had been on the train for a couple of hours. Thank goodness for progress. So we arrive in Kanazawa and find the information desk where for once we find a lady who spoke really good English and she told me how to get to the garden and the castle plus the Samurai area. We purchase a bus ticket and off we trot to the Kenrokuen Garden. They say that this garden in spring is amazing all I can say is they are amazing in summer so I wish I could ... read more

We were up bright and early and made our way to the bus station. I had definitely slept well on the futon, it was really comfortable. Luckily the bus station is right next door to the train station, so it was really easy to find. We bought our tickets and boarded the bus. It left bang on time, 7:50 am, I love Japanese efficiency. The drive through the countryside was beautiful, and we went through about a million tunnels, it's the only way to get through all the mountains. We made a brief stop at Shirkawago, it looked great, I can't wait to go back there on Tuesday. The journey took just over two hours. at 10 am we were deposited at Kanazawa bus terminal. We found the bus stop for our journey back and also ... read more

The train travel from place to place seems to be just as much an event as the places themselves. Our journey from Takayama to Kanazawa took us through the heart of the Ryohaku Sanchi mountain range. There is no Shinkansen here. A rickety little diesel train wound it's way alongside a fast moving river all the way to the sea. Almost no one was on the train so we were able to jump from one side to the other to get a good view of the landscape as the train crossed bridges and popped in and out of tunnels. The views were really beautiful and the autumn colors spectacular. The landscape reminded me a lot of the Appalachian mountains in Virginia. Rugged and hilly but covered in trees. The train stations along the way were tiny ... read more