Osaka and Kyoto - Start of trip

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We left London Heathrow in the morning and landed at Charles De Gaul in Paris to get our connecting flight. We decided to fly with Air France and it was a enjoyable flight with a good media database with a screen to yourself also the food was good for airplane food. The flight time was just under 16 hours long which went quite quickly, and some exceptional sights just before landing of the surrounding countryside.

After going through immigration at Osaka, which was very brief and easy with the officers being polite and friendly (unlike U.S immigration officers) we went and collected our luggage and rail tickets. The first thing that grabbed my attention was how clean the airport was and with such a clam atmosphere seeming it is a busy airport.

We got our ticket to Kyoto which is a short journey north of Osaka - about 30 minutes on train. What blew me away first of all is the Shinkansen (bullet train), it has huge amount of leg room and was so quite while traveling there was also no real shaking on the carriage. It was by far the best train I have ever been on hands down.

We managed to get to Kyoto station and find the tourist information office which were very helpful in finding us a hotel and spoke very good English. I was really struggling with jet lag and needed sleep but Ryan talked me into trying to see some of Kyoto for a couple of hours. It has some amazingly old Japanese architecture that would garb anyone's attention (even a jet lagged zombie). Kyoto is Japan's old capital where the Emperor used to reside and has great tradition.

I managed to drag myself around a tour of the Emperor's old palace which was breath taking and then we walked back to the hotel to grab some much needed sleep.... I awoke after a few hours rest and we decided to go a grab some local delicacies...

We went walking around the old part of town which has not been changed for 200 hundred years. This was a great experience with opportunities for some brilliant photographs and a quick look for a few Geisha which we got and we were on our way to get some food...

We ended up in a tiny place with one chef who knew no English, a lot of the locals don't but are very helpful if you try some Japanese, so we eventually managed to ask for some local delicacies. Which ended up with me eating LIVE octopus - yes you heard me live - and a weird omelet with lots of random meat and veggies in topped with mayo and ketchup. It was an experience that was a great way to start a life changing trip......

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Photos

Sake Time
Ryan enjoying the hotels Sake

Ryan
He decided to go to Japan and after we got there I found out he doesn't like fish!!