High speed travel day!

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We left Matt and Dianne's home on a hot Sunday morning, with unseasonably warm temperatures brought from the tropics by a typhoon passing by. This weekend is the national sports day holiday, and we stopped by the neighborhood elementary school to watch the opening ceremony, before we left for Kyoto.

The trip took a total of five hours, door to door. We walked to the train station and took a train to Ome, where we got on the express for an hour long ride to Tokyo Station. Once at the station we went to the railpass office where we exchanged our voucher (ordered online before we left the States) for our passes. The clerk made our reservations for Kyoto on the Shinkansen (the bullet train) which was leaving in 20 minutes, and we headed back into the station to find our way to our train. Everything is well marked, and all trains are on time!I

The trains are so clean and spacious, and you can buy snacks and drinks from an attendant who passes through with a cart. When your stop approaches, you need to be ready to get off, since the train only spends a minute or so in a station!

We had beautiful scenery of mountains and sea coast on the two and half hour trip to Kyoto. Mt. Fuji was partly hidden by clouds. Once in Kyoto, we found our way out of the giant station (there is an expensive hotel, high end shops, and many places to eat) and followed the directions to our hotel apartment a fifteen minute walk away. We made one wrong turn, but realized our mistake before we had gone too far. Street names are not always helpful in Japanese cities!

Our new home for the next four nights just opened three weeks ago. The building is right next to two railroad lines, and not as sound proof as we had hoped, but the trains stop around 11:00pm. The apartment has everything you could want (including a washing machine!) for $90/night... The young managers are enthusiastic and helpful.

This evening we shopped for breakfast supplies and then ate dinner in small restaurant on the way home from the grocery store. I tried shochu, an alcohol that can be made from many different things ( this one was made from potatoes).

Tomorrow we will start visiting shrines and temples...tonight we're relaxing and watching Japanese TV!

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Photos

Sports Day at the neighborhood elementary school
My niece will go here one day...

Cold "milk coffee" from the vending machine at the local train station.
I love these vending machines!

Bill waiting in line at the railroad office.
This was well organized, as one expects in Japan..

A cool Japanese show where contestants have to find the actual buildings they see on Google earth
Then they interview the owners and show old family photos...