JR Pass

Travel day part 2

How can the last day

be such a disaster for

us after such fun?

Thursday 9 May [no pictures – no time]

OK let’s get the worst bit out of the way first. We get up, check out and are on our way to catch the 08:02 Narita Express from Shinjuku Station. It’s morning rush hour and negotiating the crowds with four suitcases was not easy. We arrive at the barrier and the clerk looks at our JR passes but says we also need a reserved seat ticket for the N’Ex. I go to look for the office and discover acres of white sheeting covering building works. I return but he’s adamant I have to go further and get a ticket. Beginning to worry a little now with ten minutes to spare, I scoot to the ticket office and get our tickets. Back to the entrance and we are let through. As we scuttle towards the platform, Dee says “Where’s the camera bag?” Ooops! That’ll be in room 601 at the hotel where I packed and prepared it and then failed to pick it up. I race back to the hotel with an outside chance of making it back. This vanishes when the receptionist quite legitimately checks my details before issuing a duplicate room key. The lift takes forever to arrive. Bag swiftly retrieved, key back to desk, shoot out of door, fly through the morning masses but to no avail. I find Dee, as ever, minding the luggage. So I leave her there, go to the ticket office and get a new N’Ex reservation – umm – from Tokyo Station not Shinjuku. So it’s down several escalators to the Chuo Line for the fifteen minute trip to Tokyo and then escalators and elevators to the Narita Express platform with ten minutes to spare. No problem then. The train gets to Narita at 09:55 and our departure is 11:55 so good time to return the portable wi-fi router and get checked in.

However on the train I check the tickets along with the wi-fi return location and discover that China Eastern Airways to Shanghai actually departs at 10:55, not when my memory told me it departed. However we still have an hour and all should be well. Part one is good – the rental company are happy to email me a receipt from the card details they took on arrival so we don’t have to wait for that.

But this is when I realize I don’t have a phone in my pocket any more. After frantic searching I conclude that I must have left it on the train when checking Tom’s phone number in Hong Kong. We go to the airport information desk and get a number for lost and found but it won’t connect. All I get on Dee’s phone is “NTT Docomo regrets to inform you that this line is not in service.” Oh well we have to go to through security and get to the gate now since my bonus hour proved illusory. We’ll try again at the gate. Here the China Eastern/JAL staff are superb. They call the number we gave them which works from one of their mobiles but gives them another number. They call this and confirm that a phone matching the description I’ve given them was indeed found in seat 11A and is now at the Narita JR terminal. As we are now minutes from departure time there’s no way we can get it but I think we agree that they’ll ship it on the next Hong Kong flight. We are both staggered that within ten or fifteen minutes of us leaving the train, the phone was already gathered in and available for collection had we been able to get there.

The flight to Shanghai is comfortable, has food and beer and gives us time to calm down a little after a mad start to our last day in Japan and get some blog written. Shanghai Pu Dong International Terminal is a vast soulless hangar of a building virtually devoid of life which makes it good for frequent fliers who can get through it fast but it did not appeal to me. Unlike Hong Kong’s new airport – on my last visit I had landed at the old Kai Tak where the plane’s wings scraped the skyscrapers and the runway ended in the harbour – scary. There’s a lot of water around Chep Lak Kok as with much of modern Hong Kong as it’s all built on reclaimed land. The terminal is elegant and efficient and we take Tom who kindly came to meet us, to areas he’s never been to to make a full report about my phone. [Between them, the train line and the airline contrived to forward my phone for collection in Hong Kong on Saturday. A bit of a result that!]

An exciting cab ride back into central Hong Kong island and to our Happy Valley home for the next few days. A celebratory glass of champagne and the joy of home cooking after 28 days of eating out every night provided a wonderful relaxing end to what might for some have been a somewhat stressful day.

In Japan

The long railroad to the north

Will our grand send off

help us through the train night

or exhaust us both?

So here we are finally after faffing around at the Shinkansen gates expecting to be whooshed to Hokkaido while we slept but are redirected to Track 13 – not a bullet train line. All the paparazzi are still lurking about and a guard comes running down the platform to get us underway.

He checks the signage – as do we – and the insignia on the train.

Both look fine but this is our train.

Not the post modern express we’d hoped to help us through the night – rather less elegant inside than that in Some like it Hot as it happens. The Hokutosei seems to use rolling stock from the fifties.

However, we installed ourselves, the train set off and after organizing our bags in this tiny space we set off for the dining car. Oh, oh, no. Reservations only and must be made three days in advance. Why did nobody tell us this when we booked our berth at considerable expense above our JR Passes? A cart came by with some provisions and we had a few bits and pieces so we were able to construct an amuse bouche and then dinner.

Fish biscuit amuse bouche Dinner

After this wondrous repast and a few rounds of “Take Two” there being no electricity for blogging except by standing in the washing area – and dear reader some lines have to be drawn. So anticipating an early (06:35) arrival in Hakodate we prepared for bed. As we finished our ablutions the train stopped. We looked through the window to see a solitary figure on the platform opposite photographing us. Ironically, or perhaps necessarily, we were at Fukushima and expressed our solidarity as best we could.

Not a great deal of sleep was had by either of us before dawn broke and we emerged from the Seiku the world’s longest undersea tunnel (53 Km; 33 miles) into Hokkaido. We soon had our first glimpse of Mt Hakodate, arrived at the station and saw the train depart for Sapporo. Off for a day of enforced sightseeing as we can’t check in till 4 pm.

As the song says “Oh what a night!” But not quite inn the same way. Do the sums: Osaka – Tokyo 570 km in 3 hours; Tokyo- Hakodate 830 km in 11 and a half hours.

In Japan

Kyoto diary

Three nights in the same

hotel, how will we cope with

such wardrobe choice?

Good morning Kyoto. A little later than intended after completing the three day blog, going to Yodobashi – an incredible nine floors of electronics, electrical, camera and computer gear with some stationery thrown in – to buy a bigger USB drive to store all the photographs we’ve been taking. Yes they are on the cloud but it’s always reassuring to have a physical backup for us oldies. Our late night activities were accompanied by a little whisky which may have accounted for a good night’s sleep.

There’s some admin to do today too. We need to exchange our JR pass vouchers for the real thing and reserve our week after next overnight train to Hakodate. Fortunately the hotel is right across from Kyoto Station so we don’t have far to go. JR passes were easy, the sleeper reservation not so easy as the train I had selected from Hyperdia online is no longer in service so we’ll have to go from Osaka to Tokyo and get an overnight from there to Hakodate. It’s booked and we’ll just rejig things a bit.

Kyoto station is stunning. A glass and steel facade with amazing angles, lines and reflections and an interior to challenge Grand Central for the classical railway station images of the future. And like the St Pancras redevelopment in London it’s making stations not just places from which to travel but places to be. It has a stage and stepped terrace for music gigs, more restaurants and shops than you can imagine and a green garden on the roof with some very clever eco planting that helps reduce heat transfer into the building – lots of summer days are over 35 degrees – 19 last year alone and it will probably rise. From the roof there was a great view of the Kyoto Tower and our acceptable but undistinguished hotel (the one with the white T up the front). And that’s where we headed next.

Having set out in jeans and jumpers we quickly found temperatures soaring to 25 and up. We didn’t pack shorts but fortunately did have some light walking trousers and sandals which were more appropriate attire for the day – thank goodness for the three day unpacking stay. We set off with Katie’s “dorky” maps to explore some small parts of this huge city. Mastering the simple two-line subway, we went first the Shinjo-dori the main shopping street to see if we could buy a Japan road atlas in English to help with our next stages of rentacar travel. We found a big bookshop with new Murakami book posters everywhere but no road atlas. Off the main street, which is the universal, global big city shopping area, are arcades crammed with little shops which are much more interesting. Then we came to another of Katie’s suggestions, Pontocho, which is a narrow street lined with bars and restaurants overlooking the Tama River. It was so warm that we just had to go into one to enjoy the air conditioning for a bit and of course a beer. We had a great view of a team who had dammed up part of the river to build a platform out over it which apparently many of them do for the summer season. We could imagine the delights of a glass of wine out on the terrace.

Refreshed we strode off to the Nanzen-ji Temple where we enjoyed the beautiful spring garden – the shimmering colours of acers in spring are almost a match for their autumn glory and of course so much fresher. Here we also obtained, as advised, our hon (pr. hone) a folding book on which temples stamp their insignia with a hanko (handwritten kanji combined with a special rubber stamp). They are beautiful and will give us a great souvenir of our trip.

We then set off on the ‘Philosopher’s Walk’ a canal-side stroll through eastern suburbs with stretches of complete calm and peace conducive to higher thought – I certainly needed that – and small craft shops selling locally produced goods. By the time we reached the end we were well away from train lines and subway but Dee had cleverly picked up a bus map and the next one to round a corner was the 100 bound for Kyoto Station. It was very crowded at shop and shrine closing time and we stood for most of the journey which was a shame as it passed several landmarks of which we could only see the bottom half.

The philosopher? … in pursuit of gesiha on the walk? … this is what Dee wanted by the end of it.

As we got back to the station, we decided to see if the Kyoto Tower had an observation gallery. It does, we went up. Dusk falling visibility hazy after the heat of the day but a fun visit nonetheless.

Shinkansen passing on the approach to Kyoto The Tower reflected in Kyoto Station

After a freshen up and a couple of much needed beers following a hot day on our feet we decided to head out to find dinner locally. I don’t know if you have the same problem but we are very indecisive when confronted with a street with five restaurants all of which look interesting. We walk up, we walk back, we look at menu pictures outside and then we decide we really are hungry and are going to have to plump for one of them. We did and it turned out to be a hibachi grill place. We were shown, shoes off of course, to a private screened booth with a footwell under our table and were served fresh vegetables and akta mackerel which we cook ourselves over a brazier with three red hot charcoal logs. Great fun and very tasty and we had chosen some excellent sashimi as a starter. We enquired of our server how she spoke such good English and it turned out that Mikita was coming to Brighton in June to study English and had been practising ahead of the trip. We have been struck by amazing meetings with people with existing and possible connections throughout the trip – there really are only six degrees of separation.

We left the restaurant and walked back towards the hotel and spied a rather lively and bright yellow-coloured bar (apologies to our Hornet friends that it is yellow AND green) – standing only and it had a great name. So given the deprivation of yellow as we are missing so much Watford football, we thought a sake night cap was in order. It proved a great people-watching place as late nighters popped in for a quick one on the way home and two ladies of a certain age stood consuming beer to our left until closing time – when we too were asked to drink up and depart – extremely politely. Busy, busy, Kyoto.

Masoho restaurant entrance The last orders bar

Friday dawned fresh, bright and breezy and it was back to jeans and sweaters big time. How can the temperature change by 15 degrees overnight? Well it did and we took the subway south to visit Higashi Inari Shrine. Sadly we missread the map and finish up at a station which is s forty-five minute walk from the shrine rather than the railway station that’s right in front of it. So a taxi was hailed and delivered us to the Fox Shrine which apart from amazing main buildings has a walkway of shrine gates or torii which stretch up to the main shrine on the mountain and involve 10 000 vermillion gates – awesome. We only walked the first three thousand as other sites called but a stroll to the top and back would make a great half day outing given more time. We were approached by a uniformed guard and were worried that we’d been photographing in the wrong place but he was a retired firefighter who had spent time in Sheffield and Liverpool on job exchanges and welcomed the opportunity to speak English. We next took a short train ride to Tofukuji Temple where the buildings are stupendous but the main attraction was a beautiful zen garden on all four sides of the main hall. A wonderful oasis of peace and contemplative strolling in the midst of busy, busy Kyoto. On our way back to the station we called into a small temple Doju-in where the attendant most beautifully calligraphed and then stamped our hon.

We then used our JR Passes for the second time on a train to Kiyazumi which is an amazing complex with superb views over the whole spread of Kyoto and then walked through quaint streets with fabulous little shops dotted about until we reached the Yasaka Pagoda and turned in to the Maruyama Park a popular open space with ponds and shady pathways – and a few ups and downs as we’re in the mountain foothills. After an increasingly chilly walk around the park as the wind got up we descended to the Chion-in Temple just in time to find it close. This is fortunately a short downhill walk from Gion the ancient geisha district which we wanted to explore. It’s lovely, weird and wonderful. We saw women buying kimonos and accessories, having their hair done and one of my favourite shops was a koto, shimasen and shakuhachi shop.

Yasaka pagoda Maruyama Park Old and new Kyoto meet in Gion

Some difficulties next after boarding a train at the first station we came to, Kawaramachi, where we showed our passes only to be told at the exit ticket barrier that it was a private railway and we’d need to pay. Kyoto – maybe Japan trains = confused.com. However we got back safely and did a load of laundry in the coin-op in the hotel, conveniently on our floor. Then repacking ready for the road tomorrow and what felt like a wimpy dinner in the restaurant beneath the hotel which was actually rather good – beef and potato stew for me and fried beef and rice for Dee occasioning slight food envy. She had made the right choice.