15 Reasons Why We Love Japan!
15 February to 4 March 2017
We opted to leave the sun kissed white beaches, fascinating underwater marine life and the ice cold beers to discover the innovative, richly cultural if not a little crazy country that is JAPAN!
We were immensely looking forward to seeing Tokyo, the hub of the hi-tech world and we couldn’t wait to hit the slopes in the Hakuba valley on the main island. As the skiers of you know Japan is famous for it’s snowy conditions, the weather systems that move across Siberia mean that there are massive amounts of snow compared to the rest of the world’s ski areas and we all know that lots of snow means… lots of PAAAAAAAAAAWWDAAAAAAAAl! (powder). To give you an example the average snowfall in ski resorts in Japan is anything between 14-18 metres. Compare that with Europe, although European resorts don’t publish their average snowfall, so after scouring the internet I did find one article that reported Lech in Austria known historically for having superior snow cover and also the highest average snowfall of any resort in Europe at 10.6 metres, once, big difference hey! We were very excited to get amongst the paaaawdaaa and see this super snow for ourselves.
We couldn’t wait to don our newly bought winter coats and see what Japan had to offer. We had just under three weeks to explore this country. We had high expectations which meant we could have easily been disappointed, but it exceeded our expectations. We loved Japan! Here are some of the reasons why…(in no particular order):
One of the things I was most excited about seeing and experiencing in Japan was their famous Shinkansen. We opted to buy a JR Rail Pass, which entitles you to use any participating train around Japan, including the bullet trains!
The Shinkansen is pretty impressive due to many factors, the futuristic appearance with its long nose is very stylistic. The punctuality of the trains are second to none, JR reported that the Shinkansen’s average delay is just 18 seconds, wow, C2C and Greater Anglia could take note. They’re also renowned for being pretty quick too, the top speed of the Shinkansen is 320km/h (200 mph).
Our first ride was from Kyoto to Tokyo, which took just over 2 hours and covered just under 500kms, pretty quick hey!
Excited and ready to set off
Trying to navigate our way to our hotel from the bullet train…
We loved the Shinkansen’s so much, we took ourselves off for the day on the train, accompanied by some wine and cheese, to an hour or so outside of Tokyo to cross platforms and head straight back!
Everywhere was so incredibly clean. OK so we had just come from spending 4 months in South East Asia and so clean public facilities weren’t a common feature, but what was more common were pungent smells when you wandered down roads that were riddled with cockroaches. But seriously though, this country was spotless, there was no litter anywhere, no horrid smells, there are no cigarette butts and chewing gum on the pavements, in fact there are designated places, outside, for smoking, eating ice cream from a street vendor, yes you cannot walk along the road whilst eating.
The roads themselves are extremely well maintained, the streets in Kyoto and in particular Gion Shijo, which is like their equivalent of Oxford Street, was immaculate, to the extent that it looked fake, like a street you would see in a theme park, are you with me?? Dan and I rode along this stretch on our bikes (a little clip in the Kyoto vid).
You are never more than a hop, skip and a jump away from a vending machine in Japan. Everywhere you look two, three, four machines are lined to give you a thirst quenching treat.
The selection was mammoth, in a few seconds you could have your hands on water, fizzy pop, juice, beer, sake…
It was also the first place where not only a cold drink option was available, but also a hot beverage, and a selection of them! I went safe and opted for hot chocolate, it wasn’t quite PAUL standard but it was pretty good.
We soon discovered that these machines were not limited to supplying drinks and that you could buy a variety of goods…
3. Noodles, yes, hot noodles!
8. Vegetables in stick form!?!?
So it’s quite simple, you order whatever picture takes your fancy, put your money in and within a couple of minutes your dinner/lunch is served!
We took the Shinkansen out to Hakone, a day trip from Tokyo and were impressed with the snowy peaked Mount Fuji. We travelled to Owakundani in Hakone which has great views of Mount Fuji and itself is a volcanic valley with active sulphur points, so we got the rotten egg smell and you can see the steam in the picture below.
We were lucky enough to see Mount Fuji on one of our sightseeing days in central Tokyo when we went to the top of the Metropolitan Government building, which was also free, lucky timing hey!
I love sushi and couldn’t wait to try it in its birthplace. Dan who isn’t so keen also tried it and while it didn’t blow his mind, his conclusion was “I didn’t mind it” which I’ll take as a win as he would flatly refuse to try it in the UK.
We had sushi at a sushi train restaurant at the famous Tsukiji fish market in Tokyo. We sat at the counter where the chefs made the sushi in front of us which was a great experience. The Tsukiji fish market is the biggest wholesale fish and seafood market in the world and has a renowned tuna auction which takes place daily, however it is limited to 120 visitors per day and so we weren’t lucky enough to witness this event. We did however sample the best toro (high quity tuna) I have ever tasted, delicious!
Enjoying something other than sushi
We did sample these and they were NOT nice!
This may seem a strange heading, but there is music everywhere in Japan. Christophe loved it!
There was musical tunes when you took cash out of the ATM’s, when you crossed the road, when you entered a 7-Eleven, when you used a public toilet… OK so you may be thinking that there are sounds everywhere when you do all the above (maybe except for the loos!), but that’s just it, it wasn’t simply a toy machine gun sound when the green man appeared at a crossing, or an urgent set of beep beep beeps when your cash appeared, making you fear that if you weren’t quick enough to retrieve it, the cash machine may gobble it back up. No, these were melodies, tunes that made you smile and in Christophe’s case, sorry, Dan’s case, want to sing along.
Moving onto the music in the loos, well, the toilets were quite frankly awesome, see ‘Electronic Toilets’ below. When you entered a cubicle, music started, the sound of running water and birds tweeting, what a genius idea in order to ensure patrons could be discreet, or slightly foolhardy if you were cutting it fine, I am not sure the sound of running water would help!
We spent a day and a half navigating our way around the numerous temples, gardens, imperial palaces and Shinto shrines in the previous capital of Japan, Kyoto. We hired bikes and were on our way, first up, the Golden Pavillion, Kinkaku-ji Temple…
Geisha spotting in the Golden Pavilion Gardens
Here we lit candles and had a go at getting our fortune. Unluckily we didn’t get a good fortune and so we tied our fortune up and left it there, apparently this averts you from receiving the bad luck, fingers crossed!
Next up was the Bamboo Forest at Arashiyama, OK so not strictly a temple, but it was amazing and felt like you were in another world, plus there are temples around it. The bamboo forest is quite awe inspiring and according to CNN is one of the most beautiful groves on Earth!
We visited the Imperial Palace gardens
We then headed for Sannen-zaka, a typical Japanese street full of Japanese sweet delicacy shops and lots and lots of tourists. From there we headed uphill to Kiyomizu-dera Temple.
The Pagoda at Kiyomizu-dera
From the temple there was a lovely view of Kyoto
The final destination of the day was the world famous Shinto shrine, Fushimi Inari-taisha, which is a spectacular area full of Tori gates (orange shrine columns). Thousands of these tori gates form passageways and snake through the forest into the Inari mountain range. We were quite tired by the time we reached this temple and so didn’t walk the full 4 kilometres of shrines but we did cover approximately half of it, which was quite mesmerising.
We also passed many fox statues made out of stone, which are said to be the messengers of Inari, the Shinto god of rice, generally guarding the place.
Dan and a very tired looking tourist giving the foxes a hand.
We refuelled with a Yatsuhshi Chou which is the most popular traditional Japanese sweet made from rice flour, sugar and cinnamon… not bad.
Yes the toilets are EPIC! Not only could you probably eat your dinner off of them as their public loos are super clean, the Japanese have gone one step further and turned these thrones into technological marvels! They actually call them Washlets and they can have up to 20 functions… I won’t bore you with them all and we didn’t really like the idea of the bidet function, which also included different water pressure jets that could clean your behind, accompanied with a drying function of different temperatures!
What was a lovely surprise though was the heated toilet seat, especially on those skiing days, with music playing (see ‘Musical tunes’ above) and an automatic toilet lid, so as you entered the cubicle, the lid lifted, genius! :-)
However, when you marry a big kid, you can sometimes get more than what you bargained for… These toilets can also come with remote controls, which sometimes are attached to the outside of the toilet door. Can you see where this is going… Yes, I got a little surprise during one visit to the bathroom!
The taxi drivers in Japan are always very smartly dressed wearing a suit, driving cars that look like they were straight out of the 80s and the drivers tended to be older men. Maybe it’s what you do when you retire in Japan… well you should know the roads pretty well by then!
They are also renowned for being incredibly expensive and so we only got one taxi whilst we were in Japan, see ‘Golden Gui’.
We were a little dubious about onsens. We wanted to experience a Japanese style bath and say we’d been in an onsen, however, communal bathing with dozens of other naked Japanese people would be very uncomfortable! So whilst in the Hakuba valley we opted for a private onsen. It was set in idyllic open air surroundings and we were ready for some relaxation and to reap the benefits of the mineral composition of the bath. However, it was bloody hot! Apparently, Japanese people can sit in hot springs up to 55 degrees! 55 degrees!! Not sure I want to be part boiled.
11. Polite, disciplined and friendly
The Japanese people really do lead by example, they are so incredibly polite and disciplined. They queue meticulously for everything, think of Canary Wharf underground station during rush hour, on steroids! The Japanese also are extremely disciplined at pedestrian crossings. They don’t just quickly skip across the road when there are no cars coming, they patiently wait for the green man even when the road is a single lane road.
The Japanese really are so helpful and friendly, continually bowing when they greet you which feels a bit awkward, do you bow in return, then fear you may do it wrong or bash heads or just stand there like a lemon…
Dan and I were looking at the Tokyo underground station map, trying to work out how we could get to the Tokyo Tower. This kind Japanese man asked us in broken English if he could help. We started to explain where we were headed. He looked confused, unsure how to get there himself. Next thing, he was running away from us, briefcase in hand, (picture a Japanese Tin Tin, just missing Snowy) towards an information desk which we didn’t see, he found out the directions, then gestured for us to follow him, he kept saying, “I will take you”. We asked him where he was supposed to be going, he just said “it’s OK”. What a complete gentleman, we kind of worked out that he wasn’t really heading in our direction but he was so helpful and happy. We all got on the train and he took us all the way to the Tokyo Tower, changing trains and platforms along the way! When we left him at the Tokyo Tower station a good twenty minutes later, he bowed and bowed at us and I opted for none of the above and couldn’t just stand there like a lemon, so went for the very English handshake. We couldn’t really believe what had happened, a total stranger, in a huge city, during rush hour and probably on his way to work, went out of his way literally to help two lost tourists, a heart warming experience and something we won’t forget, offering someone your kindness and your time.
So we were a little worried about going to Japan as we had heard that it’s just so bloody expensive, would we burn all our cash in three weeks! We hoped not, and it turns out that it is not expensive as everyone thinks. Australia for one is much much pricier. And these little corner stores, yes there is literally one every 100 yards, turned out to be very convenient and helpful in saving our pennies. They sold everything, to the extent that people would actually have their evening meal and sit inside so it was a 7-Eleven as we would know it, plus a dine in restaurant and take away! The Japanese people that served us were uber friendly, loving their life grinning from ear to ear, chatting away to us whilst we paid, not that we understood a word they were saying… Either way, they were ultra convenient and pretty tasty, the sushi wasn’t bad from these joints either!
Luckily for Team TT we found out this fact before we arrived in Japan and so saved ourselves from insulting any locals. I was a bit surprised to begin with as you pretty much tip for everything at home but after some thought, I kind of liked the message behind it.
On our first night in Tokyo we opted for some traditional Japanese food at a BBQ place where you order your meat, and you cooked it yourself on a BBQ grill in the middle of the table. We had Kobe beef which was delicious, along with beef tongue, not so delicious! In fact it was disgusting!!
The restaurant was close to Golden Gui, a small area near to Shinjuku station where there are approx. 6 rows of small shed like buildings, housing around 200 bars. They are tiny in size, a few metres wide, fitting only 5 or so patrons at any one time. We picked one and had a few drinks chatting to another couple that made up the customers in the bar, oh and the barman.
We got on the red wine, uh-oh and ended up leaving around 4am, as the owner had to take his son skiing that morning. We were chatting to a lovely couple from Mexico and decided that it woulld be good to move on and hit up a karaoke bar.
We ended up getting a taxi home around 8.00am! Needless to say the next day we didn’t make the most of our first full day in Tokyo :-) and Golden Gui most certainly beat us. We had a fantastic night and Japan was turning into a fantastic trip. Thanks for a fab night Lina and Carlos!
We took the Shinkansen from Tokyo to Nagano near to the Hakuba Valley where we would spend the next 8 days skiing the best of the 10 ski areas. We stayed at the hotel Reposer Hakuba located in Echoland a small village just outside of Happo-One the main ski area in the valley.
We only had summer clothes with us :-/ so quickly headed to the hire shop and got fully kitted up ready to hit the slopes.
Ok so I know I agreed to take my husband family name, but surely this was one step too far!? :-)
First up, we decided to ski the 1998 Winter Olympic ski field, Happo-One. Being immensely excited and keenos, we were ready to get the first lift and I wanted photographic evidence.
First in line, so up and away on the first chairlift! :-)
The runs were empty, the snow was soft, light, fluffy and squeaked when you walked on it. Due to the massive amount of snow Japanese resorts receive each season means that they are not known for having many blue bird days. However, Mr Lucky strikes again and we had 8 days of sunshine and blue sky! This meant that we unfortunately didn’t have any powder days, making first tracks in the snow, but the snow on the pistes was the best we have ever skied in perfect conditions. You gotta take the rough with the smooth! :-)
Over the next week we skied Hakuba Cortina, Tsugaike Kogen, Iwatake, Happo-one, Hakuba 47 and Hakuba Goryu. Our favourite was Iwatake, the runs were empty and it was like a ghost town. We pretty much had the place to ourselves to the extent that when we reached a chair lift, the lift operators were so pleased to see us like we were the only people they had seen all day, maybe we were!
This meant we could practice our technique and for me that meant taking the perfectly timed shot.
The pro carving up the snow
We had an incredible week skiing and absolutely loved Japan. We hope you enjoy the two videos below.
Next up for Team TT was a road trip through Vietnam, not before meeting up with my fantastic folks, it was going to be an emotional reunion.
