First proper day in Japan for my mum, as yesterday’s trauma of getting from the airport obviously didn’t count! Managed to negotiate a later checkout for free, and so we emerged into the world at 11am. Leaving our bags at the hotel front desk, we went for a morning coffee/cup of tea, and then jumped on the metro over to Roppongi for a nice bit of lunch. We went for more Katsu at a place called Imaka, mums first Japanese meal, and it was lovely! I had chicken Katsu and mum had pork, and we shared some curry sauce on the side.

After that, we went off to explore the Imperial Palace gardens… Which of course were shut, which seemed depressingly predictable by now. Why was nothing going smoothly 😞 We had a look around the outside and the fish swimming around in the moat were beautiful!

We then headed back to the hotel to pick up our bags and carry them to the next place we were staying, which was a modern designer ryokan in the north of Tokyo, near Minowa station. It was so so hot and humid outside, around 37C, it made it very difficult to transport the bags across Tokyo, and so we ended up going from aircon to aircon spot inside the station to try and cool down momentarily. Mum looked like she was melting, no real surprise there. When we arrived, we were shown to our little room on the third floor with tatami and futon, aircon and shared showers and bathrooms on each floor. The aircon had not been switched on so it was about 30C inside the room! We promptly left to go and cool down. The staff offered us a complementary jacuzzi visit as they have one inside the premises. Mum immediately signed up for it, and I mentioned my surprise at this to her, as she had spent the last 3 hours complaining about being hot and yet signing up for a hot bath?! Turned out she didn’t realise it would be hot, so we promptly cancelled our reservation! We also found some adverts for the 2020 Olympics… Good luck Tokyo! Hope it goes better than Rio!

l took mum on an evening tour of central Tokyo, when it was just starting to rain. We first went to Akihabara and looked around there until mum got overwhelmed by all the electronics(!) we also visited Harajuku for a brief wander round, before we went to Shibuya and across the big busy pedestrian crossing, which was quite weird to see from under an umbrella. Finally walked to Shinjuku and found a cheap and cheerful ramen place, called Udon: Mentsu Dan. Lovely udon noodles, nice broth, and 200 yen for two glasses of ice cold draft beer? Onto a winner I think! By the time we got back to the hotel, the room was lovely and cold, and we had a great night’s sleep, ready to go to Utsunomiya in the morning!

My day began horribly early, at 6am, very quietly exiting the dorm room and getting dressed in the bathroom, as I wanted to go see Miyajima before leaving Hiroshima (my train being at 12) and also wanted to see it as close to high tide as possible. High tide was at 9.30 so I planned to be there around 8, before it got too busy. I left the hostel at 6.45 and walked through the empty village to the streetcar, getting to the ferry port about 7.15am. So early 😞

Found the JR ferry, as it was free if you had a JR pass – I activated mine the day before as I was going to Hiroshima, and had checked the ferry timetable in advance and knew it would leave around 7.40. There were about 3 people in the queue ahead of me, and only about 25 total got this ferry! Lovely scenic ride across, only 10 minutes, and I was there!

The island was so empty this early in the morning, people were still raking the paths clear of deer droppings and general detritus from the day before. Amazingly empty on the island, so tranquil, and a pleasant 31C as it was still so early in the morning.

Walking along the coast, you can see the Grand Torii Gate materialising out of the water majestically. I went into the Itsukushima Shrine, and even that was still relatively empty of tourists. It opened its doors at 8am and I arrived only a few minutes later. Walking on the boards which seemed to be floating above the surface of the water, past ancient shrines and the monks selling fortunes was really quite eerie. Also didn’t really understand the meaning of many of the temples, but it didn’t matter, as the atmosphere was just wonderful. A kind chap took my photograph on th edge of the temple nearest the Grand Torii Gate.

After that, I walked around the island a bit, watching as it steadily started to fill up with foreign tourists, day-trippers, and large organised tour groups, before heading back to the ferry and going back to the mainland. The queue for the ferry at this point, only 9.30 or so, was immense, hundreds of people. If you want to go, try and get a really early ferry and coordinate it with the time of the high tide, in order to have the best experience possible.

It was now time to begin my long journey to Tokyo to collect my mum from the airport! Got the streetcar to the hostel, collected my bag and checked out, then a streetcar and a train to the central train station, before the Shinkansen to Shin-Kobe and another one onto Tokyo from there. Arrived at Tokyo at 4.40pm, and as the airport train I planned to catch wasn’t until just after 5pm, thought this would be plenty of time, right? WRONG!! Turns out that if you have a JR pass and want to take the Narita Express to Tokyo Narita airport, you have to have a reserved seat. Nothing indicated this, not Hyperdia, not the NEX website, nothing, until I reached the platform and was told to go all the way back to a reservation window. The queues were so long… I got to the front of the queue at 4.59 by which time they had stopped advertising the NEX I planned to get, so I asked for a reservation for the next one, thinking I was going to be late. Mums flight had also been delayed so I thought I should still be just about able to meet her. The ticket office gave me a reservation for the train at 5.03pm – it was now 5.01!! I legged it down to the platform (once I eventually found it) as I knew if I missed this one, I would have to queue again to get another reservation. Made it with 30 seconds to spare… And for a “fully reserved train” I’ve never seen it so empty. In my carriage were about another 4 people. Why I couldn’t just get the train… So annoying!

Went to the airport, collected mum (who was knackered after travelling for 22 hours) and took her to our hotel. Should’ve been simple as it was just one subway line from Tokyo station, 3 stops. Right? WRONG!! The station was having major renovations so to get from the entrance of the station to the actual ticket gates for our subway line took 15 minutes of going up and down stairs, around corners, through shopping centres, all with no aircon – not great! Finally got to Hanzomon station and the heavens opened – by the time we got to the hotel (only a 3 minute walk) we were absolutely drenched! However it was a lovely hotel with a view over the Imperial Palace Gardens, not that we could see much that late at night! I went out for Katsudon at Maisen in Harajuku, which was delicious, you could even choose the breed of pig and cut of pork that you wanted! Went back and went to bed, ready for a day showing my mum around Tokyo😉

When I was first planning my trip to Japan, I was debating where to go; I spent so much time agonising over whether to visit Nagasaki or Hiroshima. I was tempted by Nagasaki due to the 26 Martyrs memorial, and also being in a friendly seaside city, not to mention that there was a special deal on flights to Nagasaki to encourage tourism, only £40 one way! However, there was no cheap flight back except to Osaka, and since I needed to get to Tokyo to pick mum up from the airport, it wasn’t particularly convenient. With all this deliberating, I realised the night before I planned to go to Hiroshima that I hadn’t actually booked anywhere to stay! Jumped on hostelworld and there was only one hostel free which as it turned out wasn’t near Hiroshima at all, but oh well! I booked one night in the Omotenashi Hostel near Miyajima.

I caught the Shinkansen from Osaka to Hiroshima at around 11am to give me plenty of time in Hiroshima, and once I arrived tried to figure out how on earth to even get to the hostel. I had to catch a train for 25 mins from the main station, and then catch a streetcar the rest of the way. Very difficult to find the streetcar platform, I wandered around for about 10 mins in the blazing sunlight before realising it was directly under the previous train platform… Whoops! The streetcar also had a wonderful chart to help you calculate how much to pay for your journey. A conductor came round with a little purse and I handed him my fare, but it turned out he just changed larger coins into smaller ones, and you paid by dropping money in a box by the driver when you got off. I eventually reached Jigozen station and felt like I was in the absolute middle of nowhere. Wandered down the road in 39C heat and stumbled across my hostel, so dumped my bags and headed straight back to check out Hiroshima.

First stop was to see the Atomic Bomb Dome and the Peace Museum. Such a weird atmosphere, so eerie how every building near it is so new, and how this is the only surviving building in central Hiroshima. A man outside it was a pre-natal survivor and had copies of a book written by his father about his Hiroshima experience, very chilling. Some tourists from China were having their photos taken in front of the dome, bunny fingers up… Rather odd.

The Peace Museum is currently undergoing renovations so it was absolutely packed, but the artefacts on display were so sad, lots of children’s clothing and photographs of the ruins, as well as a stone wall with someone’s shadow permanently engraved on it, from when the person casting that shadow was vaporised… Horrifying. The Children’s Memorial is a great idea, with hundreds of thousands of paper cranes, folded by school children from around the world, all uniting against nuclear warfare.

In order to recover, I walked down Hondori Street to have a coffee, and a parade went past… Not entirely sure what it was in aid of! I went to go and have some Hiroshima style okonomiyaki which is called Nikudama soba, lots of spring onion on the top, delicious! I shared a table with a business man who was very embarrassed to sit near me for some reason. The restaurant was located in a brilliantly named shopping mall, “ASSE” 😁 I then caught the train back to the hostel with the intention of having an early night, but ended up drinking beer with two other backpackers, one from Essex and one from Holland. Oh well, who needs sleep! Tomorrow, off to see Miyajima shrine!

Another day in Japan, another day feeling like I was melting… Youth hostel had 4 girls in the room (including me) but the aircon was set to 26 in the room so I decided to seek shelter in a shopping mall in Osaka, and stare at the sheer amount of manga on offer…! After that, I headed back to Dotombori to get some delicious okonomiyaki! Okonomiyaki are Japanese pancakes, with lots of cabbage, some egg and batter, and fillings of your choice, topped with sauce and mayonnaise. The restaurant I went to was down a side street, called Okaru. When I got in there, the waiting area was already completely full of Japanese families waiting for a table, so I joined them! They had a large choice of ingredients to add into the okonomiyaki, so I chose pork and prawns for mine. This restaurant actually cooked it for you at your table on the hot plate. My waitress decorated it with hello kitty shaped mayonnaise ❤️

So filling and delicious! I then walked around Shibata and Umeda areas, and tried some delicious takoyaki (octopus in balls of batter), before jumping on the train and heading over to Kobe!

Caught the Hankyu railway to Kobe-Sannomiya as I hadn’t activated my 1 week JR pass at this point, so needed the cheapest option, and walked around Kobe. Really easy to get to from Osaka, and a nice city to walk around, a lot quieter than Osaka but good grief the heat was intense! I walked up the hill towards Shin-Kobe station in order to locate Nunobiki Falls which I had read were hidden somewhere behind the train station. I was considering taking the cable car but it was like over 1000JPY one way – no thanks! Found what I presume were old steps up there, but they were so bloody steep, glad I wasn’t going up those!

The walk wasn’t signposted particularly well, and I’m pretty sure I walked considerable farther than required, but after walking through Shin-Kobe station for the 2nd time, I finally spotted a sign for the waterfall! Lots of families having fun in the water at the bottom of the hill, and so I promptly began to trek up it.

Once I reached the top, it was worth it, it was so beautiful! It was still suffocating humid and hot, even in the shade, and there was no breeze at all up there, just the sound of hundreds of cicadas, but the falls themselves were wonderful.

I then made my way back down and jumped on the metro to get back to Sannomiya, before meeting with the divine, the wonderful, Katy! I hadn’t seen her since uni so it was so good to catch up with her and so kind of her to give up her evening to chill with me a bit :3 thank you katycake!

Finally, after 7 years, I returned to Osaka! This time I didn’t get to stay in a hostel in Shin-Osaka central, as it had completely sold out; this time, I had to make my way to Mikuni. I caught the Shinkansen from the airport to Shin-Osaka, and wanted to get the subway to near the hostel, but couldn’t for the life of me work the ticket machine, so had to walk the 35 mins to the hostel. It actually took me 20 minutes to even find an exit from the station…! Got to the hostel for 9.20pm, checked in, and wanted to eat something before bed. Problem was that it was Obon week and everything was closed, so the hostel staff helped me find a little place that sold Katsudon which was just what was needed!

The hostel was lovely, run by a husband and wife, with their family living in a separate part of the building. Not the most convenient as the nearest station was the Hankyu line but it did introduce me to all the many private railways in Japan! After a long sleep, I went out to explore Osaka, starting with machine ordered ramen – really good but pretty cramped in there! I had been eaten alive in Taiwan so was still covered in some pretty damn impressive bites.

I then explored Shinsaibashi area, seeing all the pachinko machines, before walking down Dotombori beside the river, and seeing the massive sculptures of food outside some of the restaurants. Some lucky people were on river cruises.

Then I went down some of the side streets, to see a little temple and explore a bit of old Osaka. Quite weird, seeing all the modern shops and buildings, finding Chinese speaking shop assistants, but also there still being some more traditional Japanese items hidden behind the rows of shops.

Finally, went to Takarazuka to see Verity and the theatre; it’s been years! Had a lovely time together in a local cafe. Let’s not leave it so long next time, OK? Had a lonely train journey back home, and was quite pleased when I arrived as I was bit nervous that I was on the wrong train!