Luica’s Blog

Getting up at 5am only to see some auctions at a fish market isn’t really my cup of green tea, but we did manage to catch some action when we arrived at the market just before 7am. The Japanese seemed to have forgotten all their manners when it came to business - the usual bowing and smiling were replaced by lots of shouting and pushing. Don’t wear your best clothes and shoes is the obvious advice.

After an hour of photographing massive tuna, giantic octopi, and king crabs with super long legs, my parents and Brad headed to a sushi restaurant for their breakfast, while I had a wander around a nearly temple for fishermen.

Travel Tip: The Tsukiji Market doesn’t open on Sundays. It’s alwasy a good idea to check the calendar before you go.

Suggested schedules drafted by a friend who knows Japan really well (times are approximate):

• 5:00 - taxi to Tsukiji Fish Market
• Have a wander around Tokyo before our flight in the evening

Our only full day in Tokyo and we decided to have a little adventure without following the schedule drafted by my mum’s friend. Brad and I spent the best part of our morning in ITO-YA, a 9-storey stationery shop with some of the most peculiar products, for example, a leather pouch for your tin of mints.

Our next destination was the paradise for all geeks: Akihabara, Tokyo’s famous electric town. It was one of the busiest parts of town on a Sunday. We walked into a shop with rows and rows of toy vending machines and some of them contained pornography plastic figures! With Japanese Yen being quite strong, we didn’t see much point in buying gadgets there. So we ventured to another bizarre part of town, Harajuku.

We were hoping to take some interesting photos at Harajuku’s Cos-play-zoku (or Costume Play Gangs) that assemble in Jingu-bashi (the bridge linking Meiji-jingu with Omote-sando), but found that the whole thing was just another touristy trap. We quickly moved on and were more fascinated by some girl dressing up like a French maid doing some shopping nearby.

Mum and dad met us for dinner at a Korean BBQ place, where they spoke no English at all. We managed to stay away from anything that is too authentic by pointing, nodding and smiling (like a bunch of idiots).

After dinner, Brad and I went to do some night photography at Shibuya, which Brad insisted on seeing as it was heavily featured in Lost in Translation.

We were surpised to see such a huge amount of food for breakfast. This time we cooked the slightly strange squid sashimi with the boiling miso soup — I know this isn’t right, but it did taste better.

Our hiking plan was disturbed by the frequent rain showers during the day. We spent most of the day in and around Kinugawa Onsen’s centre instead and stumbled across a local festival with residents performaning Japanese dancing and singing. Since we were the only foreigners there, the locals welcomed us with some food and gave Brad a cotton scarf as a souvenir.

Travel Tip: When in doubt, always bow to express apology or appreciation.

Suggested schedules drafted by a friend who knows Japan really well (times are approximate):

• 9:00 - Train from Kinugawa Onsen Station to Ryuokyo Station (hiking along the waterfall and river, about 40 mins)
• 13:00 - Train from Kinugawa Onsen station to Asakusa Station on the Tobu line (2 hours)
• Subway Ginza train from Asakusa to Ginza Station
• Walk to Washinton Hotel in Ginza (5 mins)

A good night sleep was followed by a simple Japanese, starch-heavy breakfast and an early start up to the mountain. The bus journey was quite long and windy and mum wasn’t feeling great on the way back. But the view on the top was magnificent; with impressive landscape such as Lake Chuzenji and Kegon Falls.

Toshogu Temple is worth seeing if you haven’t already seen thousands of other temples in Japan, and we couldn’t be bothered to pay to get on to the Sacred Bridge.

It was strange to get on the train again after yesterday’s 15 hour travel. We were all very looking forward to the traditional Japan dinner at the Kinugawa Onsen Hotel and a hot spa afterwards.

Dinner turned out to be a two hour ceremony with over ten interesting but suspicious-looking dishes, served by a lady in a traditional kimono. It was 100 per cent fun, but I wasn’t really that keen on the raw baby squid.

My mum and I enjoyed the hot spa and tried out different pools of varying temperatures. Brad wasn’t pleased to find out that we were not joking about having to be naked in the segregated hot spa but enjoyed it in the end.

Travel Tip: You are required to wash before getting into the hot spa and no clothing is allowed. A night for four at the Kinugawa Onsen Hotel including dinner and breakfast costs ¥55,200 (less than HK$900 per person).

Suggested schedules drafted by a friend who knows Japan really well (times are approximate):

• 8:00 - Tobu Bus from near the hotel to Lake Chuzenji and Kegon Falls
• 11:00 - Tobu bus back to Toshogu Temple and Sacred Bridge
• 15:00 - Pick up luggage from the hotel and go to the station
• Train from Tobu Nikko Station to Kinugawa Onsen station (may need to transfer at Imoimaichi station)

The long start to our trip commenced at 5am and eventually ended in Nikko at 8pm as we settled in to our first guest house. The fifteen hours of travel consisted of a 45-minute taxi journey to the airport, a five-hour flight to Tokyo Narita Airport, Airport Express into the city centre, a slow two-hour train journey to Nikko, and lastly a 30-minute taxi ride to our guest house for the night.

Travel Tip: Buy a travel pass for Nikko at Asakusa Station. We bought All Nikko Passes for ¥4,400 per person that can be used on all trains and buses (including the winding bus journey up the mountain) for four days.

Suggested schedules drafted by a friend who knows Japan really well (times are approximate):

• 15:00 - From airport to Ueno by Keisei line (51 mins)
• Transfer Subway Ginza Line in Ueno to Asakusa
• 16:30 - Arrive at Asakusa
• Buy a 2-day pass and take Tobu Nikko Line from Asakusa to Nikko (2 hours)
• 19:00 - Arrive at Tobu Nikko station and then take a taxi to the hotel