Japan with Milo 2023

 Today Hiro and Ran picked us up at our hotel and entertained us.  We started with the best hamburgers in Tokyo (apparently, though we liked Hiro’s burger better) at Shake Tree. Milo and Ran both left doodles on the wall. Then we went to the Sumida Hokusai museum-we have all seen his famous wave print “The Great Wave Off Kanagawa” - it was an interesting exhibit. Then off to Odaiba where the Diver City mall features a life size (20 m) statue of the RX-0 Unicorn Gundam. We ate ice cream at a restaurant overlooking him then went out in the rain for a photo op. This was followed by a trip to Hiro’s mom’s kimono shop, where she gifted us with yukata (casual cotton kimono type garment) for Milo and Reche’s kids.She fitted Milo out in yukata and geta (traditional sandals worn with yukata).  Then off to pick up Sean and visit Muji store before going to supper at Ryan’s restaurant where she cooked us up a lot of courses of Japanese food. All in all a wonderful day.

 On Saturday evening Sean’s friend Hiro hosted a welcome party for us at his bar. All of Sean’s Tokyo family of regulars was there (the bar was not open to the public ) and each had contributed something to the party. Most of it was very good (though the gizzard skewers weren’t for me, I know my dad loved gizzards). Hiro made Dave, Milo and I each a deluxe hamburger (but no one else). He provided iced tea for Dave, Calpis for Milo, and beer for me. It was wonderful to meet all of Sean’s friends - the older gentleman made a point of telling us they all loved Sean and he wasn’t alone.  Milo stayed with Sean that night as the plan was to go to a street racing meeting- they went but unfortunately the police had closed it down before they arrived. On Sunday we moved hotels to the Gate Hotel Kaminarimon where we had stayed in 2016 and Dave wanted to repeat the experience- it is right by the Kaminarimon gate to Senso-ji shrine, so was still hopping on Sunday which was the second day ...

 We slept in a bit today (except for me). Heard some activity in the street and looked out the window to see a tent outside Family Mart and a group starting to gather. At about 10 am the group moved off to go to Senso-ji temple (a few blocks away).  We went out for a walk and saw massive crowds and various portable shrines being carried through the streets. Each shrine was preceded by drums and a bamboo (?) pipe. The carriers were energetic and shock the shrine up and down as they carried it. It is the beginning of the Sanja Matsuri festival today.  After wending our way through the temple grounds we went to Starbucks for lunch.  After lunch we walked home - Or attempted to. I said “yes” when Milo asked if our hotel was the “ Stay Sakura Tokyo Asakusa”. Unfortunately that hotel is about a kilometre away from ours which is the “Stay Sakura Tokyo Asakusa Edo no Mai”.  (And there is also a Stay Sakura Tokyo Asakusa Art Deco in the area.) We ended up flagging down a...

 We travelled from Kyoto to Hakone yesterday . Due to a lack of understanding of the geography of the area we are staying in the village that is close to the train station and has great hot springs and pretty mountain streams (prettiness assisted by people in spots) but does not have a view of Mt Fuji. Sean did the on-site outdoor onsen last night and this morning- Milo only joined in this morning. (Although I never mentioned it our hotel in Miyajima also had an on-site onsen and they used it once.) Our plan today was to do the Hakone loop but the weather turned rainy so no views of Mt Fuji to be had - we’ll head back to Tokyo instead. In the meantime we enjoyed our Japanese set breakfast- tiny cup of corn soup, salad, a bit of bacon and sausage, a cold runny egg, thick lightly toasted white bread, tiny yogurt with jam, and coffee or tea. The next time we come to Japan we’ll definitely do the Hakone loop.

 So we took the train from Osaka to Nara and saw the big Buddha and all the deer (more aggressive than the ones in Miyajima, likely because you’re allowed to feed the Nara deer and you aren’t supposed to feed the Miyajima deer.).  Then we hopped the train to Kyoto and Milo and Sean became Samuri for an hour. We had dinner at a teppanyaki restaurant and Milo said it was the best beef he’d ever eaten.  We all retired to our rooms. Milo and Mayumi got up before the crack of dawn and hiked 5 km up the Fushimi-Inari pilgrimage through multitudes of tori gates and 46+ flights of stairs. They returned after a couple of hours, we all had breakfast, (where Milo got to eat the best French toast ever), then allowed them a short nap before going out again.  Dave and I visited aBuddhist temple and garden while the rest went to visit monkeys. The plan was to then walk to the bamboo grove and after that visit the Golden Pavilion but it was 36 degrees and we opted for an air conditi...

 We got up early and walked to the Itsukushima shrine. It was high tide and the tori gate was “floating” in the water. Dave opted out from going further, thus the photo of him on the bench. We toured the shrine, asked for good luck from the Shinto gods (which are all nature based), learned about the Sake offerings, etc. The shrine complex was all on piling built over the water at high tide or over mud flats at low tide. Mayumi, Milo and Sean carried on to Daishoin, the Buddhist temple. The Buddhist temple and Shinto shrines are usually in close proximity. I went back to the hotel, getting lost on the way. I stopped to ask the way from a couple of police, but they knew little more than me. The G7 is going to be here in a couple of days and there are a lot of police around, but they are mostly from other parts of Japan. Luckily a young lady happened upon us and offered to lead me home so all was well. I was only a couple of blocks out of the way. We all gathered back at the hotel and...

 We got up and hopped on the Shinkansen for Hiroshima (actually we took a local train to another station to get the Shinkansen and then switched to another Shinkansen in Kobe). We arrived in Hiroshima and our guide Mayumi (who we met on our last trip to Japan) met us on the station platform. We began with an Hiroshima Okonomiyaki for lunch, which was yummy. Then we went to the Peace Park and the atomic bomb museum, which was depressing but very good. I don’t know how anyone can contemplate using such a horrible device again.  We got on a boat and went down the river and across a channel to the island of Miyajima. There are wild deer wandering around the island - Milo had fun taking photos of them. After checking into our hotel we went out for dinner and ate some oysters- we’d seen the oyster farms on the way over on the boat. They also were yummy, though I must admit I ate mine fried instead of raw. Our hotel is more Japanese style and we left our shoes in the foyer, but I had...

 Today we got up and went to Starbucks for breakfast so I got my coffee. Unfortunately the breakfast sandwich didn’t agree with me so I followed that excursion with a morning spent in the hotel room. Since it was raining today (off and on), it wasn’t as disappointing to stay in as it might have been. Sean came and we went out to a Korean barbecue restaurant for a delicious lunch. The restaurant was on the 9th floor of a department store and had a great view of the the layers of pedestrian traffic going into Ueno station.  After lunch we wandered through a couple of crowded Japanese streets. Then Sean and Milo headed to the electronics/anime district and spent some money. We organized our luggage so we could head off tomorrow for a few days out of town with just a backpack each. One suitcase is being transferred to Kyoto so we can replace dirty clothes with clean ones hallway through. The other two suitcases went home with Sean to be stored in his apartment while we’re out of t...