Travelling in Japan - Day 3 - Another side of Kyoto

After a restful night, the plan was to explore more of Kyoto before finishing our journey to Osaka later that day.  Our party first visited Fushimi Inari-taisha, known for its vibrantly colored gates and stone shrines.

The gates lead up to the top of the mountain.  Unfortunately, the walk was taking longer than we hoped, so we only made it about a 1/3 of the way up before heading back down.

On the walk back down, we found many shrines and altars.

Our next destination was the beautiful Tenryu-ji.  You can take mass transit between Fushimi Inari-taisha and Tenryu-ji.

The temple is beautiful.  Full admission is 600 yen.  Added appeal of this location is its proximity to the Path of the Bamboo, which is free.

We had a really good and reasonably priced lunch in Kyoto.  Just watch out, as a reminder, many places do not take credit card (cash [yen] only).

Travelling in Japan - Day 2 (part 2)

For much of the afternoon and early evening, our group was on foot, exploring temples in Kyoto. We walked to Ryosen, Kiyomizu, and Yasaka temples.

 Tokyo and Kyoto are very humid right now, with varying clouds and clear sky as the days progressed.  Portions were also very crowded.  It's very easy to unintentionally bump into people.

I don't know if this is a daily thing, or we visited Kyoto at the right time, but there were a lot of Japanese dressed in traditional attire, both men and women.  It kinda reminded me of Renfair in the US.

Travelling in Japan - Day 2 (part 1)

After a somewhat restful/restless night, I woke up on my day 2 in Japan with a mild recovery from the previous day's 13hr flight (to a location 12 time zones out of sync with my own).  Our party all had to get up and get out early, since our JR bullet train ride from Tokyo to Kyoto was early morning.

The ride is about two hours on the bullet train.  Our JR train commonly maintained speeds between 150 to 160 mph.  We watched the city, suburbs, countryside, suburbs and city wiz by.  Of note, there were an unusual number of Ferris Wheels visible from the train, along with a rather high number of netted driving ranges.

Once in Kyoto, we dropped our bags off at our hotel, then went exploring on foot.  We found a good place along the river for lunch.

I had the Chicken Salad.  This dish was a 'salad' in name only.  The chicken was great, and the lettuce was really unnecessary.  The noodles where good too.  I was suprized that I liked the tofu skins that came with the appetizer.

The view we had while dining was of the river, but the river isn't much of a view.

There were several types of birds that were up to their bird-antics nearby the river, which did serve as mild entertainment while we enjoyed our lunch.  Afterwards, we headed back to the hotel to properly check-in and prepare for the afternoon exploration around town.

Travelling to Japan - first day

Well, here I am in Japan, on a business trip.  There are some expected things, and some not so expected things.  As expected, the bathrooms in the hotels are small.  The hotel rooms themselves are small, often with the bed butt up against one of the walls.  

Things not expected are many.  The main airport into Tokyo is actually quite a distance from Tokyo.  I took the JR (bullet train) from the Narita International Airport to Tokyo.  The trip took just under an hour, and included only a couple of stops.  

Have cash (yen)!  You may be unpleasantly surprized by the number of places that don't take credit card!

There is English all over the place.  Pretty much any business you might find yourself will have some ability to communicate with you, some better than others.  There are a lot of English translations for things like street signs, company names, restaurant menus, etc.

The mass transit makes getting around fairly easy.  Not everything in translated into English at every point, but enough of it is translated when and where you'll need it in order for you to get to the right location.

The first night I was the Tokyo, in the area of Shinagawa.  I met my co-workers at a quaint sushi restaurant.

 

Since I arrived late in the day and zonked out from a 13 hour flight, I turned in early with the hopes of waking up the next day gleefully well adjusted to the local time zone.  That plan kinda worked.  Kinda.

U.S. Space & Rocket Center of Huntsville, AL

On a recent trip to Huntsville, AL, I was able to squeeze enough time for myself to visit the world famous U.S. Space & Rocket Center.  When you first walk into the museum, the first couple of exhibits are a little underwhelming, given the grandeur of the purpose of the site.  There is a display of patented inventions, then a tribute to Dr. Wernher von Braun.

It is interesting, but very museum-like.  Where's the rockets?

Well, once you are thru there, you can go outside!  Rockets!  Rockets!  Rockets!  None of them blasting off, but still impressive, nonetheless.

Of course, there is a lot more than just rockets that go into space.  Without giving too much away, here's a few more photos.  This is really a place you should visit just to see the shear scale of these massive machines.

Brief stay at Nashville, Tennessee

While travelling last week, I had the opportunity to stay in Nashville, TN for a couple of days.  It wasn't long enough to explore the town, but long enough for a couple of hours visit to the Grand Ole Opry Convention Center.  Unfortunately, there was also a cheerleader competition convention in town at the Grand Ole Opry Convention Center.  Nonetheless, I was able to explore the amazing site, though I eventually had to retreat to a wine bar to escape the otherwise madness.