So we left London on Friday morning, the 2nd of September, to start our Journey. First stop, Tokyo! The flight was long, as can be expected and between the 2 of us, we got through 6 movies and only managed to get about 1 hour sleep, not our smartest move so far.
We arrived at Tokyo Narita airport at around 9 in the morning and as the doors opened we were hit with our first shock, Tokyo is super hot at this time of the year - even at 9am it was 30 degrees. We grabbed our bags and headed down to the train station to head into central Tokyo. I had read on route that there was a place called Asakusa which seemed pretty cool, so we went there. It's not easy to find a hostel in a city as big as Tokyo. We walked around for about 2 hours (in the heat, with our big backpacks!) before finding a tourist information point (which was actually next to the station). They were really helpful and booked us into the Sakura Hostel which was just around the corner from the Asakusa Shrines and Temples. We were planning to stay awake for the rest of the day so as to try and prevent too much jet lag the following day but unfortunately, we crashed our for about 6 hours, woke up and got some food from the local 7-11 and went back to sleep. Not a very active first day but as I said earlier, maybe we should have tried to get more sleep on the flight. The next day we went for a 2 and half hour walk to the Imperial Palce in Central Tokyo - I nearly fainted on the way. We couldn't actually get into the palace itself but walked around the gardens for a while, they were really beautiful - so pristine! We decided that we weren't up for the walk back so caught the metro back and had some dinner - good food but really small portions. When we returned to the hotel we met Bastian and Stephanie who were from London (well technically Austria and Greece and Germany). They were really cool and we had a few drinks with them in the dining room - Bastian had some lovely 15 year old single malt whiskey which was great for me but Laura thought it tasted like feet! They suggested we go to Mt Fuji as they had just come from there. Tokyo was stressing us out anyway, so the next morning we packed our bags, checked out of the hostel and got a 1h45 minute bus ride to KawaguchiKo near Mt Fuji.
The drive to Kawaguchiko gave us a better view of what Japan was about. Small houses and flats line the highway for about an hour as you head South out of Tokyo. Was you're out of Greater Tokyo, the road narrows and the landscape seems to come alive. You are suddenly surrounded by mountains and trees and it is beautiful, like seriously! We arrived at Kawaguchiko Station at around 2:30 on Sunday afternoon, where our new hostel, K's House (which has branched all over Japan) came and picked us up. We did a bit of planning and had some dinner and pretty much went to bed on the first night. As of this writing, we have just returned from a cycle around Lake Kawaguchico. This bike ride actually had a dual purpose, 1st and foremost, to see local area and get a better view of Mt Fuji - we didn't see it, the stupid thing was covered in clouds which apparently is what it normally does! Second, we had a mission of sorts (Punks and Boobs, stop reading now). I left my Journal on the bus from Tokyo! I was actually really quite upset when I realised this had happened. We sat down on the bed on Sunday night to catch up on what we had done and it wasn't anywhere to be seen. We quickly realised what had happened and Laura went down to reception and got it sorted (surprise, surprise!). They tracked the bus and arranged for the same driver to bring it with him on next journey to Kawaguchiko, which was today. So I got it back (Punks and Boobs you can carry on reading from here). The end. Just kidding hehehehe.
We are now in Mt Fuji waiting to hear back from a Wwoofing host, as soon as we get the all clear we'll be jumping on another bus (for 8 hours - yay) to Osaka or Kyoto, whichever the host says is closer. We're having loads of fun without you all but we do miss you! Lots of love and check back soon to see what we get up to next!
We arrived at Tokyo Narita airport at around 9 in the morning and as the doors opened we were hit with our first shock, Tokyo is super hot at this time of the year - even at 9am it was 30 degrees. We grabbed our bags and headed down to the train station to head into central Tokyo. I had read on route that there was a place called Asakusa which seemed pretty cool, so we went there. It's not easy to find a hostel in a city as big as Tokyo. We walked around for about 2 hours (in the heat, with our big backpacks!) before finding a tourist information point (which was actually next to the station). They were really helpful and booked us into the Sakura Hostel which was just around the corner from the Asakusa Shrines and Temples. We were planning to stay awake for the rest of the day so as to try and prevent too much jet lag the following day but unfortunately, we crashed our for about 6 hours, woke up and got some food from the local 7-11 and went back to sleep. Not a very active first day but as I said earlier, maybe we should have tried to get more sleep on the flight. The next day we went for a 2 and half hour walk to the Imperial Palce in Central Tokyo - I nearly fainted on the way. We couldn't actually get into the palace itself but walked around the gardens for a while, they were really beautiful - so pristine! We decided that we weren't up for the walk back so caught the metro back and had some dinner - good food but really small portions. When we returned to the hotel we met Bastian and Stephanie who were from London (well technically Austria and Greece and Germany). They were really cool and we had a few drinks with them in the dining room - Bastian had some lovely 15 year old single malt whiskey which was great for me but Laura thought it tasted like feet! They suggested we go to Mt Fuji as they had just come from there. Tokyo was stressing us out anyway, so the next morning we packed our bags, checked out of the hostel and got a 1h45 minute bus ride to KawaguchiKo near Mt Fuji.
The drive to Kawaguchiko gave us a better view of what Japan was about. Small houses and flats line the highway for about an hour as you head South out of Tokyo. Was you're out of Greater Tokyo, the road narrows and the landscape seems to come alive. You are suddenly surrounded by mountains and trees and it is beautiful, like seriously! We arrived at Kawaguchiko Station at around 2:30 on Sunday afternoon, where our new hostel, K's House (which has branched all over Japan) came and picked us up. We did a bit of planning and had some dinner and pretty much went to bed on the first night. As of this writing, we have just returned from a cycle around Lake Kawaguchico. This bike ride actually had a dual purpose, 1st and foremost, to see local area and get a better view of Mt Fuji - we didn't see it, the stupid thing was covered in clouds which apparently is what it normally does! Second, we had a mission of sorts (Punks and Boobs, stop reading now). I left my Journal on the bus from Tokyo! I was actually really quite upset when I realised this had happened. We sat down on the bed on Sunday night to catch up on what we had done and it wasn't anywhere to be seen. We quickly realised what had happened and Laura went down to reception and got it sorted (surprise, surprise!). They tracked the bus and arranged for the same driver to bring it with him on next journey to Kawaguchiko, which was today. So I got it back (Punks and Boobs you can carry on reading from here). The end. Just kidding hehehehe.
We are now in Mt Fuji waiting to hear back from a Wwoofing host, as soon as we get the all clear we'll be jumping on another bus (for 8 hours - yay) to Osaka or Kyoto, whichever the host says is closer. We're having loads of fun without you all but we do miss you! Lots of love and check back soon to see what we get up to next!
