We are here!!! Japan-Land :D

[sleepyhead]

Gerrard, I and two others (Lee and Terry, non-forum guys) have finally made it to the hotel/Inn. 11 hour 25 minute flight and about 2 hours on the trains.



Tis great but am oh so tired...didn't sleep a wink on the plane. Gerrard didn't even make it out of Arrivals at Japan due to rampaging over a poor little child. Literally ran the kid over.

Time for some coffee or something to wake me up and er...hopefully grab something to eat!

[kalniel]

Awesome. Well jealous!

Food and drink is available 24hrs a day, don't worry!

[MadduckUK]

Originally Posted by sleepyhead

Gerrard didn't even make it out of Arrivals at Japan due to rampaging over a poor little child. Literally ran the kid over.

[tiggerai]

awww glad you finally made it!!

Have fun guys!

[abaxas]

If your in or near Tokyo, you have to go to Puroland (ie the home of hello kitty).

As a man in the 30's even I was touched. Great fun for an afternoon out.

[sleepyhead]

LoL...our first meal out...Marios. Gerrard had a pizza and I had "curry taste" spaghetti meatballs. Really quite nice and unique

Lets see if we can cane 12 hours sleep to customise ourselves for the time zone. I've been dead on my feet since we landed (over 8 hours ago).

[Gerrard]

Originally Posted by sleepyhead

Gerrard didn't even make it out of Arrivals at Japan due to rampaging over a poor little child. Literally ran the kid over.

To be fair, I just wasn't paying attention where I was going and took the kid's shoe off. Great first impression I gave!

Marios was excellent and very convenient at only a couple minutes walk away. Will no doubt be spending more time there over the course of the holiday.

Have yet to see anything too weird or bizarre yet. I will also try to get some pictures soon as well.

[Bunjiweb]

Ah you will love it, I went a few years ago and being English gets u generally treated by loyalty, as long as you are polite and follow by their customs.

I was the same after the journey, but the night I arrived in Japan was taken out for a big family meal with the whole family! I then slept for about 20 hours and got up in the evening to start my adventure.

If u can get to Kyoto I would thoroughly recommend it, seeing the golden temple is a must! Also there's loads of great theme parks if you are into rollercoaster action! Take a trip down to Tokyo's Akihabara district for the full tech experience....

I will go back, hopefully in the next couple of years as my friend has just started a Japanese degree and is going to be going out there for a year (at least!).

Have fun, there's so much to experience it is a sensory overload.

Ben

[TooNice]

What sort of accommodation are you staying in? I am planning to go there next month, and started looking at accommodations (mainly Business Hotel in Tokyo, but I am thinking to stay in a Ryokan in while I am visiting Kyoto).

[sleepyhead]

Originally Posted by TooNice

What sort of accommodation are you staying in? I am planning to go there next month, and started looking at accommodations (mainly Business Hotel in Tokyo, but I am thinking to stay in a Ryokan in while I am visiting Kyoto).

Our lovely Ryokan in Tokyo

Ryokan Kangetsu

Woke up about 45 minutes ago and it's 5:20 am

[Whiternoise]

Wow was this a trip organised through Hexus or do you guys know each other in real life?

[tigerboyce]

I'm very Jealous! I will get there someday... maybe next year

Have fun

[Gerrard]

Originally Posted by Whiternoise

Wow was this a trip organised through Hexus or do you guys know each other in real life?

Sleepy started a thread here: -

Just bought plane tickets to Japan...

I just happened to mention I'd always wanted to go, but not on my own, and got invited. Luckily, sleepy's mates have been before and seem to have quite a bit planned and know what they're are doing. Although due to mega tiredness yesterday, it did take us half an hour at Shinigawa station to get tickets to change train (they found out last time tickets don't work on diffrent companies like it does in the UK. But we do now have "Oyster" card equivalents which do work). I guess there's always the option for a Hexus.holiday in the future!

The weather's also very pleasant at about 20 degrees which I wasn't expecting. However, some things are quite expensive here now due to the exchange rate @140Yen/£1 (I'm guessing with everyone going into recession and Japan getting out of theirs). Food is about the same but electronic goods seem very expensive. I saw a Sony PS3 pad for 5500Y yesterday (£40). My plan of a half empty bag didn't work out anyway. However, should the need arise, I'll just dump my camera bag to make room. Oh, and most of my clothes are from Primark, so they can be considered next as being easily and cheaply replaced!

A moment of panic for me yesterday as I had left my phone (Nokia 5800) on GPS to try and find some satellites (which it hasn't yet!) and noticed that it had connected to the Internet. At £7.50/Mb I was bit worried if it had downloaded anything (like maps). Checked online and no data usage luckily!

[sleepyhead]

Day 2. Went places. Now knackered. Gerrard doing Saracen style post. *flops to floor*

[Agent]

Very jealous

Pics are needed!

[Gerrard]

I don't usually do blogs as I don't normally do anything interesting!

Day 2:

After posting the above post, I spent a couple of hours trying to update the maps on my phone so it actually had Japan on it. Internet access here is nice and fast (was getting 1Mb/sec). Anyone know if it's possible to download Google maps onto your phone such that it doesn't need Internet access itself to use?

Anyway, I then went to the local corner shop for a snackish breakfast of a couple of scotch type pancakes and some other random sweet dough. I also had some coffee. Not unusual I guess, except it came from a can; hot; from a vending machine by the side of a street. If you've got coins in your pocket, you won't die of thirst here as there's drinks vending machines everywhere.

We then decided to walk to the river and grab some food from a 7-11. We found out that the sushi rolls require some assembly before eating! A second hand shop was passed whereby at least an hour was spent by Sleep and his mate, Terry, looking at all the Manga books. We ate lunch by the river watching some kids play baseball; where the pitcher slowly zeroed his aim on some poor kid batsman who got hit straight in the hip! Also watched some strange boats go by, which can only be decribed as a cross between a gondola and a canoe. Appeared to be a popular past time going by the numbers.

After returning to Ryokan, we looked at what to do for the rest of the day. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something which was either a big insect or small bird fly by. On closer inspection, it turned out to be a big ass bee! Anyway, we decided after looking at the guide books to visit Ameya Yokocho Promenade.

After getting there, we tried some local street vendor food, which we could only conclude was dough wrapped in nori. I can't remember what shops we went in, but we weren't there for too long (about a couple of hours). However, the problem of going here was that we passed through Akihabara. So on recommendation (a very strong recommendation!) from Terry, we stopped off there on the way back.