Hi Clem
Well, I’m back!! Japan was fantastic!!
All the accommodation was great. Good to be back to a soft bed now though, that’s for sure. They were all in really good locations – even the Tokyu Hotel in Kyoto was only a 10 min walk from the station so we only caught a taxi once when we arrived.
Takayama Ryokan was amazing. Hubby loved it, and was mega scared to try the onsen, but after much encouragement he attempted it and then I couldn’t get him to stop raving about it. He was first to go back the next morning (may have had something to do with the fact we were the only ones in there both times in each of ours, which made it easier).
The only thing that was a bit crappy was My Fuji. We left Takayama at 9.30am (you had suggested 10.30), and caught the train back to Odawara via Nagoya, but by the time we got there it was 3.30pm even though we caught the bullet trains where possible and all the trains connected perfectly (love the rail over there!!). By the time we transferred to the little train to Gora, cable car etc, it was quite late and we had the basically race through everything, and literally run from train-cable car-ropeway-pirate ship to make the last departure at 5pm.
The weather was really crappy that day, and we didn’t see anything (no Fuji-san), and it was really cold and overcast, so we just got on the train straight away back for Tokyo. We were gonna skip it altogether, but decided at the last minute to go for it, but was kinda a waste of money, then we couldn’t be bothered going back and doing it all the next day again even though the weather was perfect (of course).
So, of course not blaming you for that, but just a handy bit of feedback for next time that it takes much longer to get there, so prob wouldn’t advise people do it in one day as you don’t have time to see anything.
Other than that one day of craziness, we had great weather. The cherry blossoms were amazing, and it was so great to get back after 10 years (can’t believe I could still speak & understand some Japanese). Thanks for planning everything!!
Cheers
Sal.
May. 2010
Hotel, Kyoto, Nagoya, Nature, Onsen Hot Spring, Ryokan, Sakura Cherry Blossoms, Skiing and Snow Boarding, Tokyo
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