Arrived in Bahrain Thursday morning about 3 am half an hour before schedule as the aircraft, a new Airbus 340, took off 20 minutes early. Etihad board early and go as soon as they can. Frank and Frances very kindly got out of their bed and met us at the airport; they were there early as they had nearly missed flights themselves because of the "go" policy. Friday morning we slept in being a bit jet lagged after the 14and a half hours of the trip. Friday...

We arrived in San Francisco after our drive up Highway 1 and after a circuitous drive around the city, over 3 bridges, mostly in seafog, out to the airport we managed to leave our hire car and catch the BART into the centre of town. Our hotel was on the edge of an area called Tenderloin which is a pretty down market part of town, many rough types buying beer by the single bottle in 7/11 stores. There were security guards on the theatre doors during the day!! We w...

Back to our old hotel in Tokyo and we went out for a sushi train restaurant, good and quite cheap. Sunday our last full day we took the train to Tokyo station then to the "sightseeing" bus which really was just a bus trip around many shopping areas, other than palaces and temples there is very little heritage in Toyko. We visited an area called Yanaka where there is still some original housing among many temples and shrines. We then took a long train tr...

Hemiji & Hiroshima We took the train to Hemiji to visit the White Castle, a very large timber structure built on a very high stone base. The area is quite short of stone and so stone was scrounged from a wide area and included parts of other buildings even some coffins and cemetery stones. The castle has a large storage basement above the battlement area and six storeys above with a great view over the gardens and town. Back on the bullet train to Hiroshima...

Hemiji & Hiroshima We took the train to Hemiji to visit the White Castle, a very large timber structure built on a very high stone base. The area is quite short of stone and so stone was scrounged from a wide area and included parts of other buildings even some coffins and cemetery stones. The castle has a large storage basement above the battlement area and six storeys above with a great view over the gardens and town. Back on the bullet train to Hiroshima...