Well hello again! I'm going to have to get better at writing these regularly!

Following my last post, I spent another day exploring the temples of Kyoto, starting with Kinkakuji, the golden pavillion which was the inspiration for the silver one I'd attempted to see the day before and it was beautiful and perfectly reflected in the lake surrounding it. It had recently had a fresh gold coating applied so was sparkling. Also in the surrounding gardens were small statues with stone basins for throwing money into for luck, which was actually quite useful for getting rid of all my small change, a one yen coin doesn't go very far and its quite hard to find an opportunity to use them! I then had another powdered green tea in the tea garden at the end of the tour route. On the same day I also visited Myoshinji, Ninnaji and koryuji temples. There are some great pieces of buddhist art in some of these, particularyly Koryuji and once again I found that I was too early for the blossom in the Ninnaji temple. Also, I developed a pain in my heel whilst exploring these last three temples, making it painful to walk and dampening my spirits so I headed back to the hostel having got a feel for each place.

Next morning I headed for Nara via Kyoto main station, which is in itself worth visiting, it's a great space to be in. Id attempted to visit a couple more temples in Kyto first in the rain but they were either difficult to get to or covered over for restoration. When in Nara, though I was helped, by a wonderful lady at tourist info, with finding my way to the main park. This was a great stunning place, very easy to get lost in but you don't really mind when you're there! It is actually a deer park, where the deer roam completely free and are nothing like the shy animals we would normally think of. I saw many of them head butting visitors with food which was hillarious! the main draw of th park otherwise is Todaiji temple, supposedly the largest wooden structure in the world, which houses an enormous Buddha statue and various othe smaller golden Kannon statues. I had fun here asking people to take my picture, one of the drawbacks of travelling alone! Got some great ones though. That mission accomplished I headed back to the station to get to Horyuji temple complex which provided a lovely serene environment near the end of the day and took plenty of time. My accomodation that night was a hotel in Osaka, a place where I had little interest in but provided a good link to Himeji the next day. I found a great restaurant just round the corner from the hotel, something which I had been quite shy about so far but I had little idea what I ordered and it all tasted great.

The next day at Himeji, I met a guy my age from Hokkaido, Japan's northenmost island, who was also visiting by himself and spoke a little English so went around with him, agin helping with the picture taking! The castle is an impressive structure although most of it is just empty rooms so you have to use your imagination to think what it would have looked like with people living there, something in common with most temple buildings I had seen so far. I find it slightly odd that there aren't more exhibits inside as many of the buildings are recent reconstructions rather than the originals anyway and they clearly know from their descriptions how it would have been kitted out. Still, you can't help but be impressed at the quality of the buildings themselves.

That night was spent back at the hostel in Kyoto before heading to Nikko, a far more remote area of Japan with a national park. Here I stayed in a lovely lodge with electric blankets, so I really felt like I was roughing it! This place was owned by an English speaking Japanese guy named Ken, who was so helpful in pointing out the local sights and gave us maps of how to get everywhere. I met four people here who I visited the Toshogu and Taiyuin shrines and surrounding areas with, seeing the famous 'see/speak/see no evil' monkeys at the former along with a great 'crying dragon' ceiling which echoes for ages when you clap beneath it. These buildings were all beautifully painted in bright colours, which I imagine is what many of the temples I had seen elsewhere would have originally been like. Having seen these temples we all went for lunch together before the others all left for Tokyo. That night I had the most amazing first time experience of a Japanese Onsen, or hot spring to us. There are thousands of these around the country as the whole thing is hugely volcanic and so it is one of the few parts of japanese culture that is not inherited at some point from mainland Asia and other countries via trade routes. this had to be experienced! There is a strict code for using them, basically no clothes or towels in the bath area and you have to shower and wash thoroughly before getting into the the onsen bath itself, which is purely for relaxation and you will not be anyones favourite person if you get any soap in the bath! When you finally get in though, all your self-consciousness just disappears. I was in there for about 45minutes, having to get out and have cold showers at some points as I thought my muscles were going to stop working altogether with the heat! When I got out I felt so relaxed and the next day on the way to Tokyo, where I am now, my bag felt a light as a feather. A highly recommended experience for anyone coming to Japan and Nikko is a great place for getting out of the city and getting a different view of Japan.

So, here I am in Tokyo nearing the end of the Japan leg of my journey. Yesterday was first spent in Ginza's shopping district and visiting the Sony showroom there, then the huge government buildings in the Shinjuku area before heading to a Vaughan williams concert in the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Space, which was thoroughly enjoyed and appropriate as the last movement of the Sea Symphony is all about explorers travelling the globe, albeit by the sea rather than jet planes and superfast bullet trains!

Tonight I intend to stay in a sleep capsule before my birthday on the tomorrow! My last day on the 18th will involve a visit to Kamakura to see one last giant buddha and the Japanese coast before my last use of my Japanese rail pass getting to Narita for my flight.

That's it, next time I write, I'll be in New Zealand! xxx