Well, we are here in our final destination at long last! Its seems to have been just yesterday that we wrote our first blog from the Cook Islands and here we are writing one of our final ones!

It took us a long time to get all the way out here to Japan and to be honest we were wondering whether the journey here would be worth it in the end. We have to say it most definately was! Japan is one of the most incredible places we have ever been. It is truly like venturing into another world!

So after another stopover at Singapore where we had another good look at the airport for about 6 hours we arrived around 8am in Osaka airport. It took us a good while to arrange how we were going to get to Kyoto, where we had arranged our accommodation! Everything is in Japanese!!!! (expected in Japan) but we mean EVERYTHING! On top of that very few people speak english well enough to actually understand our question and reply in a coherent sentence! We had fun! Eventually we managed to buy a 3 day Kansai area pass and made our way to the train, then another, then the subway, then another train, then another subway, then a walk to our place! We discovered we were staying in traditional Japanese dwelling. This meant a futon to sleep on. i.e the floor...A bit uncomfortable at first, but not too bad. Although our first accommadation came with an awful lot of rules - lights out at 11pm, lock out from 11am to 4pm, no smoking, eating, drinking in rooms, plus many more as we wandered round the kitchen...a bit too controlling for us!

Anyway, Kyoto. Well actually the entire Kansai area to be honest is an absolute dream place to explore. Armed with a 3 day travel pass we managed to check out Nara and Osaka in addition to making our way from the airport to Kyoto on our first day. Nara is a stunningly beautiful town to the west of Kyoto. In Nara we discovered possibly the oldest wooden building in the world, as well as some of the most gorgeous pagodas randomly situated in the middle of the city (in a park which, to be fair, consummed about a third of the town!) As we meandered around the huge expanse of park taking in these delightful and unexpected sights we also encountered many deer. The deer is a symbol of prosperity and long life for the Japanese and are treated with the upmost respect. We decided not to feed them as we had recollections of the monkeys in Bali, but we rather tentitively patted them and cheekily used their antlers as a hat stand for a brief moment!

On from Nara to the buzzing metropolitan that is Osaka. Osaka is a rather odd place. Bright lights, hip culture, restaurants everywhere combined with the occasional church and shrines for contemplation and meditation. It reminded us of the buzz of many english cities except for the obvious and much respected intrusion of these Buddist and Shinto shrines and temples. We utilised our time in Osaka to check out some of the retail establishments that are so popular here. THEY ARE CRAZY!!! I have no idea why the Japanese wear what they do, but they do, and whatsmore they get away with it. We once more felt a little out of place being so tall and well....gangly in comparison to the petite fashionable looking Japanese, but never mind! Japan has a huge music culture as well so Andrew dragged Emma around hundreds (it felt like!) of different music stores in search of rare Oasis cds and any other music he could lay his hands on! Basically Emma dragged Andrew to the culture, and Andrew dragged Emma to the music! Osaka as the light fades becomes a completely different city, the music blares, the lights are bright enough to blind and the already packed streets become a tidal wave of people, food stalls and advertising. Upon this transition we decided to make our way back to the relative quiet of Kyoto.

Kyoto is amazing! The variation between Edo Era Japan and 21st Century Japan is prominant in this city. Where else can you spot Geisha wandering around next to teenagers with ipods blaring and the most unusual hair styles in the world!? We spent a couple of days exploring the area, taking a bus to the Golden Pagoda which is one of the most breathtaking pieces of architecture we have ever seen. We also explored several of the shrines and temples in the city. It was a wonderful experience to be wandering around the city, even the Gion Geisha district, which has maintained some of it's ancient atmosphere - and to discover an ancient shrine or temple, slightly set back from the road, complete with gorgeous grounds! We spent many an afternoon exploring these areas along with the maijn shopping districts and the geisha district Kyoto is so well known for.

Emma even took the chance to be dressed and made up as a Geisha, the result was amazing! Andrew took lots of pics as Emma could hardly walk or breathe with the amount of costume!...Andrew passed at dressing as a Geisha (I don't think they would have allowed it anyway haha!)

Whilst In Kyoto we met a very kind but slightly crazy japanese man! He overheard us trying to ask the way in a subway station and promtly said he would show us the way as long as we looked at an English to Japanese phrase book he had been working on and try to spot any mistakes. It is hard to explain this bizare meeting lets just say we shall never forget that guy...he had us in stiches!!!

Both of us really enjoyed Kyoto, it had all mod cons but then was so traditional and tranquil. A really clean and amazing city and one we shall never forget!

Another city we shall never forget but for slightly different reasons is Hiroshima. We took a bullet train (yes they are very fast!!!) to Hiroshima and spent the day looking around the peace memorial and museums. To say it was enjoyable would be the wrong words. It was an experience!!! The city is built up and just a normal city with a shopping district etc etc but within this there is an area that remembers the bombing. There is a building that was only half destroyed which has remained and is a chilling monument. The museum held some interesting artifacts but was a wee it depressing to say the least (also the usual asian pushing in syndrome that is so annoying!!!!)

A bullet train back to Kyoto to buy lots of souveniers and onward to Tokyo!!!!

What a contrast to Kyoto this place was! It was as busy and as crazy as we expected. Lots of flashing lights and a bombardment of advertising everywhere you looked.

We managed (after thinking we would be out sleeping in the streets at one point) to find accomodation at Ace Inn, which was a capsule hostel. Basically a capsule hostel is where you sleep in a glorified coffin! We really enjoyed staying here as it was so different to the hostels we had stayed in. Tokyo is a busy place and expensive too and this was our only hope in our budget as everywhere else was full!!! It turned out to be great with free internet and a nice relaxing tv room on the top floor. Rooms were clean...only annoying thing was the showers were on a timer and had to pay 100 yen to use! (It was so hot we needed the showers haha)

Tokyo was a really busy city, and although not impossible to navigate im sure we did find ourselves very lost from time to time! But we enjoyed it. Whilst in Tokyo we had some things to tick off the list to do. Andrew wanted to see sumo and hunt round music shops! Emma wanted to see everything traditional but wasnt really bothered about Tokyo! We both wanted to see some theatre there. Andrew didnt get to see sumo....it wasnt really the right time of year and the stuff that was on was EXPENSIVE!!!!! He did manage to find some nice rare Oasis cds though which made up for this!

We did manage to see some Kabuki theatre. Now these plays last all day and so we payed to just watch one act. It was a great experience and didnt matter that we didnt understand the language - the movement and music was wicked entertainment.

To get away from the hussle and bussle of the city we decided to take the train to go and see Mt. Fuji. It was a really nice journey through beautiful countryside to see the Mt....well....I say "see" the Mt haha. We knew it wasnt the right time of year to get a clear view but thought we should go anyway. When approaching on the train we saw quite a bit of the Mt. When we walked to the observation centre the haze had come in and we could hardly see a thing haha. It still got us out of Tokyo and was fun...if a little annoying because it spoilt our pics!

The culture shock of Japan is something both of us won't forget. It was the only place on our trip that we had a language barrier. We enjoyed this though and it really made us laugh! The tradition of the place really appealed to us and it was just a fantastic experience. We both really loved this country...we just found the food weird!!!!