Home now. So another Japan trip has come and gone in a whirlwind of crowded trains, amazing scenery and sleeping on the floor. Today was, without a doubt, the most painful day of the trip. Not emotionally painful, because we're well and truly ready to come home, but painful because today, and by extension yesterday (since both days have blurred into one) was simply travel, and not much else. After collecting the last of our things from the floor of the Co-...

This is the last entry for the trip being written on Japanese soil. This time tomorrow night we'll be probably sitting in the plane ready to commence take-off for a painful 8+ hour flight to the gold coast. I'm still debating whether to take up Jetstar's business class upgrade offer for the trip home. It is a lot of money to spend just for single a better night's sleep. It will be a short an uninteresting entry today, because we basically packed, shopped and re...

Woke up on the floor again. Normally this would be considered unusual, but it is something we're getting increasingly used to. So far the Co-op inn has been great. It is probably the most quiet of all of the hotels we've stayed at so far. Being on the 9th (and top) floor, and being down one corner of the hotel with no neighbours probably has something to do with it. So far my only complaint with the Co-op inn is the room air conditioning. On heat mode, it has o...

It is starting to feel like the trip is winding down, which is a good thing, because we've packed so much into the last 3 weeks, that we're all feeling a little exhausted. Almost ready for another holiday. Today we made our final city hop of the trip. We're finishing our holiday with 3 nights in our favourite city, Kyoto, before flying home on Wednesday night. We bid farewell to our final Tokoyo Inn for the trip this morning. Frustratingly, we've now stayed in e...

To anyone coming to Kobe in the future, and considering attending Kobe Luminarie, I won't tell you not to do it, but I'd advise you to be prepared for the worst when you do. It is the most popular event on the Kobe calendar, and people come from all over Japan (and the world, if you count tourists like us), so being able to see Luminarie is a marathon effort in itself. I'll get back to Luminarie a bit later. Firstly after a minor sleep in, we went down for bre...