Category: Family
-
Fuji-san
Day 19 – Tuesday, 16 April 2024 From Tateshina, after a walk in the morning, down to Lake Yamanaka, and our breath taken away by the iconic sight of Mt Fuji. Words really do fail. It stands, alone and astonishing, like one’s first sight of Saturn through a telescope – miraculous, impossible but so obviously…
-
Serious Woodwork, Old & New
Day 18 – Monday, 15 April 2024 Finally, a day which didn’t involve driving until one or other member of the family got snappish and said something brusque and ungenerous to another. I’d like to say that we sacked the fool who planned the last couple but, in truth, he just got lucky. A shortish…
-
On the Road
Day 17 – Sunday, 14 April 2024 Up the next morning in Nara, remarkably not too long after Annabelle, so we set out together for the before-the-boys-are-conscious exploration. A ramble up and down the arcades of Nara’s funky town. A needed toilet break for me led to a conversation with a local, of many years’…
-
On the Bridges
Day 16 – Saturday, 13 April 2024 The first of two days of driving. Silly days, really. Four and a half hours doesn’t seem like much when it’s just a blue line on Google Maps. It’s a lot on the actual road. For those of us in the front seat, with driving and/or navigating to…
-
Idleness
Day 15 – Friday, 12 April 2024 Finally, a day to do nothing. The road down from the campsite too scary, the distances to everything too far, the lure of bed and book too great. Did nothing. I gather that Anna and the boys went for a couple of walks. Good luck to them, I…
-
Remoteness
Day 14 – Thursday, 11 April 2024 The price of getting Anna to agree to a whole week in Tokyo was some time somewhere remote and relaxed. Mission accomplished. She is poorly, so it is only the boys and I that set out on two missions – to grab a handful of things from a…
-
-
Solvet sæclum in favilla
Day 12 – Tuesday, 9 April 2024 Our hotel is only two hundred metres from Peace Memorial Park, and there is, after all, only one reason that really puts this small, regional city on anyone’s itinerary, so there is no reason to do anything else first but to take those last few steps of the…
-
Philosophy and Hiroshima
Day 11 – Monday, 8 April 2024 The day started with packing – after five nights our stay in Kyoto ends today. Bags stuffed into the corner, we headed into the city centre and tried to catch a bus but, at approximately noon on a Monday, two turned up with insufficient room for all of…
-
The End of an Era
Day 10 – Sunday, 7 April 2024 We are not done with Pokémon. Seb has seen, on the trains, advertisements for an exhibition leveraging the popularity of the little monsters to showcase the work of leading and emerging artisans in the traditional Japanese crafts, collectively called kogei, including textiles, lacquer work, you name it. It…