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I Think We’re Turning Japanese
  • Paul and Nancy. We travel
  • Nancy Hughes
  • Paul and Nancy. We travel
  • Nancy Hughes

I Think We’re Turning Japanese

Haiku Cruise Japan
Around the island we sail
Bucket list ticking
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12 days on the Celebrity Millennium cruising Japanese waters with a stop in Korea and a few days tacked on in the end to visit Tokyo. Read more
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  • Trip start
    April 7, 2024
    I Think We’re Turning Japanese
    2

    And so it begins . . .

    April 7, 2024 in Canada ⋅ ☁️ 12 °C

    And we’re off, slightly delayed, on a transpacific flight crossing the International Date Line, next stop Tokyo.

    An overnight stay in Yokohama and then we board the Celebrity Millennium for 12 days cruising around Japan with a stop in Korea.

    Then a few days tacked on the end to explore Tokyo.

    We have decided to honour Japan by making this our 1st ever Haiku Cruise!

    For those unfamiliar, the Haiku is a classic Japanese form of poetry consisting of 3 lines with a 5-7-5 syllable format:

    Haiku poetry
    Three lines of five seven five
    Rhyming optional

    See, if I can do it, so can you!

    Our plan is to write a daily Haiku appropriate for where we are and what we are doing. Let the Haiku Games begin!

    Commenting in Haiku format is at your own discretion😂😂😂    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Ready, aim, board the ship

    April 9, 2024 in Japan ⋅ 🌧 18 °C

    After a fairly long day of flying and then a nice drive through rush hour Tokyo traffic we arrived at our overnight hotel in Yokohama. It is Cherry Blossom season (Sakura) in Tokyo and we were pleased and surprised to see blossom festooned trees everywhere along the highway on the hour+ long drive from Narita Airport to central Tokyo and then into Yokohama

    Woke this morning at 6 jet lag am to watch our ship arriving at the Yokohama Cruise Terminal about 1km away.

    Bit of a damp day, the forecast was actually written up as “tons of rain”. No worries, we know how to do rain✅

    Long day flying done
    Ship in sight, boarding at noon
    Leaving the rain behind    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    For the history buffs

    April 9, 2024, North Pacific Ocean ⋅ 🌬 13 °C

    As we sail away we have a stunning view of Yokohama Bay and my inner history buff wonders what it would have looked like on a fateful morning in 1942 when the Imperial Japanese Navy fleet weighed anchor and set sail for a speck of an island in the middle of the Pacific called Midway.

    Yokohama Bay
    Kido Butai lifts anchor
    Midway morning soon

    5 fateful minutes that changed the path of history

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Midway    Read more

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    12

    Lucked out this morning

    April 10, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ☁️ 11 °C

    Pulled into Shimizu this morning and we totally lucked out. Known as the best place in Japan to see Mt. Fuji, the travel gods smiled on us and parted the early morning clouds to reveal the mountain basking in the rising sun

    Seeing Mt Fuji
    Majestic snowy sparkling
    Lucked out sunny day    Read more

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    1

    Shimuzu, a time for Sakura

    April 10, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ☀️ 8 °C

    Sakura is cherry blossom season and is celebrated across Japan for the beauty of the blossoms and as a reminder of how fleeting life is.

    We hit peak Sakura in Shimuzu today as we visited a some local sites including an old Shogun castle that is now a public park and a nearby Shinto shrine. The clear sunny weather held true and we were treated to all day views of Mt. Fuji as we toured this busy port city of 650,000.

    In related news, we successfully negotiated our first interaction with one of the 6 bazillion gazillion vending machines in Japan, 99.9% of which have Japanese only instructions.    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Kobe. Where’s the beef?

    April 11, 2024, Inland Sea ⋅ ☁️ 11 °C

    Kobe Osaka
    Close together visiting
    Our next two days here

    We will pitch up in Kobe harbour at noon and we spend two nights in the area, one docked in Kobe and then we move a few miles to Osaka.

    Busy days ahead . . . Looking forward to the cherry blossoms at Osaka castle and we have signed up for a Geisha Tea Service so we can channel our inner Shogun, Anjin san persona👍. We also get to ride the Shinkansen high speed train to visit Kyoto

    Details to follow . . .    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Osaka. Got here from there pt 1

    April 12, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ☁️ 24 °C

    Docked in Osaka this morning, just a few miles from where docked in Kobe, yesterday. Yesterday, from Kobe, we did a day of organized touring, visiting the spectacular Osaka Castle and being introduced to the Japanese practice of Shintoism at an ancient Shinto shrine

    Loving Japan a lot. Very unique in how everything is super organized and despite being packed in, it is quite a calm place.    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Osaka. Got here from there pt 2

    April 12, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ☁️ 24 °C

    Today, docked in Osaka all day, we ventured off on our own, trying our luck on the Osaka Metro to go downtown from the cruise port.
    Navigation when there is no English alphabet was a bit entertaining but we managed to get to the famous Dotonbori Street.

    Yesterday from Kobe
    Osaka exploring day
    Again Osaka

    Our “formal activity” of the day was to attend a Japanese Tea Ceremony presentation. Very interesting history and the entire ceremony was both entertaining and fun

    Dotonbori Street is kinda crazy and the place starts getting loud around noon and then gets crazier. The night life scene is apparently wild but we will miss that as there is an on board Japanese cultural show with large Taiko drum band

    Good couple of day for a couple of cruise tourists.

    Tomorrow, the Shinkansen high speed train is on our agenda    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Japan. Things people do

    April 13, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

    We have been visiting some of the oldest and most revered temples in southern Japan and we are starting to understand a very small bit about the Japanese. A people who have an intensely deep feeling for their history and ways of allowing 125 million people to live in very, very densely populated areas.

    All of Japan is about 1/3 the area of British Columbia and about 70% of that is uninhabitable mountains. The lowland coastal areas are packed solid! They adore punctuality, order and politeness, qualities that are required when living in such close quarters.

    Crowds are simply part of life in Japan. Streets, metro stations, train stations . . . Everywhere. We visited the Temple of the Golden Buddha on a day we were told “wasn’t very crowded”. We thought the place was packed! Many of the locals wore kimonos and went to great lengths to be photographed under the best cherry blossom tree.

    Somehow, even in crowds, the Japanese find a way to purse serenity.

    Our journey continues, still heading south and onwards. We are leaving the main island of Honshu and sail to the city of Kochi on Shikoku island    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Shinkansen. Fying at ground level

    April 13, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ⛅ 19 °C

    Took the Shinkansen “Bullet” train to Kyoto today. Helluva train.

    Shinkansen smooth fast
    Such incredible quiet speed
    So much speedy fun

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    A nice day in Kochi

    April 15, 2024, East China Sea ⋅ 🌧 21 °C

    The sunset promised a wonderful day in Kochi and it delivered with sunny skies and low 20 temps. We had an easy morning, starting at 1015, so we enjoyed a lingering breakfast on the open air stern dining area before making our way to the buses to explore the region

    More visiting temples, lunch at a rather effervescent, crowded and bustling Sunday market and then back to the ship to be entertained with local musicians and dancers as we sailed away.

    Sea day today enroute Busan Korea. We are looking forward to a “day off” without any Temple steps to climb.

    The weather has changed and it is a day of clouds, winds, whitecaps and some rain squalls.    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Sea day, clouds day

    April 15, 2024, East China Sea ⋅ 🌬 19 °C

    The Travel Weather Gods have been very kind to us. Warm sunny days so far.

    Today we are at sea enroute Busan South Korea and the skies closed over and we have had some whitecaps and rollers.

    The forecast for Busan is back to warm sunny skies.Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    It’s show time!

    April 16, 2024 in South Korea ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    One of the things we really enjoy about cruising is the variety of live entertainment. There are multiple styles of musical acts performing in venues around the ship every day.

    On our ship, there is a large, 750 seat fully equipped theatre where the major shows are performed. We boarded a new troop of performers in Yokohama and last night, along with the ship’s most excellent band, they put on their first show.

    A tribute to great music from the 80’s and it looked like this

    It was a lot of fun    Read more

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    Busan. A busy, tall place

    April 16, 2024 in South Korea ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

    We had a brief but intense introduction to Korea today and this place is an amazing combination of old Asian Buddhism over written with a driving work ethic to get better. We were off the ship by 8 and travelled 30 minutes up the coast to visit a beautiful seaside temple with some of the most intricate woodwork and detailed painting we have ever seen.

    As we travelled back into the city our guide provided a capsule history of South Korea and for a nation that was in shattered ashes after the Korean War and has an area of just over 100,000km2 (9 South Koreas would fit in B.C.) the progress is off the charts. The port is incredibly busy, there are 90+ story high rise buildings everywhere and you can just feel the energy.

    We were most impressed by Busan Korea.

    Made it back on board just in time for a lovely lunch on our favorite, weather dependent, dining venue . . . Deck 10 Aft and the weather was on our side today.

    Bonus points if you recognize the flag✅

    Heading north into cooler weather with a Sea Day enroute to Hakodate, our 2nd last port of call    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Sea day & something new for us

    April 17, 2024, Japan Sea ⋅ ☀️ 13 °C

    So today we signed up for an “Inside the Ship, How it all Works” tour

    The tour was great. We went behind the curtain and visited the galleys, the provisioning stores, the engineering control centre, laundry facilities, some crew areas and the Bridge. At each stop the Head of Department was on hand to give us an overview of how things worked and answer our questions.

    Unfortunately we were not allowed to photograph anything for security reasons so in lieu of a photographic record of our tour, I present to you, for your viewing pleasure, a classic “wakes disappearing over the horizon”    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Hakodate . . . An unusual arrival

    April 18, 2024, Japan Sea ⋅ ☀️ 10 °C

    The arrival of the local Pilot is part of the ritual of docking in a new port. They usually arrive in sleek, fast motor launches and then manoeuvre in close and the Pilot climbs a short ladder to enter the ship and proceed to the Bridge to advise the Captain

    This morning in Hakodate (Hak-Oh-Dat-Eh) there was a very different sound and looking out we saw this unusual Pilot arrival    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Hakodate. Look up, look way up

    April 19, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ☁️ 10 °C

    Docking in Hakodate meant we had reached the northernmost point of our trip around Japan and the 3rd of the 4 main islands that make up Japan. Hokkaido is Japan’s winter sports island and is also home to the well known Sapporo brewing company.

    We had a long day, with a trip north to the Onuma lake area then back to Hakodate to sight see from the Goryokuko Tower and wrapping up the day taking a sky tram to the top of Hakodate mountain. Nancy was thrilled with both height experiences!    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Aomori. Pottery kilns & Parade floats

    April 19, 2024 in Japan ⋅ 🌬 11 °C

    Docked in the quiet small city of Aomori where we travelled inland about an hour to visit a family run pottery & shop that produces remarkable unglazed pottery from what looks like 12 century brick kilns. All hand made stuff, very unique and there was shopping to be done.

    On the trip back to the boat we visited the Goshogawara Tachineputa Festival presentation Center.

    https://aomori-tourism.com/en/event/detail_86.html

    These massive floats are simply off the chart, spectacularly incredible. I can only image what they look like at night during the actual festival.

    They are HUGE+++ 75 feet tall, nearly 20 tons and built on a four wheeled frame so they can be pushed along the streets by teams of 50 fit young guys, They are wire and wood frames covered in a special nylon reinforced paper and in illuminated internally, all painted in spectacular colors and details.

    The pictures can’t really capture how huge and intricate these four story floats are.

    It would be a great festival to attend!

    Aomori leaving
    Sailing south last cruising time
    Yokohama bound
        Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Off the ship, pitched up in Tokyo

    April 21, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ☁️ 16 °C

    All cruises end and ours terminated in Yokohama this morning. We processed off the ship and through Japanese Customs and arrived at our hotel in the Akihabara district, ready to roll

    Spent the day at a local botanical garden, took a ride on a scenic river cruise and visited a local temple for “Dress up in Kimono Sunday”. A warm day in Tokyo and we managed a couple of Bingo Beer moments

    Early night for us, more adventures riding the Tokyo metro system again tomorrow    Read more

  • I Think We’re Turning Japanese

    Tokyo scrambles, temples and trains

    April 22, 2024 in Japan ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    Another day riding the magnificent Tokyo metro system . . . We are actually getting quite good at navigating our way around

    Started off at the roof top observation deck of the Metro government building where on a clear day you can see Mt. Fuji, but not for us today. Worked our way to the Meiji Jingu Garden Temple area and then to the very cray cray “Shibuya Scramble”

    https://www.gotokyo.org/en/spot/78/index.html

    Off to our much anticipated Walking Food Tour this evening    Read more