Christmas 2012: Lake Toba

50th post! Ding ding ding! Back on the road again, and back to one of our favourite countries, Indonesia. This time around we stationed ourselves in Sumatra, and more specifically on the island of Samosir in Lake Toba, so basically - an island within a lake, within an island! (There was also a smaller lake on the island, although it's unknown whether or not there was a smaller island within this lake).

Having said all that, Lake Toba is more than just your 'run of the mill' lake, it's actually the crater of a super-volcano! And not just your 'run of the mill' super-volcano either, when this super-volcano erupted around 70,000 years ago, it created a worldwide volcanic winter that almost wiped out humanity...

Merry Christmas everyone!

So, we flew in to the city of Medan on December 22nd and spent the night there before getting the bus to Lake Toba the next morning, or at least that was the plan. When we got up that morning, we asked reception to arrange a taxi to take us to the bus station for our trip to Danau Toba. This was all fine anyway, and although our taxi driver didn't have any English, he kept repeating "Danau Toba" and we nodded along, so he obviously knew where we were going. About 10 minutes later, he dropped us at a hotel and pointed inside, so we thought 'maybe they organised for the bus to collect us from here...?'. So, we waited for a while in the lobby of this hotel - no sign of a bus. We asked reception when we were going to be collected - they had no idea what we were talking about. We couldn't understand what the mix up was... After waiting quite a long time (longer than we care to admit), everything suddenly made sense. We finally realised that the hotel we were in was actually called Danau Toba! Ahh...

At that stage, it was too late to catch a bus, so we had to ask reception to arrange a private taxi for the whole 4 hour trip to Toba. Dose! Things like this happen though and in the end, we still arrived in the right place that evening, so it was just a bit of extra money and hassle that it cost us.

When we were booking accommodation, most of the nice places were already full up as it was the Christmas holidays, so we ended up staying in a place called Romlan Guesthouse, a cheap and... well, I was going to say cheerful, but the owner had a face like a smacked arse for the duration of our stay. So, it was just cheap, and nothing more!

For the first few days, including Christmas Day itself, the weather was pretty dire, so we couldn't do a whole lot. We sat by the water's edge when we could, opened our presents, had a small walk around the area and watched a whole series of The Amazing Race!

On St. Stephen's Day, the weather cleared up a small bit so we rented a motorbike and went for a spin around the island. But as we were driving along, Aisling suddenly cried out in pain. I pulled over and she had to lie on the ground to keep from fainting. She had picked up a nasty sting on her side, from what we didn't know. It was probably a pretty strange scene for anyone passing by - us pulled up on the side of this quiet country track, Aisling on the ground. In fact, many people stopped thinking there had been an accident!

When I first pulled over, it was just us, but by the time we left, it seemed the whole village had gathered, including one guy selling ice-cream from a bike, and another playing guitar. It was like a mini festival had sprung up around us! It was probably the most interesting thing to happen to that village in quite a while. There were probably pictures of us the in the morning papers!

After maybe 20 minutes, when she was feeling a bit steadier, we travelled down to the local medical centre for some expert advice.

We saw the doctor straight away, as we were actually the only ones there... (I guess not much happens around here).

After taking a look at the mark, she said that it wasn't a sting but a bite, most likely from a "lipan". We obviously didn't know what that meant and she didn't have the English to translate, but it didn't really matter. She gave us some tablets and Ais started to feel a bit better so we continued on for the afternoon.

We did eventually look it up later that evening, just out of curiosity, and eh, this is a lipan:

A massive frickin' centipede!!! How does something like that even happen?!

We rented out the same bike for pretty much all of our remaining days, and we even got a bit of sunshine to enjoy! It's by far the best way to see the island and there's very little traffic around so perfect for a rookie like me. We're really after getting into travelling around by motorbike after trying it out for the first time in Sapa last year.

The island itself is far too big to circumnavigate in one day, and there's only really one main road that makes a big loop around the coast, so our choice when exploring was basically - clockwise or anticlockwise. And over the last few days we were able to follow both to see where they led. The scenery was actually surprisingly different each way, changing from lowland fields with scattered villages, to hilly paths overlooking the lake.

In terms of actual sights or landmarks, there wasn't much at all. We visited a place called "The Stone Chairs" at one point, which are just, as the name suggests, a bunch of old chairs made of stone. And that was about it in terms of actual tourist sites! Samosir Island is actually Christian, which is surprising seeing as Indonesia is a Muslim country (the biggest Muslim country in the world, would you believe!), so there were also plenty of churches to see too, rather than temples and mosques.

There was also this building that looked pretty cool, even though I have no idea what it was.

Actually, while we were parked outside the building above, a minibus pulled in and asked could they all take a picture of us! We were only too happy of course and after the picture, they all piled in and drove away again! Now, we've had people ask for our picture before on our travels, but we've never had a bus pull over especially to do it!

As usual, we made a video diary, in fact we made two! In the first one, the surroundings weren't very scenic so we made another one later on, but in the scenic edition, you can't actually hear anything we're saying because it was so windy! So, in the end, I kinda had to splice them together.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YTSZebu1q8&feature=youtu.be

And that was the end of Lake Toba! In the end, our stay here was only so-so due to bad weather and substandard accommodation. The island itself was really nice though. We made our way back to Medan (on the proper bus this time!) and stayed the night there once again before returning to HK the next morning, via a short but delightful stop in Penang, where we were greeted by Aisling's friend from home, Denise.

Only one more blog left to write before I'm officially up to date, and that'll be coming some time this week. I have to have it finished by then as we're flying off on our summer holidays next Monday! So, the next entry coming soon - Chinese New Year in Boracay!

Summer 2012 - 19th Stop: Shanghai

Ok, this will probably be quite a short blog entry to finish up our summer holidays, partly because it was such a long time ago that I can barely even remember visiting the place, and partly because we didn't really do a whole lot there! In fact, one of the few notes I made from one of the days was "got a bad Subway"... I'm sure that says a lot, not only about what we did in Shanghai, but also, how much we love Subway! (It's really great!).

I don't mean to come across that Shanghai was boring or anything though, we were just on wind-down mode a bit after a summer of travelling and we were also busy looking up new apartments for HK. We did have a lot of fun there and saw some great things. I mean, just look at that for a view!

We arrived in on a night train from Beijing, and literally, as soon as we arrived, the people became a whole lot nicer! A girl directed us to the metro station, a guy asked us if we needed help buying tickets, and this was all completely off the cuff! We didn't even ask for their help! We also saw a young boy pissing into a bin; which, fair enough, isn't ideal, but at least he's trying! It's a start. Beijing, take note!

The Bund (as seen above) is the main attraction of the city and was quite near to our hostel so we went there a few times, just to walk around and take pics. In terms of skyline, it's right up there with the nicest we've seen. Better than Hong Kong though? Hmmm...

On our first night while visiting The Bund, three Arabian men came up to us asking if we would take a picture of them. Of course, we were only too happy to help, but it turned out they wanted us to take a picture of each of them, individually... We did it, but at the time we were thinking, 'did you really need us for this...?'.

As it turns out, according to some beliefs, Muslims aren't allowed to take pictures of people! Who knew?! The Quran must have been way ahead of its time to forbid the use of digital cameras! Although, now that I think of it, I'm the one who actually took the picture of them... if Islam turns out to be the one true faith, I'm in sooo much trouble...!

As I said before, we didn't do a whole lot here, but it's a nice city in itself, just to be in, even if you're not doing anything in particular. Shanghai was historically a major hub for European traders, so the city is a real melting pot of culture and architecture, between the traditional Chinese, classical European and, in the last 20 years, the strangely futuristic.

One of the few things we actually did do in Shanghai was go to an incredible show called Era: Intersection of Time. It was so entertaining! One of the best shows of any description I've ever seen. It was basically a variety show of all different types of acrobatics and stunts. It was amazing. You weren't allowed to take pictures though, but I managed to get off a few sneaky ones.

The only other thing of note from our time here was on our way to the airport. Instead of getting the train or bus like regular 20th century folk would do, we climbed aboard the Maglev and went for a ride - into the future! The Maglev, or magnetic levitation, will probably be the next big thing in the world of transport for the coming century, so it was cool to take a spin before it hits the mainstream, just so we can be real travel hipsters! Due to the fact that the train carriage is floating on a kind of magnetic cushion of air, there's no friction or bumps or ups and downs, even though you're travelling at speeds of up to 430 km/h.

Speeds of 431 km/h in fact! We were going so fast, the pictures even came out a bit blurry! Or else I just couldn't hold the camera properly...

This kind of technology will more than likely revolutionise long distance transport by taking people out of the air and putting them back on the ground (or just above the ground). Although, having said that, the Shanghai Maglev - the only commercially operated line in the world - cost over a billion dollars to build, so we've some way to go before these things spread worldwide. Hopefully, they'll be popping up in a city near you in the next few decades though, which means Ireland will probably get its first Maglev some time in the 23rd century! (We still don't even have an underground for God's sake! Even North Korea has a metro line, two of them! And they were built 40 years ago!)

North Korea - better transport infrastructure than Ireland

We made a video diary too, our last of the summer, on the Maglev, so have a watch of that!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smXApwsS1-I

And that's the end! 10 weeks of travelling (and 10 months of writing!). Next up will be our Christmas holidays in Lake Toba (been and gone), and then Chinese New Year in Boracay (also been and gone!). Just up to date in time for another summer of frolicking around the Orient (still to come!). Thanks for reading! :)

Summer 2012 - Bonus Entry: The Great Wall of China

Bonus blog! Wooo! I don't usually write entries for single sights like this, but this one definitely calls for an exception to that rule. The Great Wall of China is obviously one of the most recognisable and well-known landmarks in the world. But the problem with visiting a 'wonder' like this, is that it's so famous and so hyped up, that it can't help but to fall short of your preconceived expectations. And to be honest, The Great Wall just wasn't what we had hoped it would be either...

It was so much more!!!

It really was great! We, of course, only saw the tiniest fraction of it, but it's hard not to when the thing dips and dives and zig-zags its way along for over 21,000 km! That's unbelievably over half of the circumference of the planet! To put that into perspective, if it was built in one straight line, it would stretch from Cork (which I believe is the international standard measuring point) all the way to Tokyo... AND BACK AGAIN! And standing on the hills, watching it snake its way across the countryside, it really does look like it just goes on forever. We couldn't get over it. (Neither could the Mongols! Zing!)

There are, of course, thousands of different places you can go to see the wall. For our visit, we decided to go to a more secluded spot, in a small town called Gubeikou, about three hours from Beijing. It would have been a lot easier for us to just visit the nearest and most popular wall site at Badaling, but after experiencing the Beijing crowds before, we wanted to get as far away as possible! If you're going to travel and spend money to see one of the greatest sights in the world, you might as well do it right, instead of taking the easy way and ending up with something like this:

Instead, we had a lovely, quiet, two-day trip to what is referred to as 'The Wild Wall' - one of the few places where the wall is still in its original state. And there couldn't have been more of a contrast with the picture above. On our first day, we didn't pass a single person. It was like we were the only two people in the world.

And no foreign invaders either, which just shows, after more than 2,000 years, it's still doing its job!

We set off from Beijing and got a 90 minute bus to a place called Miyun, where we were meant to catch another 90 minute bus to Gubeikou. However, after arriving, we couldn't find the bus stop and, like sharks smelling fresh prey, we were swarmed by a bunch of taxi drivers coming out with the usual crap - "oh no, no bus here, you need to get taxi", or "no, last bus gone, I will take you there" etc. etc. Of course this was all rubbish, so after calling our guesthouse in Gubeikou, we were shown to the right bus stop by their inside man in Miyun, and we were on our way again!

When we arrived in Gubeikou, we were trying to figure out where to go when we met two Spanish girls with the same problem. We both had sets of directions to the guesthouse but they inexplicably pointed us in different directions. We followed their route, as it led downhill, and sure enough, we found the place! I'm sure there's a life lesson in there somewhere...

But when we arrived at the guesthouse, they seemed to have overbooked. This could've posed a huge problem, but instead it couldn't have worked out better, as we were the lucky ones to be upgraded to a fancy, private double room! It wasn't even a double room, we had our own little cabin to ourselves! (They sneakily tried to get us to pay for the upgrade first, but after a very minor refusal, they just gave it to us for free!)

We had lunch with the Spanish girls before heading out alone onto The Wild Wall. We had two days here and two ways to go, so on day 1, we headed east on the 'Winding Dragon Trail'. It was kind of a gloomy day and halfway along we even had to take refuge from a thunderstorm in a watchtower! It was all very atmospheric!

We also took a video diary en route, one along the wall and one in the watchtower - two videos in the one video diary! Unbelievable!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1wn8b8vkl4

That evening there was massive drama in the guesthouse as one of the Spanish girls was stung by a scorpion on their way back! She was alright in the end but the funny thing was, we had only been talking about scorpions earlier while having lunch with them! Oops!

The next day, we headed off in the other direction, over Crouching Tiger Mountain, although this time we had big blue skies overhead!

It's hard to tell if this path was much nicer, or if it was just the weather that changed the view for us. Either way, we had another wonderful day! There's not a whole lot to say as we were just walking and climbing for the afternoon. It was great though, it really was!

That evening, we got a bus back to Miyun, but this time we knew exactly what we were doing, so we were easily able to navigate our way around and find our way back to Beijing! As I said in the last entry, we had a few more days there, seeing the Forbidden City and Tiananmen Square, before moving on to our last stop of the summer, Shanghai! So, I guess that's where we'll see you next!

Summer 2012 - 18th Stop: Beijing

Beijing, hmmm... where do I start? I suppose it was kind of a mixed bag really. To sum it up in one sentence, I would say that it's not a nice city, but had some nice things in it. A very different atmosphere to what we just came from in Japan, and even very different to city life in Hong Kong. Even though it's the capital of the world's economic powerhouse, it just lacks the class of Tokyo or any westernised city for that matter. I guess the best example of this was on our first day, when we saw local kids taking a piss in public on four separate occasions. And I don't mean discretely behind a bush or something - one was on a busy street and the other three were in a temple! We even saw one girl dropping trou and letting flow right next to a toilet sign! You couldn't make it up! I would have loved to get a picture for the blog but it probably would've landed me on the sex offenders register. Hopefully nobody caught me Peking!

Before leaving Osaka, we stuffed ourselves with Subway as we wouldn't be arriving at our Beijing hostel til late that night, but onboard our 4-hour flight with China Eastern Airlines, we were given, not one but two full meals! We weren't even remotely hungry but who turns down free food?! No regrets!

The next morning, as we stepped outside for a new adventure, it was hard to tell whether we were greeted by traditional Chinese mist, a dull gloomy haze or infamous Beijing smog. Either way, it was a grey, grey day. And that wasn't even the worst part about our visit to the Summer Palace - there are 1.3 billion people in China and I think they all decided to pop over to Beijing for the day, as the place was full to the brim with tourists. As for the palace itself... it might have been nice, I don't know! It was hard to enjoy between the crowds and the weather.

One really nice part though was a place called Suzhou Street which was exactly what I imagine old-school China to be! And because of the narrow, windy streets on the water's edge, it was impossible for it to be too crowded!

Not the best start to our time here, but we certainly got a taste of the Beijing experience. And on the way back to our hostel later that evening, we also saw the best and worst that the local populous had to offer. As we were getting the metro back, two women were clawing at each other, both trying to squeeze into the already overcrowded train. As the doors closed and the train moved off, the pushing and shoving between them continued and gradually built up into a full scale screaming match. We were obviously staring at them, watching the whole thing unfold (and wishing we spoke Mandarin!).

And just when we started to lose faith in the Chinese, a young girl standing nearby, no more than 14 or 15, turned to us and in her best English, apologised for their behaviour, shook Aisling's hand, wished us a pleasant stay and hoped we didn't judge her people based on the actions of these two women. How cute is that!? Seriously though! I really wish I had pictures of all of these little moments!

And that little glimmer of light, on an otherwise dull day, really kickstarted the rest of our stay in Beijing! The next morning, the sun was up and so were we, ready to beat the crowds to the Temple of Heaven.

There were some really nice individual sights to see on the grounds, like the Temple of Heaven itself (above), and the Temple of Harvest; but the highlight for us was seeing the locals out in their droves making the most of the open space in every way imaginable. People young and old (well, mostly old) gathering in groups to do singing, dancing, aerobics, tai chi, tai chi with swords (!), the list goes on. A city that was so dull and grey the day before, just seemed to burst to life in the sunshine!

It was fantastic to see, not only from a spectator's point of view, but it's wonderful for the all the people involved too - socially, creatively, health-wise - it's great that there's an outlet like this. No wonder people live so long over here (even with all the pollution!). You'd never see old biddies back home trying out stuff like this!

Also, respect to the woman in the middle who obviously forgot her sword that day so just used a stick!

We took in a few more sights that afternoon - including the very beautiful Lama Temple and the Drum Tower, where we stayed for a performance - before heading back to our hostel to prepare for our trip the next day to The Great Wall. (I'll be doing a special bonus entry for our two days there, so look out for that one!)

On our return to Beijing, we had an early night as we wanted to be up to beat the crowds to Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City the next morning. This attempt proved futile however. I guess that's one thing you'll just have to accept about Beijing - if you want to see the main tourist spots, be prepared to share them.

We arrived at 7:30am, with the Forbidden City not due to open for another hour but at that stage, bus loads of tourists had already flooded the scene. While we were waiting for the gates to open, we went for a wander around Tiananmen Square, just across the road. The square is probably most famous for this photograph of a student blocking the path of a line of tanks during the Beijing protests of 1989, one of the most iconic images ever taken.

Alas, no such excitement while we were there, typical! We come all the way to Tiananmen Square and this is the tanks we get!

Seriously though, there really was nothing to see there. It's just a big open square, and unsurprisingly, no mention of the protests. Being honest, the Forbidden City didn't really live up to its billing either. It was grand but nothing we hadn't seen on a smaller scale before. None of the buildings were particularly spectacular. The only real draw was the sheer size of the compound.

Afterwards, we just went for a walk around Beihai Park, before collecting our stuff and boarding the night train to Shanghai - our last stop of the summer. But before all that, we have our bonus Great Wall entry, so stay tuned!

Summer 2012 - 17th Stop: Osaka

Once again, we have come full circle, back to where we started our Japanese adventure three short weeks ago (or in real time, 8 long months ago!). And ever since we first stepped off that plane, Japan has surged ahead in the 'favoutite country' stakes, ruthlessly sweeping all competition aside (sorry Myanmar). Many of the cities and countries we have seen in our time in Asia are well worth visiting from Hong Kong, but Japan is one of the few places we've encountered that's worth the journey no matter where in the world you are!

By the time we reached Osaka though, I must admit we had run out of steam a small bit. Japanese summers are hot hot hot, especially in the cities, so the majority of our time here was spent in cool down mode. We still made the most of it, just at a slower pace.

One of the best things about our time in Japan was the ease of travel - the speed, the comfort, the efficiency and of course, our JR passes were worth their weight in gold. Especially following on from our topsy-turvey path through Vietnam and Laos. And this journey was no different. Just one hour down the track from Kyoto and here we were! In a way, it's hard to feel like you're in a new place after such a short trip! It takes me an hour to get to school in the morning, that amount of time means nothing anymore!

Our first bit of tourism came the next afternoon as we travelled to Osaka Castle. It was another hot and heavy day, although equally damp and drizzly; the kind of day that throws up a raincoat dilemma. I always hate rainy days like this while travelling. Not just for the weather itself, but I just think places look so much better with blue skies.

I guess great, big puddles can be nice too though...

Later that evening, we visited the Umeda Sky Building (they went there on The Amazing Race once, so obviously, we had to), for a nice view over the city. One thing that struck us though, and it was the same in Tokyo - Japan doesn't really have that many skyscrapers! I always imagined it would be similar to Hong Kong in terms of skyline, but no! Japanese cityscapes are pretty flat! Well, flat by big city standards anyway. You wouldn't go confusing it with Cork or anything!

Afterwards, we visited an area of the city called Dotonbori; and if the Osaka skyline was not what we expected of Japan, then this bright, flashing, neon district definitely was! 

And speaking of "typical Japan", with only a few days left in the country, we did something that we'd been putting off for a long time. In fact, we'd been putting it off for our whole lives - sushi! Neither of us had ever tried it before, so we thought what better place than Japan to throw some raw fish down our necks for the first time? 

I wish I could say it was a revelation and that our eyes had been opened to the wonders of Oriental cuisine. I wish I could say it will always be in our hearts, but we barely even kept it in our stomachs! It was disgusting! I always suspected this would be the case, but then I thought - it's a popular international dish; nobody would eat it if it tasted so bad; there's got to be some trick to it, right?

Wrong, it's revolting.

And we gave it a fair chance, we really did! It wasn't a case of taking one bite and condemning it forever. We tried salmon, boiled shrimp, tuna rolls and unagi - all terrible.

This is my second time using a picture of Ross this summer!

(Also, I never knew I could use GIFs in the blog! This changes everything!)

The next day, our last full one in Japan (*tear*), we took a little day trip thirty minutes down the road to Kobe, famous for Kobe beef - the most expensive beef in the world (obviously, too expensive for us!). It was a really nice city too, not too big, right on the water's edge and apparently the number one place for expats to live in Japan.

And see how futuristic it looks!

We spent most of the day just strolling around, through the streets, down by the harbour and into Chinatown. We went to the Chinatown in Yokohama too and it's kind of a waste of time really seeing as we live in one big Chinatown anyway! It would be like going abroad and visiting the local "Ireland-town".

Actually, on second thoughts, I'd love that! Just to see what their view of Ireland would be! Probably just a street of pubs. And sadly, that would be pretty accurate...

And that was pretty much our time in Japan done! The next morning, we just visited Shitennoji Temple and went for a walk around Tennoji Park, making a video diary in the process:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8NqwMjltxI&feature=youtu.be

before getting a train to the airport and then off to Beijing! I'm sure it won't be our last time in Japan, I hope not at least, but for now it was onwards and upwards, back to our adopted motherland for the last leg of our journey!

Summer 2012 - 16th Stop: Kyoto

Sorry sorry sorry! I'm so far behind! Massive apologies to all. Anyway, Kyoto! For no reason whatsoever, I had tipped Kyoto to be the dark horse of the summer. I just had a feeling I was going to love it here, even though my knowledge of the place barely extended beyond studying the Kyoto Protocol in college. We stayed here for six days overall, longer than we had spent in any other city this summer, but even after almost a week in town, the streets never really seemed familiar. In every other place we had visited, even just for a day or two, you gradually get a feel for the place, for better or for worse. But I never felt that in Kyoto. Don't get me wrong, we had a lovely time here, but I just felt like there was something missing...

On a lighter note, here's a mildly interesting fact from our trip - this is the second time this summer that we've visited cities that are anagrams of each other with Kyoto & Tokyo joining Hoi An & Hanoi on the list. Ok, I know I said that was mildly interesting, but who am I kidding, that was a f*cking incredible bit of trivia!

We arrived in Kyoto on the afternoon of August 7th after a speedy Shinkansen journey from Hiroshima. When we arrived in town, we checked into Bola Bola - a really nice, traditional Japanese guesthouse, complete with straw mat floors and everything (although the novelty wears off pretty quickly when you have to sleep on them for 6 nights...). We dumped our stuff and headed down the road to Arashiyama, a picturesque little mini-town in the west of the city, the highlight of which was definitely the Bamboo Forest.

This was one thing I really wanted to see in our time in Japan, any one would do! Every country has its iconic images, defining features that give the place its unique identity, and Japan probably has more than most. So, we wanted to see as many as possible during our time here. Basically, we wanted our stereotypical view of the country to be true! (If I had seen a sumo wrestler walking through the trees, eating sushi, I think I would have died of happiness!)

The next day, we went to Nijo Castle and walked around the grounds. It was a lovely place, although you weren't allowed to take pictures inside the buildings themselves, so you'll have to take our word for how pretty they were!

We also walked around the central district. Well, we think it was the central district. It was kinda hard to tell where the city centre was here. I don't really think there was one... It was the area around the main train station anyway, which was a big, shiny modern building with lots of shops and restaurants. All far too expensive for us!

Sorry for flying through everything so quickly, but we had six days here so I might have to zip through some details. One thing worth describing though was our dinner that night! The area in which we were staying, Uzumasa, on the outskirts of the city, didn't have much to offer in terms of food, and anything half decent was doubly expensive (€30 pizza, come on like!). But its saving grace was an amazing Indian restaurant with naans the size of your head!

Seriously, they were comically large! And ridiculously tasty!

The next day, we went to the Fushimi Inari Shrine, probably one of the most recognisable and impressive sights in the city. The shrine itself sits at the base of Mt. Inari, but the main attraction is the thousands and thousands of torii gates that line the mountain paths, forming big, orange tunnels running up and down the hillside.

Each one of these toriis... (toriis? toriies? I'm not really sure about the plural, neither one looks right)

(Someone call Beverly Hills 90210, cause I may need to check my Tori Spelling! Baddum tsh!)

Anyway, each of these toriis are donated by local businesses as an offering to the Shinto god, Inari - god of rice, presumably in the hopes of wealth and success, rather than actually rice. As I said, the place was covered in them, and they seem to be putting up new ones everyday, so, if you're hoping for a prosperous year, forget donating one, and try investing in the company that makes them!

And speaking of dreams of gold (laboured segue alert!), we capped off our day by gathering around the wireless to listen to Katie Taylor's Olympic triumph. Ireland!!!

Wow, the Olympics was so long ago... I'm really far behind in this blog!

We mixed things up a bit the following morning and went on a day trip to the former Japanese capital of Nara, which I just found out has recently celebrated its 1,300th birthday! So, happy birthday, Nara! It was a lovely town, similar to Miyajima in many ways - lots of temples, lots of deer and lots of fun to be had! It was quite a gloomy day though so we just kinda swanned about the place. (Aww! I should've said that when we hired that swan boat in Bedugul two years ago! I could've even said swanning a-boat! I really missed a trick there...)

We visited a few sights around the town, including Daibutsuden, which is a UNESCO site and apparently the largest wooden building in the world, and also houses Japan's most famous Buddha statue.

We also got our fortunes told at a temple-side stall. We had to shake a box, take out a stick, hand it to a woman and she gave us a print-out of our futures. A very spiritual experience, I'm sure you can imagine. And the good news is, we should both expect some "moderately good fortune", which is nice...

The next day, we had intended to get up and active again and hopped on a bus to a different part of the city, but as we arrived, the heavens opened, so we just stayed on board for a round trip back to the station. We were looking for some rainy day activities and were all excited for a holiday-cinema trip, until we found out it was €18 a ticket. Instead, we went to a manga museum which was good fun, although I'd imagine it would have been a lot more rewarding if we actually spoke Japanese (or had an interest in manga...). I did get my portrait painted though!

I think it's quite good! Aisling decided not to get one done, although she was raging she didn't afterwards!

We also went for dinner (for the umpteenth time since arriving in Japan) in a place called Saizeriya. It's a chain of cheap and cheerful Italian restaurants with branches all over the country. The food is actually quite good too considering the price. There's apparently one in HK too, although we haven't checked it out yet.

That evening, we finally got around to watching The Hunger Games. I had been listening to the audiobooks as we travelled through Vietnam and Laos, and Aisling had subsequently read all three books before we arrived in Japan, so we couldn't wait to actually see it on the big screen (of my laptop...). It was all a bit of a let down in the end. I don't want to be one of those people, but the film really didn't live up to the books. (I think this is actually the first time I've read a book before watching the film!) The books are great though, you should read them! Or better yet, listen to the audiobooks - all of the fun, with none of the effort!

And that's about everything worth mentioning. We visited a few more temples, had a failed sushi expedition and of course, made a video diary too:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=glD_wqbyl8g

So, that was Kyoto. Perhaps a little dip in form for an otherwise flawless Japan. Next stop and last stop, Osaka!