Tim in Japan- part 2

Tim's entry continued- no mention of us going to Mount Fuji though, tut tut...:

On the morrow, we travelled by shinkansen (bullet train) to Okayama and than took a local train to Tsuyama, San's town. Once we got to San's house I thought it was lovely, perfect for one person really and we relaxed until we met Will and went to a restaurant called Joyfull (yes, they spell it with two 'l's for some reason).
I think Joyfull is a Japanese attempt of a American diner, although it was designed as if they had only read about what an American diner should look like rather than ever seen one. I thought it was sweet and I can see why we went as the food was at least something I understood (pretty much everything else I had eaten before was either guessing, or from San's recommendations).



Tim plays the 'Will it make me gag?/ What is it?!' food game that I am a little too used to...

The next day was probably one of my favourites; some might say that it is sad that after going to all these fantastic places in Japan, my favourite day would be one spent cycling around a small Japanese town, looking at a Japanese garden and being shown the sights, but I loved it. It was so relaxing, so pretty and I felt so at peace. I could feel the stress of the journey, the stress of work and other personal rubbish slowly going away.



Tsuyama is in the back of beyond, but it has nice sunsets..

The next day we were off to Tsushima, a small island near Korea with some of San's friends to stay at a beach house. The journey was long and I have to admit I was disappointed. I had an image in my mind of a small house on a beautiful beach, pretty much untouched, maybe walking distance to a small village where there would be a restaurant or a pub where we could go for drinks and chats and stuff.
It wasn't like that, it was a house in the middle of nowhere on a small wooden pier, there were sea urchins littered around so the only way to get the sea was jumping off the pier and than getting back on was a pain. I tried to hide my disappointment but think I failed a little bit. Though driving around was cool and the slide park we went to was great fun, it wasn't what I was hoping for.



Tim is a moany old so-and so, check the view from our doorstep.

I think at this point I should mention that fact that I am not normally such a brat but maybe the heat and the exhaustion did mean I had less patience than I normally do. So apologies to the rest of the gang who I met there, I am usually quite nice. Good time to mention the heat as well, it was hot and very humid, the kind of heat that makes you hot and sweaty and tired the instant you walk out of the door. I kept myself hydrated as much as possible but I don't think there was enough water in the world.


After the little island we hopped onto the ferry (a later one than we hoped) and headed over to Hiroshima...



The ruins of the A-dome can just about be made out through the arch of this monument.

Hiroshima was beautiful, the Peace Park I though was very tranquil and the museum even though horrific was also very interesting. I was surprised at how the museum didn't blame anyone but was more directed to ensuring the message of banning the bomb and ensuring that nothing like this ever happened again was thoroughly engrained into your soul.



This monument has the word 'Peace' inscribed in it over and over again in different languages.

Tim neglects to mention Kyoto, but we'll forgive him.

This is a just a taste of what my summer was like- the first summer in the longest time that I haven't been slaving away, but had time to actually enjoy it. As I am now back at school (boo :( ), no doubt I'll feel the need to reminisce on these halcyon days filled with sunshine, booze and lots of lie-ins. I'll fill you in on the details later...