Hikone

Sam's parents also graced us with their presence earlier this year in April. We met them in Kyoto and did a couple of day trips out of Kyoto with them. It was surprisingly cold when they came. I had expected the weather to have warmed up during the second half of April but nope.

The first day we went to Hikone, which is about an hour by train and is situated on the east side of Lake Biwa north of Kyoto. Hikone was a very quiet town with not much to see apart from the castle.

Lake Biwa

Green maple leaves

I can't believe they used to use these steep and narrow staircases with no railings.

What a tree! It needs support to keep it's branches up. =P

Hikone castle and water reflection

Cherry blossom

 We saw this cat dressed up in samurai gear (the same clothes that the local mascot wears) riding on some lady's shoulders. When she saw that Lois and I wanted to take a photo of the cat she put it down, made it look presentable and gave it it's sword. =P

Love how Japan has beautiful flowers in pots everywhere

 On the way back to the station we stopped at Zuiho jr. cafe for lunch. The food was great, especially for the cost! A recommended place for lunch if you are to visit Hikone castle.

Deconstructed sandwich?

Salad with glass noodles.

Meatballs with a sweet sour sauce and vegetable chips

Ramen noodles

For dinner we tried out a tempura restaurant on the 11th floor of Kyoto station.  It was kind of disappointing for a tempura specialty restaurant. The batter wasn't as crisp and light as I have had at other places.

Tempura-don

Osaka and Himeji Castle - April

During the remainder of the time that mum was in Japan we did a couple of day trips out of Kobe. We went to Hiroshima, Osaka and Himeji. 

It was nice walking through the park surrounding Osaka castle although most of the sakura blossoms had disappeared due to the typhoon the weekend prior. I didn't enjoy Osaka castle that much as the inside was more like a Japanese history museum.

Osaka Castle

I enjoyed Himeji castle a lot more even though they were doing some restoration on the main building. They also have some free volunteer tour guides in English. 

Dressed up guards at the entrance gate

There were a lot of cats around castle grounds.

 In the picture above you can see two different windows in the wall. The one on the right had a long thin rectangle and the other a small square. The long thin rectangle was where they would shoot arrows from using the long bows. The square was used by guns with long barrels. It is larger on this side of the wall as it allowed more movement for those defending. From the other side of the wall the attackers would have a small target. On the right side of the photo behind the wooden fence looking thing, was an area where they could pour either stones or hot liquid onto those attacking the castle. 

Due to the restoration of the main tower, they opened up another section of the castle and were having an exhibition of samurai helmets.

Fan curve of the castle base.

Japanese castles were generally built on a mound or hill. These fan curved bases provided more strength than if it were straight as well as making it more stable during earthquakes.

Family crests used in the roofs.

That stone on the right was tombstone that was dug up and used in the building of the castle base.

Restoration in progress

Not far from Himeji castle is Kokoen Garden. When you purchase the Himeji castle entrance ticket you can purchase a pass that allows you to visit the garden as well for a little extra. It was a pretty big and peaceful garden.

Just a random moon shot from the balcony.

Kinosaki Onsen - Day 3

The third day at Kinosaki Onsen started with a nice big breakfast. I decided to try out the western style breakfast. They even brought in a toaster oven for me to toast my bread in. You get one roll which is made with onsen water, although I couldn't taste the difference. =P

Inside Sam's nabe

After breakfast we made our way to Kinosaki Marine Park. It was a fairly short bus ride (about 10minutes) from Kinosaki onsen station. The weather was pretty miserable and rainy as a typhoon was going past. Most of the marine park was indoor which was great! I really enjoyed this marine park, and would have to have been one of the best aquarium type things I've been to. The glass on the displays were clean, they had some cool aquatic life and lots of shows, which is a big thumbs up for me. It also had a pair of walruses! First real walrus I've seen not on tv. Sorry in advance for the bad pics with the glass reflections. They also had this fishing area where you could fish for mackeral to eat (didn't take a photo =( ). You could take them up to this restaurant and they would gut and tempura them for you!

This salamander was just a little shorter than I am with a length of 1.5m and weighing 37.4kg.

Maybe it just had a meal?

Not really sure what these are but only a small segment of them sticks out of the sand

Another thing that they did at this marine park is penguin walks! They would take the penguins for a short walk. The staff would move people to the sides and let the penguins walk through the middle. They are apparently very bad at going down the stairs. It was really cool to see the penguins up so close.

You can't see how high this dolphin jumped but it was really high!

Walrus is doing sit ups

My awesome husband with this super fluffy cute seal, which I regret not buying.

Sam loved these little guys! They would squeak when you squeezed them so Sam would stand there squeezing a hole bunch of them.

Went back to the ryokan afterwards for a warming bath or two before another spectacular dinner. It had just passed crab season in Japan. Kinosaki is famous for it's crab, so I was quite surprised to get some for dinner on our third night. It did not disappoint!

Sam's sushi plate.

Fish and bamboo in some super tasty broth.

Braised beef.

Chawanmushi. Num num num..

Cheese miso fondue. Surprisingly good!