Konnichiwa, Nippon!

As you may or may not know, Linda and I embarked on a two week adventure to the island
of Japan last month. We've wanted to go to Japan for as long as I can remember, and there
were many times in the past when we started to plan the trip, but due to one thing or another,
it just wasn't in the cards.  But 2010 was the year we made it happen. Linda painstakingly
planned every hour of every day of the trip so we could maximize our experience, and to my
surprise I think we accomplished over 85% of the things we wanted to do, which I think is
pretty impressive, since most of the time you run into problems on trips like this that
prevent certain things from happening.  One other thing that was nice about this trip, is that
we met up with our close friends (Tom & Kris from Chicago and Jim up from Singapore)
while there which made the experience that much more fun because we could share it with
other gaijin.

So, with out further ado, I will start documenting the trip here on LJ.  But be warned, some of
the following posts will be epic in size, as I just have too many photos to share.  I did my
best to organize things, with a post for each day there, and several separate posts that will
deal with individual aspects of the trip in more detail.

Also, I must apologize ahead of time for the quality of my photos.  Being on the move
constantly really does not bode well for careful photography, and many of the photos
were taken with my little Sony Cybershot, some on the sly, and many in poor lighting
situations.  Anyway...

Here we are, still in the US waiting for our flight...


Pirate sox.


Panorama out the window.  That's our Nana Nana Nana (777).

Another panorama waiting to board.

On the plane.

After we got off the jet at Narita, we were weary.  We left Reno in the morning Friday, flew to
LAX and then boarded our jet to Japan and took off at 11:00am.  Eleven hours later we landed
in Japan at 4:00pm Saturday.  The time change is weird.  So we were up for like 26 hours straight
and then we had to take a 40 minute train ride into Tokyo, then board a bullet train to Kyoto. The
Shinkensen that takes you to Kyoto from Tokyo takes 3 hours.  So we did not hit the hotel until
after 10:00pm.  It's a long, long trip.

Waiting for the train from the airport.  We didn't set foot outside until we reached Kyoto.

Linda waiting for the train with all our bags.  Running on fumes.

Tired, but excited on the train.

Linda waiting for the Shinkensen.

Panorama of the bullet train.

The bullet trains are amazing.  They travel at 150-180mph, and are extremely comfortable. Clean bathrooms, food and drinks, roomy and comfortable seats, the works.  Why we don't have these over
here is beyond me.