Kaoru left for her morning bath at 6.15. We had a bit of a schedule to keep and no time to waste. I tried to get back to sleep but decided to take advantage of my last bath. So I got up and went downstairs.
I wasn’t in for long, and as I was drying myself, the alarm on my watch went off – 7.00. I had a look for Kaoru in the library downstairs, thinking she would be having a morning coffee. But she wasn’t there so she must have been having a long bath!
She returned to the room a bit later and we went for breakfast at 7.30. I was still lounging around in my yukata but Kaoru had gotten dressed. Breakfast was the same as yesterday.
Our plan for the day (version 3 from last night’s planning) was to catch a 9.07 bus from the hotel. We had finished eating by 8.10 and decided to rush back upstairs and catch the 8.37 bus instead. We made it there with 5 minutes to spare. It was lightly raining as we left the hotel which just made us laugh again. We were expecting nice weather based on the forecast! It didn’t last long though.
Our destination was just 5 minutes away – sazaedou. We got off the bus and knew we were at the right place just by looking at the stairs ahead of us. But to make things easier there was a travelator! We opted for the exercise though and took on the stairs.
Sazaedou is an old building designed as a one way circuit. So you never pass people coming down as you are going up. There was a great view from the top.
We then climbed some more steps and found the graves of 19 soldiers who took their own lives rather than be killed by the army who just won the battle. They were 16 and 17 years old.
We descended the stairs and caught the next bus back to our hotel. We were back by 9.40 and I took the opportunity to have a final bath and warm up. The baths weren’t meant to close for cleaning until 10.00 but the one i wanted already was closed! So i went to the other and had 5 minutes relaxation. Then it was back to the room to do a final pack.
We went downstairs to check out and topped up our water bottles, and then walked to the bus stop-this time fully loaded. We took the 10.31 bus which was longer to get to the station than the 10.36 (as it went a different way) but we hadn’t done a full loop yet.
At the station we bought our tickets to Tokyo, some lunch from the supermarket and then killed some time at mister donut. We then boarded our train for Koriyama. There was some beautiful scenery for the trip. A bit over an hour later we arrived and had 15 minutes to transfer for the Shinkansen. It was going to be crowded so we went straight to the platform to wait in line, hoping we could get a seat. While we were waiting we watched a Shinkansen go past without stopping. I had never seen that before. Wow it was fast!
We could see 2 empty rows of 3 seats on the train as it went past, and we were second in line. Luckily i managed to get the one in middle before the person coming from the other door got there! We ate our lunch and sped back to Tokyo. 275 was the fastest speed i recorded us doing.
Once in Tokyo we did some shopping, and caught the 3 trains back to Mio’s house. We had an iced drink (Mio had given Kaoru some vouchers for) and then picked Arisa up from her school. The three of us were going to walk back to the house but Mio was now free and came to pick us up.
Back at the house we unpacked and passed the time, until going out to dinner. We walked to an Italian restaurant nearby, where they regularly go to. Mio and I talked for a bit – her getting to practice English, and me practicing some Japanese when I could. The 5 of us enjoyed a fantastic meal, and then walked back home for the night.
Arisa had a bath. Kaoru, Yoichi and I sat downstairs and had a couple of drinks. Mio had bought a few new whisky’s for me to try, so I didn’t want to offend. Kaoru and Yoichi chatted while I did a bit of work. I hope to be able to understand what they are saying one day!
Some photos from today:
