NZ North Island - Day 1

Off we went on our first family overseas holiday. 5 passports, 5 departure and arrival cards and a car full of luggage. There were plenty of surprises

Local life

 

Kyoto had lots of woman wandering around in traditional dress like these ladies above whom we saw while eating Icecreams. As soon as we got there we got stuck into the vending machines.  I love that they had hot drinks in them too, the coffee, it could knock your socks off.

 

Best of all it was cheap cheap cheap, about $1.70 a drink including for the 500ml of water so I didn't carry as much water as usual as the vending machines were every 50-100 meters in Kyoto. Very convenient.

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Off to Japan we go

It always seems to me a great idea to plan an overseas holiday with a 5 year old but I do always have a moment of doubt somewhere early on. This time it was not before we got on the plane but once we were off the other end and trying to buy tickets onto the train into town. I'd got the name confused of where I'd wanted to stay and it turned out to be half an hour further out from Tokyo than the place I was meant to stay near and we had to wait almost an hour for the next train. Bianca luckily took it all in her stride, here she is on the right on the train, at least 3 hours after she would normally go to sleep and still going strong.

 

Next day and she was ready for more travelling action with a train to Kyoto.

More silver temple

View from top of the garden in silver temple.

 

The paths, so many uses of gravel and fences....

lovely paths

Kyoto - the silver temple

 

I may have been a little ambitious with our travel plans. We stayed the first night in Tokyo near to a subway station. the plan was so we could walk there but then we were tired and tried to take a cab and he wouldn't take us, perhaps because it was so close? Certainly no English for the cab drivers.

 

Once we got to the hotel, I picked up my internet connection for the trip (mailed to the hotel). After that we could use google maps which shows the Japanese characters for a place on it for cab trips, that made life much easier, as did having a mobile internet in general.

 

First up was the Silver temple. we dropped our bags at our hotel and caught a cab. I had looked into a few tours but the problem with an organised 4 hour tour is that it doesn't wait for little people who don't feel like walking or get bored. So I figured with the money saved from no tours we could catch a couple of cabs.

 

The silver temple is on most but not all tourist agendas so it was pretty busy. As our first garden, it was also pretty mind blowing. Entrance to the temple below - even that looked amazing. had a momentary panic when camera wouldn't work, even on the iPhone, it all looks fabulous.

 

The silver temple is quite large, it has some gravel raked into cool patterns (see the large cone at the back right below, it is as big as a person - taller actually). The gardens then snake up a mountain.

 

Bridge just visible in the pic below.

 

Lots of ponds, lots of pine trees, lots of maples. Gardening heaven.

 

I loved the moss below - which was plentiful all over Kyoto. Kyoto even has a couple of famous moss gardens which you need to apply for tickets in advance and no under 18s, something for another time.

One thing that was awesome was the variety in the paths - stones of every pattern, bamboo fences, stone walls, every combination.

Finally as we came back down the hill, the silver temple itself.

That wore us out so much, we had to stop for icecreams which turned out to be lunch.

Port Macquarie is fabulous

Check out town beach. Divine!!!! Also it faces north so handy if a bit windy elsewhere.

Whale watching in port

We timed our visit perfectly to match with whale watching season. The boat was awesome fun, a joy ride in itself.