Japan

Japan was the most orderly and easy place we have ever traveled. The people were super-friendly and helpful, the trains ran on time, and just about everything was in English. We traveled south from Tokyo to the city of Kagoshima on the tip of the main Japanese island of Honshu via the shinkansen (japans 185 mph high speed train), visiting the temples of Kyoto, the memorials at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the volcanic hot springs and geysers of the Kyushu region. Our trip coincided with the incredible annual display of the blossoming of the cherry trees, so everywhere we went was not only spectacularly scenic, but also temples were open and lit up for night viewing, and almost everywhere we went, we found Japanese out celebrating the blossoming with picnics, toasts, lots of saki and sapporo drinking, and all kinds of festivals. Here we are rowing around a moat of a castle in Tokyo...as usual, Kirk is doing all the work!

We were happy to learn we’d unintentionally purchased tickets in the smack center of the ‘organized cheering section’ at a Japanese baseball game, and had a great afternoon following along with our whistle blowing cheerleader to the pre-canned cheers they have for every possible situation ( including every strike, foul, fly out, home-run…) and shooting balloons around the stadium at the 7th inning stretch. Domo arigato japan.