So this is it for Japan. We visited Kanazawa’s famous garden for a couple of days and headed back to Tokyo to make our flight to Dubai. We thoroughly enjoyed all 20 days in Japan and very much enjoyed seeing cherry blossoms every single day we were in the country. We had no idea Japan would become our favorite country and we are truly lucky to have had all the different experiences.
Kanazawa was a beautiful place. We were fortunate to catch the cherry trees at peak bloom. The three days were spent enjoying the gardens and the sights along with discovering umeshu, a delicious fruit wine. Even though umeshu is very good, we are happy we discovered umeshu at the end of our time in Japan. Much like everywhere else, we found many locals who were quick to help us find our way or ask us how our time in Japan was going.
We had two really cool things happen on our last day in Tokyo. First, we finally found a sushi-conveyor place and were floored with the sushi’s deliciousness. I’m not sure why I thought it might not be the best sushi I’ve ever had as every single meal in Japan, no matter where purchased, has been amazing. We’ve had food from every type of restaurant: higher end restaurants that serve organic & cage free meats, convenience store food, fast food, typical restaurants, and quick-serve like restaurants where we had to order from a machine. All, yes ALL, where awesome and the sushi place was no exception. Second: while killing time before our flight we found we could learn origami in the Tokyo Tourist Office. We simply followed the steps in the instruction book and started making cranes. After awhile, three Australian children came over and we all did origami together. They spent nearly 45min with us and their parents thanked us for helping their kids learn origami. However, I think their youngest daughter’s reply to her mother said it best, “They didn’t teach us, it’s in the book. We just followed the book”. She wasn’t wrong smile emoticon. By the time we were done we had spent about three hours making origami and had a small crane army.
We’re going to miss Japan. The conscientiousness, the courtesy, the cleanliness, the quiet, the beauty, the food, the infrastructure, and how everything works as advertised will be greatly missed. A lot of nations have some of those items almost none have all.
Enjoy the photos!
Chris W.
