{"id":10886,"date":"2023-11-15T03:14:40","date_gmt":"2023-11-15T11:14:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/?p=10886"},"modified":"2023-11-15T03:14:40","modified_gmt":"2023-11-15T11:14:40","slug":"japan-2023-day-14","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/?p=10886","title":{"rendered":"Japan 2023: Day 14"},"content":{"rendered":"

Woo, not a bad night of sleep. What I did was let the A\/C heat the room all night even though it makes awful noises and then didn\u2019t use the comforter as much. Through much experimentation I found that even if the room is cold the comforter in the hotel is just too much. Phew. Too bad I figured it out on my last night.<\/p>\n

The pain in my ass keeps being a pain in my ass. It changed though. I could not get it to go away, but it wasn\u2019t as intense. So as you\u2019d expect, I overdid it later in the day. I\u2019m on vacation. I can\u2019t just sit inside all day.<\/p>\n

I started out at the SAME COFFEE SHOP. Mainly because it\u2019s close and I like it. There\u2019s no coffee cup in the room so I have to rely on outside coffee and Drip-X-Cafe is about as good as it gets.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

Oddly it\u2019s been getting less and less crowded as the week goes on.<\/p>\n

Then it was time to make my way to Wakayama. I was going to try to get on an express train but the maze to get across the street to the main station was too much and I had one minute to make it through the gate and onto the train. I decided to go with a later option and found one that was even faster. I had to ask if it was reserved seating and it sure was. Reserved seating only! I made some mistakes buying my ticket and only bought the seat. You also need to buy a transit ticket from point-to-point and I forgot that. The other odd thing is that it\u2019s in the new JR station. It took me forever to get to the gate, and then the cars on the trains kept flip-flopping where car one was on the front for my train but was on the back for the previous train. I got the only seat left on the right-hand side and I was afraid I\u2019d be crammed in next to someone else. Turns out I was in a weird end row where there was only one seat on the right-hand side! And plenty of seats were open so I really can\u2019t understand how the JR reservation system works.<\/p>\n

I made it to Wakayama, took the bus to the hotel, dropped off my bag, and then went looking for the ramen restaurant that my friend Moriwaki told me to try. I found out later that Wakayama has their own take on ramen and they call it \u201cchuuka soba\u201d. The line wasn\u2019t that bad. And it can go pretty fast. The whole seating area was tiny and most of the inside was the kitchen.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

I was recommended the normal ramen, but I got the \u201cspecial\u201d that had more charsiu pork. The eggs and the weird sushi are there for the taking. You just tell them how many you ate as you check out.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what the noodles look like.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

Later I added an egg. Turned out to be perfect for hipsters with that bright orange color.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

I wasn\u2019t quite full but I never did find any sweets. Instead I went back to the station for suggestions on what to see. I can\u2019t remember what the old seaside town area is called (probably old seaside town area) but my ass felt OK today. It\u2019s probably because, for some reason, it\u2019s warm again. I even got sunburnt a little.<\/p>\n

I took a train to the middle of nowhere and had to walk quite a way to make it to Kimiidera. The woman at the tourist bureau told me I\u2019d be OK because there was a ropeway and elevator at this temple. It had the largest standing wooden statue in Japan(? the world?), but the statue is fairly new and also gilded so I couldn\u2019t tell it was wooden. But back to the ropeway. It was like diagonal elevator, though it cost \u00a5600 (I think \u00a5400 was for entrance to the temple). You got on and pushed the \u201csecond floor\u201d button or whatever the label was and off you went.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

The temple was quite nice and was #2 on a pilgrimage route. Just like me to start in the middle.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the building with the wooden Kannon (Goddess of Mercy) statue.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

And as the tourist center promised, the view was pretty nice (there was a nicer view but I forgot to take a picture from it).<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

Then there were miles of walking through semi-industrial Japan to get to a few shrines. My leg hurt a bit, but it wasn\u2019t so bad that I stopped. One of the worst parts is the paths were made of the same odd paving stones that made the surface uneven and that did not help.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

I made it to the last temple on my list, Kishu Toshugu shrine. There are a couple of barriers to entry. First, the stairs. Stairs are what make the pain in my ass worse. If I had any sense, I would\u2019ve skipped this shrine.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

But obviously, I do not have any sense.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

The second barrier to entry is that it costs money to enter. I don\u2019t know of many shrines that make you pay to enter and it made it feel like a tourist trap. It\u2019s modeled after the mausoleum of Tokugawa Ieyasu in Nikko and was commissioned by his son. You can\u2019t take pictures of the artwork and it was also slightly faded and dirty. I guess I was spoiled when I saw a newly restored temple in Gunma that had similar artwork but on a much grander scale.<\/p>\n

When I got to the bus stop I found there was only one bus per hour but the bus was leaving in 15 minutes! And boy did my ass hurt!<\/p>\n

I\u2019m staying at fancier hotels for my last week. I knew I was rolling the dice for the last few, so I picked a big name brand, Daiwa Roynet, for my stay in Wakayama. I think I also paid for an \u201cupgrade\u201d. I\u2019m on the 19th floor and here\u2019s the view from my window.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

The room is also way bigger than the one in Osaka.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

I could just sit here and look out the window all day.<\/p>\n

For dinner I didn\u2019t want to go far because my ass hurt (as I keep mentioning). Google only mentioned the Cantonese restaurant here but there\u2019s also a udon\/soba shop. It was pretty good. The shrimp tempura was bigger, I forgot to take a picture until I took a bite out of it. That\u2019s why there looks to be things floating in the soy sauce and tsuyu too. Anyway, this cost a whole \u00a51680 (about $11.20 US right now?)<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

I got a caramel cream puff at the Family Mart on the way back to the room and I was a little disappointed. I should remember that the puff pastry isn\u2019t going to last long enough to be shipped around, plus the caramel tasted burnt. I still ate the whole thing.<\/p>\n

\"IMG<\/p>\n

Tomorrow I take the ferry to Tokushima where I spend a couple of days. I might try renting a car one of those days. We\u2019ll see.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Woo, not a bad night of sleep. What I did was let the A\/C heat the room all night even though it makes awful noises and then didn\u2019t use the comforter as much. Through much experimentation I found that even if the room is cold the comforter in the hotel is just too much. Phew. Too bad I figured it out on my last night. The pain in my ass keeps being a pain in my ass. It changed though. I could not get it to go away, but it wasn\u2019t as intense. So as you\u2019d expect, I overdid it later in the day. I\u2019m on vacation. I can\u2019t just … Continue reading Japan 2023: Day 14<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-japan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10886"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10886\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10887,"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10886\/revisions\/10887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.i8u.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}