Sincerest apologies for the delay in (finally) posting photos from Tokyo, but it’s been a hectic month and I kept unconsciously typing “Expedia.com” into my browser each time I flipped through them. I did talk about my visit to Union Square Tokyo a while back, so you can find all that good stuff there. The weather was rather poor while we were in Tokyo — it was usually either raining or overcast, and our plans to double-back at the end of the trip were nixed — so I have pithy few photographs of this extraordinary city. I guess (Oh well, guess I’ll have to go back!) (more…)

After exploring Hiroshima a little and checking out the Peace Memorial Museum and Park, we hopped on a ferry to the nearby island of Itsukushima (厳島). Itsukushima is a small island in the western part of the Seto Inland Sea, just northwest of Hiroshima Bay and popularly known as Miyajima (宮島), the “Shrine Island.”

The island is so named because of the Itsukushima Shrine, yet another UNESCO World Heritage Site and home of the famous floating Torii gates (which also happen to be commonly renowned as one of Japan’s three most beautiful views). In addition to the floating shrine (when the water rises during high tide, the massive vermillion Torii gates and the shrine appear to float on the water), the island is also famous for its maple trees, azuki jam-filled pastries, wild Sika deer, oysters, religious significance, and as a luxury ryokan destination. (more…)

So, clearly I’m a little behind on the updates, but yes, I am still alive. We left Kyoto on June 4th and have been traveling pretty much nonstop since (with extremely limited Internet access — in fact, I don’t even have Internet access now; I’m writing this from a ferry back to Kagoshima from Yakushima so I can post it whenever I finally do get online).

In any case, it’s now been just over a week since we left Kyoto, so I’ll try to do a quick recap to bring us up to speed. In the meantime, please forgive the cheesy photo of my iPod against a window taken from my seat on a train. Unless you work for Apple’s marketing division and are hiring, in which case: please let me know where to forward my resumé. (more…)