28/6/07:
So Delhi is grating on my nerves the noise, the consant hasal and the many many flies!! We say goodbye and board the bus to the airport.

Me and Dave catch a cold beer and fish and chips before we fly, true british style (it costs us 2 nights stay for this pleasure). We then bomb it to duty free to buy copius amounts of chocolate....of course.
We are currently on the plane to Japan where there is a camera at the front of the where we can see the take off...v. cool. Well India has come to an end, we have had some brilliant times, some not so much (being fondled in the sea by a sweaty Indian b*****). Both me and Dave getting the dreaded "Delhi belly", Dave grew two moles then lost them in the swimming pool after a good scrub! I have sweated about three times my body weight but managed to put on weight!! We have had two warm showers. I have felt like the candyman covered in flies! But we have throughly enjoyed India. We have met some lovely poeple and some very dishonest gready people. India will always be special as it was the first coutry and the start of our trip.

29/06/07:
We have arrived in Japan woo! Temperature 28...better! Sooo tired from the journey have been up 28hrs. Japan airlines is brilliant, amazing services. We now have to catch our train to our hotel. One and a half hr journey, so of course we fall asleep on the train. 4 pound for a single Ahhh! We arrive at the hotel, check in a 15:00 its now 13:00, my god why! We have to remove our shoes and change into house slippers...so cool. Our room was the size of most peoples toliets (4*5ft) with a rolled up futong. Very neat and compact. The landlord very kindly lets us use the room and we take a nap and set the alarm for 17:00 and wake at 20:00 hungry.

We stroll to a cafe with reasonable prices. I had prawns and squid with rice and Dave of course went for meat. Bless him, he has been deprived for nearly two weeks. A very nice Japanese stranger who looked like he had had a few too many brought us a few beers to say welcome. V warm reception so far. We head back to use the internet (which is free!) and hit the hay again!

30/6/07:
Up early to maximise our day. We head on the subway (which is all a/c) to see the Imperial Palace. Must say the building design is v. cool, but the Indian palaces are up there for the "wow" factor.

Japanese food is so pricey so we head to the local supermarket and buy our breakie. For me cold noodle salad and Dave cold chicken and rice, we then spotted the microwave in the shop after we finished...Doh! Japan resembles New York and London with a more improved technology. The women are amazingly petite and feminine with an unique style you would just like to bag and take home. Looking at them is like viewing a cat walk parade. So so clean in comparision to India. You could literally eat of the floor....spotless!

Japan is a shoppers paradise which unfortunately we can't afford, however looking is free and we do lots of it. We rest up and break for a snack (a burger) the cheapest snack we find, roughly 5-6 pounds. We return a five ish, and head into Repongi for the evening, apparently the happening place, bars, clubs etc. There is a huge cinema showing Die Hard 4 but 15 pounds...robbers! So we say sanara to Mr Willis and eventually head back to the hotel at midnight.

01/07/07:
We start the routine again however in a different place, up shoper and pack etc. The shower cost 100yen foir 5mins. So we share a lovely 2.5mins each of a warm shower. I am now in a country that the humidity doesn't affect my hair as much, but the power outlet is about half of UK so its about as powerful as placing my hair on a luk warm radiator and expecting miricles to happen. So yet again I am still sporting the new white woman afro, and Dave is resembling a yetti...what a pair!
I get burnt in town yesterday and am looking good with my " t*** straps" over my chest. We head to the post office as the cards cease to work in most ATM's. After testing 8 cards with a few swears and a 20 min train journey no such luck on the INTERNATIONAL ATM...Balls! So to conserve our money I head back to the hotel as Dave goes to the airport to exchange to the money exchange, cause its Sunday and there is no place open to change the cheques either....#*@!!! So I am feeling about as useless as a chocolate kettle while Dave is off to the rescue to sort out the finances.

Our train the Shinkansen aka "the bullet" s s very fast train to Kyoto is booked for 19:00 pm (55 pounds single). It's now 17:00 and Bravid just walks in all is ok the money had been released we are saved. So we board the train to Kyoto. It takes two hrs to go about 400 miles. It portrays an aeroplane ( you will see in the pics)ears pop and the speed is amazing!! Unfortunately we have limited time in Kyoto as we have to sort out our Chinese visa's in Tokyo.

We arrive at ten. The toliets on the train are Japanese style which is a disturbing reminder of India as it's also just a a hole in the ground, although its a bigger hole it brings back painfull memories. We wonder around Kyoto looking for the info office which is helpfully closed. We try to find the "Tomato" hostel which is appears closed or shutdown and after what seems like hours and two slipped vertabrae later we find a pricey guesthouse which is originally called the Kyoto guesthouse we receive a warm welcome, bags off and straight to bed, we explore tomorrow.

2/07/07:

What a sleep! We rise early and after another warm shower we have breakie. (co co pops, toast jam and fruit salad, v. Japanese!). We hear of a tour guide, a 76 yr old man who tours around Kyoto for free because he loves tourists and likes to practise he english. I call but unfortunately the is booked so we head on our billy and go exploring.

We buy a travel card for buses and head to the temple. Twas very cool, in a beautiful location in the mountains! Lots of Budda's and gongs. We then head to the Japanese market "Nishiki" to see the weird and wonderful things that enter the world of Japanese cuisine. Lots of moving things and watching you! (they also eat leeches!). We walk to the Imperial Palace which is off limits..shame. Then we bus it over to the golden temple. This was incredible a GOLD temple with enormous Koi Karp in the surrounding waters.

After we come back and shower...it's free, and had some lovely shushi. We ventured out to Gion town to to try and spot a real Geisha. We hung around like dodgy paparazzi on a mission to snap one. We did about 20 rounds of the streets looking at the old Japanese style tea houses or "ho slums" in modern street talk. We then spotted a madame "pimp" who was seeing her Geisha's "b****es" off with a client "sugar daddy". We couldn't believe it a real Geisha. Dave was so excited and the combination of the dark we caught a semi decent snap of one. We then of course saw another 3! It was very sureal as if we were in a movie. Some were non obliging for posing and some were ok. After lurking in the "backside" (Indian phrase) of town we decided we were done and headed home.

03/07/07:
Today we head back on the bullet to Tokoyo. We dump our bags and look around Kyoto station before boading. The station is giangatenous and has escalators all the way up to an "observatory" platform. Unfortunatley no picture of Mount Fuji. We get back to Tokyo and go to another hostel and chill out with a movie.
04/07/07:
We make use of our time left in Tokyo and go looking around town. We head to the Chinese embassy to hopefully start the process of our visas. We go into Ueno and take in the park and art museum. The collection of budda sculptures were incredible and the amour was brill. There were ink on silk paintings which were pretty awesome! We have really heavy rainfall (not as bad as the monsoon in India). Lots of homeless living in the park.
We then got to Asakusa to see the large temple guarded by the guradians of fire and lighting and the five tiered pagoda. It was pretty cool, but we have to wait for the sun to set to snap some decent shots. The colours were fantastic. After this we stagger home, fall into bed with throbbing feet.
05/07/07:
Up early it's our last day. We head into town to look at the "art space" building which contains the "crazy" escalator experience. Well there was no crazy feeling going up what looked like a very ordinary escalator. I think the only buzz I was getting was from the iced coffee I had prior to boarding the mad ride, so we felt pretty cheated! Howerver, the art exhibition was pretty cool with some groovy photography. The other building the sunshine building, one of the largest in Japan contained one of the world's largest exhibition centre of Toyota cars. We went on driving games and simulater, sat inside some nice cars and saw a stunning sports model in red, at the risk of sounding like a chav... it was lush!
The rest of the town is all shops, a big fat tease for travellers. We mange to collect our visas and are now legally allowed into China.
06/07/7:
On the train to the airport where the b'stard security officers steal my french manicure set (liquid, bombs etc) so now my nails look skanky..how rude! It's roughly 4 hrs to Hong Kong. What a journey Dave and I thought we were going to die! I thought I would see projectile vomitting, the worst flight of our lives. Thank god we don't fly for another 4 months.