On travel soon

[brian]

I still owe you all pics from the first trip to Japan!

[Xjmt]

[lswot]

And here I thought it was business you were looking forward to......har, har.
I love Disneyland......only been to the one here (presume that's DCA)......but, it would be interesting to see some of the others. Florida would be too sticky hot for me, though.
But.....in my mind you can't beat the ORIGINAL!!!!!

[brian]

DCA is the other park there, Disney's California Adventure.

If you love Disneyland, you would adore WDW's Magic Kingdom!

You've just got to come in January, when it's only 80 degrees and 90% humidity. Brrr...

[Xjmt]

ONLY?!?

[lswot]

ONLY?!?

Yeah.....my thoughts, too......

I've been to California Adventure. .....not since they've changed a few things, though.

[brian]

I made it to Iwakuni a couple of hours ago. This trip was like pushing a boulder uphill, with plane and train delays.

My hour and a half layover in Atlanta turned into five hours, due to the aircraft we were supposed to fly to Tokyo being late arriving from Johannesburg. So my plan of getting to my hotel in Tokyo around 6pm, walking around and having a leisurely dinner before retiring early turned into getting to the hotel at 11pm, rushing out to a McDonalds and crashing at 12:30am (30 hours after I rose Thursday morning), just to get up six hours later to catch the bullet train.

Then the bullet train, which have now learned is ironically called the Nozomi "Superexpress", stopped between stations about halfway to Hiroshima (where I had a connecting train to Iwakuni) and sat there for over an hour. All of the announcements were in Japanese, and neither the snack cart girl nor anyone sitting around me could speak English. We finally got one "the train has stopped temporarily due to a power failure" message about five minutes before it restarted.

Then it stopped again, just as the train was turning into a city. So we stopped with the train banked 10 degrees to the left. Fortunately, that time we were only stopped for 5 or 10 minutes.

So I was sure I missed my connection in Hiroshima, so I went straight to an information booth to try to get reticketed to a later train. No one there spoke English, despite the English sign saying "Information" hanging over their heads. Finally a traveler came up and said, "Are you in trouble?" and helped me communicate with the rail staff. It turns out my connection was also an hour and a quarter late. The whole rail system must have shut down.

The good news is that I got some of the best accommodations available here on base, nothing like the converted barracks with no internet I had last time. I have a full kitchen, living room, computer, and a back patio on the base's golf course. A month in this room won't exactly be torturous.

[AnneB]

Did you take a camera? I would like to see some of these things you are describing. And Fallstar, who doesn't pop in here very often any more, had a Japanese mother. I'm sure she would be interested in pictures of Japan.

[lswot]

Wow, Brian.......what a trip..... But, I bet the room at the end sort of made up for it all. That train sounds scary.

[Xjmt]

And I drove all the way to Sushi Rock today......that's a restaurant about 6 miles from where I live.

Yeah! What Anne said! PICTURES!!!

[brian]

I have tons of pics. I just need to process them for the web.

[AnneB]

[Xjmt]

[brian]

Well.

I've been working 10-12 hours a day for the past 14 days. I haven't had a day off since the 12th.

So all-in-all, this trip sucks.

But, I guilted my boss into letting me take the next two days off.

And I've had my fill of mountains and temples and historical wonders, so this weekend, it's pure pop culture. I'm taking the train to Osaka in the morning and seeing an all-Japanese production of Wicked at 1:00. That should be good for a laugh. And I know the show so well, I won't miss a thing. I'll have my own subtitles running in my head, lol. Then I may go to the aquarium, one of the largest in the world, I hear. And the next day I'll hit Universal Studios Japan for my birthday.

[lswot]

Well.....you deserved the time off. Have fun......and a Happy Birthday!