Alright well on the 24th I hung out half the day with a fellow New Zealander traveler I met at the hostel then left Hiroshima and jumped up to a Bullet Train to Okayama.
By the time I got to my Hotel I only had a hour of day light left and with my ankle playing up after my tramp the day before I decided to just get some food and call it a day.
So Friday I got up and went to explore Okayama.
First stop was was Korakuen Garden which is meant to be the 3rd best garden in the whole of Japan.
Across the river was the Okayama Castle.
The Castle tower was destroyed in World War 2 so like all the others I have been to before this was a reconstruction.
The tower museum was the must expensive I have been to so far and probably the worst as well. Nothing was in English and it had nothing inside to show what the castle looked like in its prime.
It was a 4 hour train ride to my next destination Matsue so after the trip to the Garden and Castle so that was the 25th.
The next day In Matsue I braved the weather again and headed to yet another castle.
As I mentioned above to this point all the castles I have been to up to this point were reconstructions built in the 1930's or after world war 2. Not Matsue Castle it dates back to the 1600s and never burnt down!
The insides were awesome!! I didn't take that many photos as it was so dark and I didn't want to use a flash but it was an amazing building.
The rest of the day was taken up by walking exploring Matsue.
The next day it was a 6 hour train ride to my next destination Kinosaki Onsen.
The reason why it took so long I had to catch 2 different train lines and both of them were local lines so they didn't travel that fast and stopped at every station. I saw some amazing land scapes though. No photos due to window reflections.
The place I was staying at Kinosaki Onsen was nice but really hard to find, had to ask two people to find it.
Room on my first night and Dinner!
And Breakfast !
Kinosaki Onsen or Kinosaki Hot springs is a small town with seven natural hot spring baths in it. In between talking multiple baths I explored the town and surrounding area.
Then headed up a cable car to a temple up one of the near by hills then walked down.
Taking baths Japanese style was a very interesting experience and very relaxing! Some of the baths were great with water falls and caves and stuff.
Ok well I am currently back in Tokyo.
Tomorrow I am going to go shopping and also head to the Studio Ghibli Museum in the afternoon.
This will be my last post while in Japan as I fly back on Thursday night and arrive back in Wellington at 11:45 on Friday morning.
I will do a least one ore post when I get home mention some of the stuff I have learned while in Japan and some stuff I forgot to mention.
Catch you guys later and see some of you in the flesh soon!
