To fight those January blues we have been trip planning. It is certain death for the savings, but for the life experience, totally worth it! Before we depart Yamaguchi Prefecture in July, we have decided to check out some of its hot tourist destinations. The first on the list…Akiyoshidi Plateau and Cave. We decided on…
Category: Country living
Birthday Bits
Another birthday, another workday. This years birthday work day was a day of student plays. They were pretty good fun and several of them managed to get a birthday reference into them! My delightful third graders even made me a card saying lots of lovely things about me and my classes, and sang me a…
Surprising Shocks
We have now been living in Japan for well over a year. It seems remarkable that we have managed this long, given that we are still far from masters of both the language and life here. Sure, we are used to living in Japan. Things are familiar to us. Yet, each day I will still…
J&J visit the Inaka!
At the end of August we were lucky enough to host our first oversees guests as James and Jade visited us from the U.K. On Thursday we took a day at the beach and relaxed the hell out of that. The sea was like bath water, but alas, it is quite the temptress! After a…
Playing at Paddle Boarding
During the summer holiday in 2017, we visited our good friends, Lauren and Brittany, on their beautiful Island home, Suo-Oshima. We last visited the island in autumn, and it was a nice enough place. However, summer is the season for Suo-Oshima! The sea was glittering and the mountains were lush. It looked like the most…
Amazing Sunsets
When Dan and I moved to Japan a whole year ago, our area felt really residential and lacking in the city fun we had enjoyed in Manchester. It was a difficult adjustment as we were used to spending our evenings in bars enjoying over-priced ale, not strolling along a beach. Don’t get me wrong, real…
Wisteria Garden Part 2 and Another Date Weekend
So, as ‘wisteria garden part 1’ suggests, we took a second shot at wisteria heaven. The second shot was a little more successful than part one, this time at least the garden was not a stick garden at least. There was even evidence that at some point earlier in the week there had been a…
Sunday Strawberries
As spring broke, the cherry blossoms departed, and the temperatures rose, we had a gentle afternoon of all-you-can eat strawberry picking. The all-you-can eat fruit picking is an unusual concept for us, but strawberries….wow, are they delicious. I am pretty sure they have always been tasty, but in Japan they seem to be more juicy…
Hanami!
Spring in Japan is a time to celebrate the change of seasons as the weather gets warmer, the bugs are born again, and the flowers bloom. Most people connect Japan with the Cherry Blossom flower, or Sakura. It features in pretty much all of Japan’s advertising and is a of national importance! Sakura trees can…
Fukuoka Flower Circles
Dan and I ventured to our nearest `big city` for a brilliant weekend of Asahi brewery beer touring, ramen eating, and gallery exploring. Fukuoka is Japan`s sixth largest city and a mere hour and half away from ours on the bus. That may feel like an age in the well-connected UK city scene, but for…