From Hong Kong we made a daytrip to neighboring Macau! You can easily take a ferry to this citystate, it only takes 50 minutes and has some beautiful views along the way. We didn’t know what to expect from Macau, knowing it mostly from its casino’s, but it turned out to be an amazing city …
Hong Kong is very unique in that the city is surrounded by nature, hiking trails, and has tons of parks that are full of exotic birds. It is such a nice experience just walking around Hong Kong! We visited two major natural areas, the first one being the peak, a must go place where you …
Now some looks into the beautiful colorful life of Hong Kong! It is an amazing vibrant city, and wow do we want to come back here again! During our stay, we went to some of the most amazing restaurants. One was on the 102nd floor overviewing the city!!! At first, we were literally up in …
We made a trip to Hong Kong and fell in love with this megacity! In the next three posts I’ll show the many facets of this magnificent city, starting with “The Walled City”. The original Walled City was demolished in the early nineties but that doesn’t mean there are tons of places in Hong Kong …
Florence is a city full of art, architecture and anatomical curiosities, and lots and lots of meat! We spent three days trying to get the most of all of it :) And Florence has gold, lots and lots of gold. Every building is basically a palace full of art and gold. On our first day, …
So, after our wonderful trip through Hokkaido, we spent the last few days in Tokyo before heading back to Sweden! When we arrived by plane, we had the most amazing views of endless Tokyo with even mount Fuji in the back. We also had a great view over Shibuya, which we ofcourse would visit! The …
For our last few days in beautiful Hokkaido we headed for Furano. This is maybe the most touristy area of Hokkaido, especially in July, because AAAALL the flowerfields are in full bloom! In the back you can see the mountainrange that we actually climbed in the last post, but now from the other side! SO …
In this post I’ll show our fantastic hike to Hokkaido’s highest mountain! ….but before heading to the Sounkyo gorge where we would stay for two days, we made a stop at the mysterious lake Kussharo. This lake has some really interesting inhabitants! These little Marimo are small, round algae orbs that live on the bottom …
On our fourth day we traveled to Noboribetsu Jigoku Valley, or “hell valley”, which is usually the name for places with lots of volcanic activity in Japan. But this place was very surprising, as it was also the home of tons of … demons! We had a delicious lunch in the small town and did …
On to Lake Toya! We are going to spend 4 days in that area, to explore the different parts of western Hokkaido. Superexcited we picked up our Toyota Yaris Cross and drove into the West. We had a nice lunch at a small cafe near the water. BTW: Japan has the most awesome candy, like …
Hoi Hokkaido! We went to Hokkaido for 2 weeks to travel around and see a side of Japan we hadn’t seen before. And it was amazing. We had a direct flight to Tokyo and then 1 hour to pick up our luggage, change terminals, check in our luggage, catch another plane on the domestic terminal …
And now for another color: yellow! Spoiler: there is going to be a lot of food in this post! The bowl of soba noodles above was really special. In a tiny restaurant (6 seats) in the street in Kyoto where we used to live (tetsugaku no michi), a cook makes a very delicious and simple …
And now for the lush green part of our travel! And now I want to dedicate the last chunk of this post to my favorite hike in Kansai: yamanobenimichi. I have made posts about this before (we’ve walked it three times now). It is a 4 to 5 hour walk through Nara’s countryside, following an …
We spent most of beautiful November in Japan and experienced all the colors of autumn, ranging from reds to yellows, green and even whites. Let’s start with the reds! Fushimi Inari still is one of our favourite hikes in Kyoto. The first few gates are very crowded, but once you pass the touristy bit the …
Yes, we went to Noma!!! “Nordisk Mat”, or “Nordic food” is what it is called, and has been topping the list of best restaurants in the world for years. Making reservations was not easy, the restaurant is closing for an indefinite time at the end of this year, and so this was one of our …
During our trip to Japan we went to one place we hadn’t visited before: Yakushima, a small island in the south of Japan, famous for its forests and hiking trails. It is said the the film Princess Mononoke inspired its forest on this island, and that is probably true, because once you venture into the …
The “geisha side of Japan” means to me the traditional arts (geisha literally meaning “art person” after all!) and Kyoto is the place to experience the different traditional Japanese arts, whether it is kaiseki food, bonzai trees or karesansui rock garden art, there is tons and tons to experience! But, I can’t have a post …
We spent a week in Kyoto and somehow did so many things, from hiking in the mountains to the north, to biking to the old geisha districts in the west, to visiting our old house and discovering new viewpoints in the hills to the east… This first post will focus on the green side of …
We went to Japan this February/March for one of the most amazing trips. I thought after living for so long in Japan, I would somehow get less impressed each time we go, but the opposite seems to be true. There is still so much to explore and experience in Japan, I don’t think we will …
Let me tell you about the infamous Besseggen hike! This a very popular but tough hike that every Norwegian has to do at least once in his life. The views are jawdropping, as it looks over the mountain range, the glaciers, and the enormous turquois glacial lake underneath. We traveled to Gjendesheim in the morning, …
And now, all about Jotunheimen! Jotunheimen means “the Giant’s home” and it is a fitting name. This area is just tremendously impressive. There are 100s of kilometers of scenic drives to do, and a same number of hikes. We only had a couple of days (one of which was dedicated to the infamous Besseggen hike …
We went to Norway! Which turned out to be one of the most epic countries I’ve ever been (and we’ve visited many!). I’ll split the post in several, because the Besseggen hike and Jotunheimen deserve their own post (120 photos is a bit much for one post anyway…) We drove all the way from Malmo …
For our midsummer break, we went to Prague! We both loved the city, you can walk around for hours and keep discovering new things. It reminds a liiiittle bit of Krakow, though Prague is much bigger and has much more extravagant architecture. The Art Nouveau buildings are amazing! We crossed the famous medieval Charles bridge …
Over the long May weekend, we went on a couple of trips to different castles around Malmo. First we biked all the way to Torup! Bokskogen is the huge forest around Torup castle, we went there in autumn a year back, but now in spring it looked very different! Very green and filled with flowers. …
This summer we did a roadtrip towards central Sweden! We went from a moose safari, to a fish smokery, through a troll forest, and ended up in small stuga (small Swedish house) surrounded by swamps! Starting with the moose safari, which was awesome, to get so close to such huge creatures is really impressive. I …
This Easter break we rented a car and drove up to Kullaberg, about 100 km north of Malmo. Kullaberg is beautiful nature reserve on a peninsula, with steep rocky cliffs, hundreds of birds, caves and beach coves, and even an ancient lighthouse. Sounds great doesn’t it? It was! We parked the car and then walked …
Spring is starting in Sweden so suddenly there are sunny days! And we decided to go to Ystad :) Ystad is actually the capital of Skane, the southern part of Sweden of which Malmo also is a part of. It’s a lovely coastal medieval city, with a big harbor, beaches and an old monastery. Some …
This weekend we took the bus to Falsterbo, an area on the most southwestern tip of Sweden. The reason we went there is because the nature preserve there only opens in winter and has a high chance of seal encounters! We DID spot a seal, but more on that later… Falsterbro is beautiful! I hoped …
The first week of 2022 we spent in wonderful Stockholm! We took the train from Malmö, and 5 hours later we were in Sweden’s capital. Our hotelroom had an amazing view over the city! Stockholm is a lovely city, basically a couple of islands connected to eachother, with on each island a different kind of …
We visited a beautiful forest area near Malmö this weekend to go hunting for mushrooms (for photo’s, not eating, we are not pro enough yet when it comes to finding edible mushrooms ;) There was a castle there as well, and we wandered along a 10km trail past many ponds, meadows, pine trees, old oaks …
2020 hasn’t really been a year for travelling, and so we decided to explore Poland instead! We went to the Tatra mountains, only a 2 hour busride away from Krakow, and one of the most beautiful spots in Poland! We went to Zakopane, the village on the base of the mountains, and spent 4 days …
Not much to do during Covid-year, but the Botanical Garden was open to the public! And it’s right behind our house. Never knew! It’s a huge and beautiful garden full of different plants. Unfortunately, because of ‘Rona, we couldn’t go inside the greenhouses, but there was more than enough to explore outside! So many colors! …
So many beautiful things already, but here is a lot more! This post I will show you our trips to the river Kwai in Kanchanaburi and the island Ko Samet. Let’s start with our journey to Kanchanaburi. The river Kwai was made famous by the movie ” bridge on the river Kwai”, even though the …
We traveled to the jungles of national park Khao Yai on the second day we arrived in Thailand, jetlag and all! The first evening we went out to go to a batcave. On the way we visited a local market where they sold all kinds of vegetables from the mountains around it, but there were …
Thailand is marked by many splendid temple complexes, often covered in gold and beautiful patterns. We visited a couple in Bangkok, but also went to the more mysterious abandoned and overgrown temples of Ayutthaya. Ayutthaya used to be the capital of Thailand (or the kingdom of Siam) and was founded in 1350. There are stories …
Thailand pt1: Busy Bangkok For Christmas and New Year we traveled to Thailand! I didn’t realize how diverse Thailand actually is, you can find old temples, a cyberpunk city, jungles full of monkeys and snakes, and beautiful white sanded beaches. We went to all of that! I’ve divided the posts up in to four parts: …
…And everything volcanic :-) It’s time for the ~~alien planet~~ side of Iceland! Why does Iceland look so alien? Well, for one, there aren’t any trees. Seriously. A couple of planted ones but other than that NO TREES. You can scroll back and check each post now if you don’t believe me :p Secondly, since …
Water! Iceland is full of water! Or foss-es, which means waterfall. They are EVERYWHERE and in every shape and size. Prepare for some awesome fosses!!! Now look at that foss! If you squint your eyes you can see people on the other side of the gorge and get a sense of the scale. (hint: IT’S …
Next element: Earth! Let’s start where we left off last post, with the misty fjord we were heading into. Seydisfjordur, to be more precise. This pictoresque village in the far east of Island is tucked away between mountains. When we arrived it was heavily foggy, but the next day things cleared up and we decided …
We made an amazing trip to Iceland this summer and while going through the photos, I realized that Iceland is very element-y! All the photos could be divided roughly in 4 themes: Wind & Ice, Water, Earth and Fire. So instead of the usual chronological way of telling, I’m going element-based this time. Let’s start …
We made a short trip to Helsinki last weekend and met up with our friend who showed us around the city and its beautiful spaces. Helsinki is all about architecture, design, patterns, snow and sauna, at least it was for us :) Helsinki is an amazing city!!! It is beautiful, clean and calm, not so …
New York is maybe even more amazing at night, when the city lights up in a thousand colors. We went up Freedom Tower to the 101st floor and it was so impressive, all the lights and cars moving around, like a giant glow in the dark anthill :p One night we had some light rain, …
We ❤ New York! We spent one week in the middle of Manhattan and here are our adventures in the city that never sleeps! This first post will be about all our wanderings in NY during the day. The city transforms at night, but those photos will come in the next post! Woooow New York is so …
We went to the Industry Workshops this year in London! This is a 3 day workshop for concept artists around the world so it is the ultimate place to meet new people and learn new techniques. Plus, we could have a small vacation in London!The area where the workshop was held was very interesting, with …
Since Vienna is just a (7 hour …) busride away from Krakow, we decided to spend the weekend in this beautiful city!There was no way that we could see all the sights in just one weekend… Vienna just has so much to explore! So we made a selection. First we went to palace Belvedere, a …
The final post I’ll make about our fantastic USA trip! This one has a lot of variety, since it covers Monument Valley, the Canyonlands, a bit of Denver and New Orleans! But first, Monument Valley! We all know those rock formations :-)It’s funny how surreal this area feels, mostly because you know the …
Time for some canyoning!! America has some fine canyons, and again the diversity is astonishing. We went to a couple o’ canyons and this post is going to be very photo-heavy because I had so much difficulty to make a selection :p. This post is about three canyons: Bryce Canyon, the Grand Canyon and Antelope Canyon. …
After our beautiful adventures in the lush forests of Yosemite and Sequoia, we saw the landscape change dramatically as we took highway 58 through the mountains. Near Sequioa, it was raining heavily, and Yosemite park actually flooded that day. But we drove towards the desert, and all rainclouds disappeared. Here came the sun! Our first desert …
After leaving the busy city of San Francisco behind, it was time for some nature! A lot of nature! First stop: Yosemite National Park.Yosemite is really gorgeous. It has incredible mountains (some still with some snow on it!) and even more incredible waterfalls (in spring they are the biggest!).We got up really early – thank …
So we made the most-amazing-roadtrip-ever this April, exploring the southwest of America, and it started out in San Francisco!Such a cool city! Our hotel was in the center, next to the awesome Chinatown, a very colorful neighbourhood with lanterns and supercool paintings on the walls. Lots of good coffeeplaces everywhere!San Francisco is just so colorfulWith our …
Yes, it is snowing, our first Polish winter here in Krakow! And we’re really impressed by the Polish snowman-making skills :-)They were everywhere, in all sizes, shapes and facial expressions :) Poor guy…:We made a new friend while strolling around beautiful snowy Krakow :-p
And after Art day and Archaeology day we also had a Vatican day! Usually there are 3 hour waiting lines to get in, but we bought our tickets to god in advance and could walk right through :-) Inside is an endless collection of riches from antiquity. In some ways it made me feel a …
We dedicated one day to the archaeology of Rome :-) O wow we love Roman history! Our first stop in the early morning was the Colosseum!It is so impressive!! Can you believe the games they held here thousands of years ago??The Forum Romanum, the very heart of ancient Rome, is located right next to the …
It’s been a while!!! In the meantime, we moved to Krakow (I promise I’ll post some photos) and we went on a short vacation to Rome :-) This is part 1, the first day, when we went to Villa Borghese and in the afternoon to the MaXXI museum (Modern Art). Villa Borghese was one of …
Before we were going to start with all the stress of moving and packing and saying goodbye etc. we decided to take a nice and peaceful break. And what would be better than a Buddhist break? So we traveled all the way south to mount Koya, which is a secluded mountain village that consists of …
And finally, a post about the Chinese side of Tokyo :-p We went to Chinatown in Yokohama, and to the Kawasaki entertainment hall. What does that last one have to do with China? Well, the whole inside of that gamecenter is decorated like the (now demolished) Walled City of Kowloon! The outside already looks awesome …
Tokyo is very moody during the night. We wandered around the city each night, visited all kinds of shady restaurants and bars, and made loooots of photos.Especially the Shinjuku district is very atmospheric. It reminds of movies like Blade Runner.We visited “Piss Alley”, named after the public toilet there, used heavily since the area is …
Time for craaaaazy Tokyo! Ofcourse Tokyo is the place to be to experience some weird crazy stuff, it is closest to the image of Japan most Westerners have, and sometimes I think in Tokyo they tend to exaggerate some of the craziness because they know tourists love that. So the crazy things we experienced were usually …
We went to Tokyo for a couple of days, just to have fun and visit some places we never gotten around to visiting, because who knows when we will come back to Japan??? So I am going to make 4 posts about different sides of Tokyo. We did so so so much different awesome things there that it …
Last week a colleague took us on a roadtrip to eat some “real soba” !It was a very cool and Japanese experience. The restaurant was located an 1,5 hour drive from Osaka, in the middle of farmlands and rice fields. The restaurant had no sign or anything, so it was a place that you hear …
Ok I want to dedicate this entire post to all the animals we encountered in our roundtrip through Australia! You get warned often to watch out for kangaroos….Wombats….And koalas…But fortunately we only encountered them in the wild and not on the road! Let’s start with the farm where we stayed for one night. There, they …
Kangaroo Island lies near Adelaide, and it has less kangaroos than the name might suggest haha :p But it has a lot of beautiful wild nature and beaches. By ferry, we arrived at Kangaroo Island in the early morning. We took a tour where we explored the island by bus with a group of about …
The Great Ocean Road! Woohoo! Driving along epic beaches and cliffs for two days and spotting a lot of wildlife! Sure, it was a bit rainy when we started…But those clouds headed towards Melbourne and flooded the city (they really did, we were lucky we missed that). So our Ocean Road was pretty sunny :)And cliffy …
We’ve visited two famous natural parks in Australia: The Blue Mountains near Sydney, and the Snowy Mountains on the way to Melbourne. First, the beautiful Blue Mountains! Amazing right? This huuuuuuuuge nature area consists of many canyon and valleys. It smells sweet from all the eucalyptus trees.We hiked a few trails too! We then visited the …
Our travel through Australia was so inspiring! We have so much photos to show, but let’s start with the big cities we visited!We arrived in Sydney, where Wards aunt picked us up and gave us a tour of the city! We finally saw the beautiful operahouse. We climbed the bridge to have an awesome view …
We traveled to Australia this christmas!! We rented a car and for two weeks and drove along the southside of Australia, from Sydney to Melbourne to Adelaide. It was a fantastic trip and I am going to write several posts about it, but for now, I just want to quickly summarize our trip and show some …
We rented a car with a friend and did a little roadtrip! First we visited Takeda Castle! This 15th century castle was built on top of a mountain and overlooked the valleys around it. Now there are only ruins left, which are really impressive. The most popular time to visit these ruins is in autumn in …
Since autumn has set in, the temperatures are nice and cool, it is time to start hiking again! And so we did, this time our goal was to summit Kansai’s highest mountain, mount Kongo!Getting there was a matter of stairs… lots and lots of stairs. Endless amounts of stairs…No it wasn’t that bad actually, it only …
So happy this year, my twinsis and her boyfriend traveled to Japan so we could celebrate our birthday together! They traveled from Tokyo to Matsumoto to Kyoto to Osaka and everything in between, but we could still spend three days together v(^^)v We climbed the Daimonji in Kyoto! Always a lovely hike, we used to live …
Summer is here!! Heatwaves yeah! 37 degrees during the day, 30 during the night and at least 33 degrees inside! Hooray for airconditioning :D No but summer also brings some very cool things (pun intended): Festivals and awesome fireworks! Near our house is Osaka’s most important shrine, the Tenmangu shrine, and every year one of …
We traveled back to the Netherlands during Golden Week! Wow, did you know Holland is absolutely beautiful? We were so lucky with the weather, which can be very rainy but was fantastically sunny the two weeks we were there. Not only did we visit our family and friends, we traveled all around Holland to the …
Or, in English, “the mountainside trail”. This famous trail leads alongside the mountains of Nara, through farmlands and past old temples, it is one of the most beautiful daywalks to do if you want to experience a bit of Japan’s rural areas. We walked this trail a couple of years ago, but wanted to come …
So it is hanami time! Time to sit on blue plastic sheets beneath the cherryblossoms, and drink and eat untill the early hours. All of it while wearing a kimono! After our trip to Arashiyama we took the train to downtown Kyoto to really get that hanami vibe :-) The atmosphere was amazing, beautiful lit …
O my it is sakura time again!! The trees are bursting with flowers! This weekend, we traveled to Arashiyama, Kyoto and Osaka to see all the famous cherryblossom spots. First stop: Arashiyama, where we actually saw a whole lot more than just sakura. Arashiyama is a beautiful mountain area west of Kyoto, and is famous for …
We have been to many of New Zealand’s beaches during our roundtrip, on the north, east, west and south side! And the funny thing was that all these beaches were so different from each other, different colors, different sand, different views. To begin with the most spectacular of all beaches: The Abel Tasman Park (named after …
So after our more general post with all the highlights of our trip, I want to show some more awesome photos about some of the fantastic places we visited! First up is volcanic New Zealand! The North Island is pretty much all volcano and that means unearthly landscapes and smells of rotten eggs :-) We stayed …
We spent three weeks traveling around New Zealand this winter and it was the most amazing trip we have ever made. New Zealand has so many different landscapes all packed together on car-drive distances, it is amazing how much we saw in three weeks. The people are extremely open and nice and everyone is so …
From our apartment we have a beautiful view of the mountains that separate Osaka from Nara. So, why not climb those mountains and see our house from the other side?? Only 20 minutes by train we arrived at the base station of mount Ikoma to start our climb!The trail starts at a beautiful old temple complex, “Houzanji”, …
Everything that allows for some escapism becomes really big and Japan, so what about dressing up in crazy costumes and parading in the streets? Yes please! Halloween has grown bigger and bigger and bigger over the past few years into a huge event with thoouuaasands of people dressed up as… well, anything. The atmosphere really reminded …
We spent a lovely day in Nara, the old city located right on the other side of the mountains we see from our balcony. Once the train leaves the tunnel through the mountain, it’s like you’re in a different world! Gone are the endless concrete buildings of Osaka, here are the rivers, green hills and …
Yes, we did it!! We climbed mount Fuji!! This was something we had on our wishlist since we moved to Japan and now we can finally say, we stood on top of Japan! Mount Fuji is with its 3776 meters the highest mountain of Japan! It is also one of the three sacred mountains, two of which we have …
Let me tell you the magical story of our visit to the Kirin beer factory! Probably one of our most absurd adventures in Japan. Kirin is one of the biggest beer brands of Japan, and as of today we know exactly how it’s made:-) How did we end up there? You know, I don’t really know myself! …
In summer there are festivals everywhere in Japan, and we went to a very magical one this year: the Shigaraki Fire Festival! And we did more than just watch, we participated :-)!! This beautiful festival takes place in a little village east of Osaka and Kyoto. The village is famous for its ceramics, and its …
This weekend we hiked the highest peak in the Rokko mountain range near Kobe! We started at trainstation Ashiyagawa and climbed all the way up to the peak at 931 m, then descended back on the other side of the mountain to Arima hot springs. The trail starts at a very nice teahouse near a …
After the Wall, Forbidden City and Summer Palace we spent one more day in Beijing. It’s amazing what we managed to do and see around the city! We walked over the immense Tiananmen Square (see the photo above), the world’s biggest square (Beijing has a lot of “world’s biggest”-records) and visited the shopping and eating area south …
So where did the Chinese royal family stay during the summer heat? Why, at the almost equally big ” Summer Palace”! :-0…. The Summer Palace lies a little north of Beijing on a hill so with a spectacular view of the city. The Summer Palace is green, lush, peaceful. A very nice place to spend a …
So after tackling the Great Wall, we visited the nr 2 on the Beijing must-see list: The Forbidden City! Here many Chinese emperors made their home! I mentioned in post 1 about China that everything here is big-bigger-biggest-MEGAHUGE and that really really goes up for this royal residence. It’s ENORMOUS! Like airport big. Really. I believe the Forbidden …
After spending 3 days in Shanghai, we took the train to Beijing! There, we prepared to do a 5 hour hiking tour across old and restored parts of this over 9000 km long wall. The weather was absolutely beautiful, and at 8 in the morning we were picked up by our guide. We drove through beautiful mountain …
During golden week we traveled through China!! Our trip was only 9 days but since we saw so many amazing things I will split our trip up in 4 (!) posts. First, I’ll start with our 3 days in Shanghai! It’s going to be a loooot of photos, so just scroll and enjoy ;-) Only 2 …
Cherryblossom season gooooooo! Every year we try to go to a special place to enjoy this pink explosion, and this time we travelled two hours southeast of Osaka to the famous Yoshino region. Basically, it’s a mountain range that’s completely covered in sakura trees. Yes, more than 30.000 trees can be found on the slopes of …
Also for Ward’s birthday, we had a fantastic dinner at Fujiya 1935, a three-starred restaurant just around the corner from our house. We had lunch there last year, and it was so amazing that we wanted to experience dinner too. Needless to say the dinner was even more spectacular!! I’ll just post images of the menu …
Ward Matsuri, or ” Ward Festival”, because for his 30th birthday Wards family paid a surprise visit to celebrate his birthday for a whole week :-D It was a biiiiig surprise because Ward had absolutely no idea they were coming to Japan!!! And so, we celebrated, gave presents, baked an applepie, took some days off to visit …
After all of our travelling in Vietnam (the past three blogposts took place in 9 days), we had one day left to explore Ho Chi Min City (also called Saigon). So we made the most of it! Saigon is very modern, and reminded us a bit of other big Asian cities, though it still has a …
After spending five days in and around Hanoi, we flew to Ho Chi Minh City, or as the locals prefer to call it, Saigon. This city is much more modern than Hanoi. From Saigon, we made two trips to some of its very interesting surrounding areas. The first was the Mekong Delta, a huge river landscape characterized …
The limestone karst landscapes of Vietnam are mesmerizing. It’s like you’re in another world. During our stay in Hanoi we did two overnight trips to these limestone landscapes: Halong Bay and Ninh Binh. First we travelled to the north to Halong Bay: this dreamy mountain area in the sea is a Unesco World Heritage site and rightly …
We have spent our Christmas in beautiful Vietnam. It was one of the most inspiring trips we’ve ever made! We took thousands of photos of the jaw-dropping scenery of bustling Hanoi, the peaceful and imposing Halong Bay and Ninh Binh, the fantastic Mekong Delta, the warfields in Cu Chi, and the modern Ho Chi Minh …
For work we traveled all the way to Bali to attend the Bali Illustration Workshop! How cool is that! It was a week full of drawing, meeting other awesome artists, eating strange foods, almost karaoke, monkeys stealing glasses right from your head, sundown at a watertemple, incredible wood/gold/silver and bone carvings, beers on hotel rooftop overlooking …
On “culture day”, one of the many Japanese holidays, we traveled to the little farm village Ohara, north of Kyoto. There we wanted to hike the mountain ridges to mt. Konpira. But first, we visited the lovely temple Sanzen-in :-) This beautiful temple in the Ohara hills has a nice garden and very cute statues. Kinda …
After summiting Tateyama our next goal was to climb the 925 meter Mount Atago, west of Kyoto. Perfect for a daytrip from Osaka! We took the 8:00 train and arrived about 2 and a half hours later at the foot of this sacred mountain in Kyoto. Then there was a warning sign, in English, wow. Must …
We’ve made it a bit of a tradition to go to michelin starrred restaurants on our birthdays. This time, we made reservations for Taian, a three-starred grill restaurant in Osaka. The first time we had three starred dinner (we usually go for lunch), so we were very excited! There was a heavy Typhoon in Japan …