Now where did I leave off, ahh yes! It was on Wednesday morning after a wonderful breakfast made by Nisrene that Tyler and I set off in search of the most beautiful castle on Earth, Himeji Castle.
An incredibly long train ride there, two hours!, we arrived in Himeji. We walked through the city on the way to the castle, and then began exploring the grounds. Yes, I had already visited before with Nisrene, but this castle is just so magnificent that I would visit it a hundred more times and not get bored. This is because Himeji Castle is not a museum inside! Yay! It was not destroyed in a war and it didn't burn down! Great news. The castle is kept up very well along with the surrounding reinforcement buildings and the like. I do not know much Japanese castle terminology.
While inside the castle grounds, my stomach began growling again, and I persuaded Tyler to go get lunch. We ate at another souvenir shop/restaurant, and I had...oh! it was like katsudon but with chicken, and I ended up dumping a whole lot of spices in it to make it tasty. Tyler got something that looked really traditional and yummy. The waitress also brought us out a little appetizer that tasted disgusting. Neither of us knew what it was.
After lunch, we were full, but there was an ice cream stand, and Tyler cannot resist ice cream. Or maybe I forced him into it, but we shared the most delicious Japanese ice cream cone ever. It was half soy bean milk and half black sesame flavored. It tasted like peanut butter!! I hope I find this again somewhere. Here's a black sesame ice cream recipe I just found.
We walked back to the station to find something else to do, and to see if that amusement park we had seen on the way in was within walking distance. While I was in a restroom, Tyler was chatting up the ladies in the information center. He found out that there was a park in addition to the amusement one nearby and that we could rent bikes and ride there. We got two keys and picked up the bikes from their underground garage (so cool! just like with cars!)
We rode around Himeji to the park. We started by walking up some stairs that had various fountains placed amongst the steps, and at the top we were greeted by a garden. We walked around the garden and then up some more and could see the city around us. We also found an aquarium. After a little more walking, we saw some medieval style castle buildings sporadically placed along the hill we were looking down. We did some exploring and took pictures of the miniature castles. I think it would be a rather romantic place to be during sunset. Wink, wink.
We had to have the bikes back by six, and we still had to travel to our hostel in Kobe, so we headed back after a little while and got on a train.
Our hostel in Kobe was not in the downtown/harbor area, and we arrived a little late so we did not do any sightseeing in Kobe. In fact I believe we were staying near some of the sake breweries, but we never went. The hostel was in an industrial area with no restaurants around, so we got food from the supermarket that night for dinner. On the upside, it was extremely on sale as most prepared foods are near closing time.
We had a tv in our room at this hostel, and since I don't have a tv in my place in Nara, I insisted on watching lots of tv before bed. Ah, I miss television.
And then the day ended.
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