A little journey around Japan

Recently we had Abbie's family come visit, we had a wonderful tie with them and even did a bit of the Japanese tourist thing ourselves, with visits to the old and current capital cities (Kyoto and Tokyo) and even went to a monkey park on our way home. So here's some pics to tell the story.

Abbie's family arrived with some NZ supplies for us,
that's right folks, we've got two unopened premium jars of Marmite!

The famous Japanese Cherry blossom in full bloom,
absolutely beautiful!

All the whanau, plus Yukiko and her niece Ami

We took the family in to Shinsaibashi,
one of the busier areas of Osaka.

Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto, one of the more famous temples in Kyoto,.
Beautiful weather that day and heaps of people.

We tried to make sure they experienced all the necessary Japanese cuisine.
Here's us having Kaitenzushi (Sushi train)

This is a unique Japanese restaurant, where you order lots of small plates and share them all. And you sit on the floor with a space under the table for your legs.

Okonomiyaki - savoury cabbage pancake, very famous in Kansai! (the region that Osaka is in)

About to catch the Shinkansen (bullet train)

The crazy lights of Shinjuku on a rainy evening

Standing on the 43rd(ish) floor of the Tokyo Council Building

Tokyo stretched as far as the eye can see!

A little stop off at Tokyo Disneyland, quite fun

One of the highlights of the trip away, the Monkey park.
The pool is a natural outdoor hotpool, or Onsen, this one is for Monkeys only.

We got so close to them, was real fun.

A little bit of monkey business

On one of our restaurant trips we met some university students. We had fun together practising our Japanese. They asked us why we came to Japan, and Tim had a crack at explaining that we'd prayed and Jesus asked us to go to Japan. Cool opportunity to share our story.

Another restaurant on another night.

At Universal Studios Japan we met someone very famous!
Hello Kitty!