Out of the ordinary

Galettes bretonnes on Enoshima. Fun, but couldn't be compared to Brittany...

Surprise!

Cherry blossoms in October!

Seize the day

Another early start today to head out to Enoshima. I have been here before at sunset, so interesting to see it all again in daylight.

Surfing the sunset

Sunset at the beach in Kamakura, complete with surfers.

First time for everything

Delicious matcha latte and houjicha ice cream at a cafe over a tenugui and tea shop in Kamakura.

Harvest

An autumn specialities box with sweet potato, chestnut, gingko nut, lotus root and lots of mushrooms.

On the rails again

Another long train journey, this time from Sendai south via Tokyo to Kamakura, another bento!

Choo choo

And another Kittfied icon, the inexplicably popular Shinkansen diagnostics train "Doctor Yellow".

You may be lucky he's not around now

Date Masamune, legendary local warlord, possibly a bit too iconic for his own good.

C'mon...

David watching taiyaki being made at a little shop on the way from Sendai station to our hotel. He had a green tea and red bean one, and I had a wonderfully savoury pumpkin one, both literally hot off the press.

Open sesame

Insanely good black sesame paste mochi from the flying dango shop at Genbikei gorge.

Fishy fishy fishy

Dinner last night at a kaiten sushi restaurant, including delicious prawn tempura nigiri and very rare roast beef!

Maybe not

"Learn English with JoJo's Bizarre Adventure!"

If you've ever seen or read the series, you'll appreciate that this may not be the best approach to learning a language for everyday use.

Mind you, as I initially tried to teach myself Japanese from Dragon Ball (my advice: don't) and one of the first four-character compounds I learned was "self-destruct mechanism" I'm really not in a position to say much.

Evolution?

Not just a rice ball, a sandwich rice ball with spicy chicken. Not seen this one before.

One for the road

Long wait at Ichinoseki station for the next Shinkansen (that we can get with the pass), so we dived into a bakery and found another Halloween special - pumpkin and cream cheese bread! David had a tea and cheese bread that actually tasted like tea.

Triple treat

A very nice light red bean paste, black sesame, and sweet soy sauce, with the most delicious dango we've ever had. And then we were invited upstairs to see the launch site and meet the utterly charming and completely eccentric owner!

Away!

The famous "flying dango" of Genbikei gorge.

And again

Second gorge of the day, the confusingly similar Genbikei. Rushing rapids and tour groups, but walk a little further and it's elderly ladies tending fields and elementary school kids fishing from the eroded rocks.

Into the valley of stillness

Another beautifully clear (but cold!) day where we used our rail passes to venture further north to Ichinoseki and on to the Geibikei gorge, where we had the most amazingly still and quiet trip up and down a section on a pole-driven boat. Just wonderful.

Don't let that stop you

Japan persevering with supercolliders despite earthquake risks.