5 November, Hearton Hotel, Osaka.

Travelled out to Nara today, only 50 minutes from our hotel in Osaka, but another world. Once we were past the usual tourist-y streets that take you from the station to the local attraction, Nara Park opened up to some tranquil open fields and forests that were just turning to their autumn colours. Thousands of deer roam the park, stalking tourists for food or just lounging in the warm autumn sunshine. Nara was the first permanent capital of Japan. Before then, the capital was moved with the death of an emperor. Many of the temples and other buildings in the enormous park are reminiscent of Kyoto, the other major ancient capital.

 

Crowds of school kids attempt to terrorise the park's deer. But the deer have their measure. Signs throughout the park warn children to beware of deer butting, kicking and even 'mounting' unsuspecting young folk!

Now that we are able to find our hotel from any point of the compass, we are due to leave tomorrow. We are off on our first Shinkansen trip of this visit to Japan, to Hakata in the north of Japan's southern island of Kyushu.

While on the point of compasses - awful pun- we noticed a very simple, but extremely useful, little inset in the footpath as we left the subway yesterday. A North direction marker - simple, but effective. There is nothing, short of a carnival ride, to disorientate one as absolutely as a subway station. Your directions or map might say go north-east from the station, but how useful is that when you emerge from its nether regions?

6 November, Sakura Shinkansen 553 Shin-Osaka to Hakata

On our first trip to Japan in 2011, we purchased a JR Pass for just over $700 AUD. This trip, the same pass was just $473 AUD. These passes allow unlimited rail travel on the extensive Japanese Rail network, including the original 'bullet trains', the Shinkansen.

 

We are big fans of long distance rail travel, having hit the rails in Europe, the US, China and Japan. Subway systems the world over have also both baffled and enthralled us since we first climbed on board a London Underground train in 1976. But the greatest thrill of all is a journey on the Shinkansen. Travelling at close to 300km/hr in cars with seating that is superior to most economy class airline cabins, the world slips past extraordinary quickly, but you see far more than from an aircraft. Our trip to Hakata today is 640kms, two and a half hours. No trips to the airport at either end, just a 5 minute subway ride from our hotel to the Shinkansen station and a walk across the road at the other end in Hakata to our hotel. Why would you fly? There has been talk at home in Australia of building a super-fast rail link down the east coast. To quote from a famous Aussie movie - “Tell 'em they're dreaming.” Even along the most populous corridor of Australia, the population density would never support such a service in competition with the airlines.

(Later)

Now settled in our hotel, just across the square from the JR station, we have planned our day trips for the next couple of days and booked our trains. Surprisingly, we found our hotel in minutes, so we had an easy afternoon scanning the web for extra information on our trip to Nagasaki tomorrow. What would we do without our technology?