Leaving Shimoda is always sad. It's such a nice town and it feels like home. My host father's friends, the Aois picked me up and drove me to the station, insisted on buying my ticket and handed me a little bag with breakfast and drinks before seeing me off. So nice.
Three women who were on going on a tour to Hokkaido sat next to me and we chatted on the way to Atami. They took the Shinkansen and I took a regular train with one change and ended up near my friend Yoshie's house. Yoshie's family lived in Carmel for a few years when my boys were young and Peter and her younger son, Ken were good friends. We deposited my luggage, had a nice sushi lunch at home with her mom and then went for a little walk. The next day she worked (she 'teaches' English to little children). I went with her to the area was teaching in that day and we had lunch together, then I just walked around for a few hours until we met up again when she finished. I decided to cook dinner - Yoshie doesn't like to cook and usually buys an entrée, which many Japanese women do...
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| A seafood salad. |
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| Yoshie on the pretty walk to the station. |
And then the day arrived. I was leaving Japan. I no longer say 'for the last time' because I know I'll be back. Maybe to live, maybe just to visit, but I know I'll be back.
Anyway, we decided to go and see SkyTree - the tallest 'building' in Japan. It's actually considered an antennae. There is a whole shopping city (Soramachi - Sky Town) around it selling souveniers of every kind and many restaurants. You can also go up to the observation tower (we didn't).
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| The restroom at the SkyTree station. |
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| SkyTree |
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| View from a lower area. |
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| It's actually a glass tube like structure with steel around it. |
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Some days there are very, very long lines to go up.
Even on this day you had to buy a ticket for hours later. |
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| Of course there has to be SkyTree characters! |
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| The café where we had lunch. |
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| Sashimi on rice with grated radish and miso soup. |
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| Salmon and ikura (salmon roe on rice). |
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| A giant rice ball. |
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| You know him! |
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| Some summertime fun! |
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| A prepared food floor. |
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This looked interesting but we'd already eaten.
Different things on skewers - meatballs, fried chicken, etc.
and a 'cone' of puff pastry filled with Japanese curry for dipping. |
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| This is what takeout sushi should look like - yum! |
The next pictures are from a 'plastic food' store.
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This is a delicious green tea slushy like drink with green tea
ice cream and dango (rice dumplings). |
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| Yoshie had a green tea latte with vanilla soft cream. |
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| Singapore Airlines - great! |
So we parted ways in the train station and off I went to the airport. Upon arrival I picked up my luggage which Naoko had shipped straight to Narita for me. Checked in, walked around a little and boarded the plane where I had a bulkhead seat with plenty of leg room. It was a great flight even though I didn't sleep (just can't even with a Singapore Sling...). Having your own entertainment system with tons of movies to choose from really makes the time fly by. I think I watched 3 movies. It was a good airline (Singapore) and a good flight.
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