November 9th : Teni’s return and off to the mountains

In Takayama! Well, not really. Today started with a taxi ride from Lauren’s to the nearby station with all our bags at 10:30am. Yup today, Teni was going home. :-( Heading from Kurihashi station, we went to Ueno, changed lines, went to Nippori, and caught an express (Skyliner) train to Narita airport. Next was checking Teni in, and then we went off to do some shopping in the terminal (which basically is a mall as well with restaurants and stores). Teni bought some last minute gifts, and feel-good things for herself and I before we decided to eat.
In the nine days we’ve been here, she hasn’t eaten sushi at all (and, in fact she’s never had it before in her life), and we decided that this was a problem, and that we should get some of her first bites of sushi. It just so happened that there was a Kaiten-sushi (conveyor belt sushi) restaurant nearby, so we stopped in. There are videos to follow after I get a way to post them (probably not till after I get back to the states), but kaiten sushi restaurants are very cool and uniquely Japanese. Basically there is a conveyor belt that goes all over the restaurant and people sit around it. There is always sushi going along the conveyor belt, and when you see something you like, you just take it and eat it. After you’re finished, the people at the restaurant count your plates (which are different colors representing the different prices), and tally your bill. Really fun stuff.

Finally…dropping Teni at the gate, which was a really sad experience. I didn’t want her to go at all. We’ve had so much fun traveling together and this will also be the longest single period of time we’ve been apart since we’ve been together. It was a slobbery, pathetic mess of “I miss you already”s and “I love you”s, and various other amorous language. After she went through security, and I lost sight of her, I made my way out of the terminal and down into the station to catch an express train to Tokyo, where I could hop the Shinkansen to Nagoya to make a change and head up to Takayama. This trip is LONG. The train from Narita airport to Tokyo is an hour if you take the fast train, the Shinkansen to Nagoya is 2:40 ish, and the final train up to Takayama is another 2 hours. Here’s the trick though, the train up to Takayama only even leaves every few hours. This added another hour on to my Journey.

So, got to Takayama station at 10:07pm. Met my friend Dan and his girlfriend Takaho, and headed off to Dan’s house…which was another 30min drive from the station. Oye. I’m sick of Traveling today. Anyway, Settling in for bed now after some chat and shower, so goodnight. Will post again soon. :-)