Days 13 to 20

Actually the ascent began the day before, around 20:00. As we were preparing ourselves, we felt like completely noobs compared to the others who had dedicated clothes, sticks, and headlamps whereas we were trying to warm ourselves using multiple T-shirts (or one sweater for those who had one) and using our mobile phones to light the path. Nevertheless, we started climbing. The ground itself was not that difficult, but heights made it harder on you. Regarding temperature, a T-shirt and short were enough up until the 8th-9th station (as long as you didn't stop for more than 15 minutes). We made several small stops to accommodate with the heights and eat some Onigiri. As we arrived around midnight at the 9th station, the last one before the top, we decided to make a 2 hours stop to avoiding reaching the top too much before 4 o'clock. This is when we started felling cold as we were no longer walking, and almost our food was gone. You can spend some time/sleep inside the stations, but it costs ~50 € per person (at least at the last one; ~7,000¥). Around 1:40, as we saw multiple groups passing us by, we decided to move to the top, which happened to be a wise move. Indeed, the remaining <1h to the top took us ~2h due to trafic jam on the path: there were tons of people doing the ascent! Hopefully, there are multiple tracks on the path, with a slow track for groups, and a fast track for those who want/can climb faster. On the top it got really cold as there was a lot of wind, and the temperature was around 5 degrees Celsius. But the suffering was absolutely worthwhile! The sunrise was really beautiful! The descent wasn't that great as it was quite monotonous: 100m down, turn left, 100m down, turn right, 100m down, turn left, etc. so you were always looking at the same view during the 3 hours it took to get down. The rest of the day was spent at idling/recovering/sleeping. Enjoy the images below! ;-)

There is Sendai in the title, but as we left in the early morning, we didn't visit anything nor did we wandered throughout the city. The point of leaving early was to arrive about lunch time in Tokyo, have lunch with a friend, before I ran to Meguro Live Station to attend Destrose's last concert before their hiatus. I tend to go pretty early to concerts in order to be among the firsts in line and therefore stand at the front row. For example, in January I went to see Epica at l'Olympia Bruno Coquatrix in Paris and started standing around 10:30, so around 9 hours before the concert actually began (and I had a VIP ticket, so I would have been at the front row, maybe second, anyway). As I had no idea how it worked in Japan nor had I any friend with me, I only went around 4 hours before the concert began. There were only five persons standing there, so I was sure to be at the front row. What I didn't know however, and only learned about it when the doors were opened, is that you do not enter based on your arrival time: no, you have a number on your ticket and you enter based on that number. I was number 146… So instead of five persons before me, there were 145 persons… I could have arrived at the time of the door's opening and still get the same spot. But those four hours standing were not completely waste, it allowed me to visit the merchandise shop. ;-) So, if you are going to attend a Japanese concert for the first time, beware the ticket ordering! Apart from that, the concert was awesome!! I was really happy to see them at least once before they went on hiatus! \m/

On Day 7 we wandered in Kyoto's center before taking the Shinkansen towards Sendai. Day 8 turned out to be our only rainy day of our three-weeks trip. Rain didn't stopped us from walking most of the day to visit a beautiful shrine, a temple and the interesting Sendai City Museum, where we learned a lot about Sendai throughout the ages and about Date Masamune's life, a powerful daimyo who made Sendai prosper. As Day 9 shed some sun, we went to Matsushima on the coast to enjoy the sightseeing of the bay and its small islands.

Almost a week already since we arrived in Japan, and already soon leaving Kyoto… But before that, it's time to visit some more temples! First on the list is Ginkaku-ji

Second full day in Kyoto, and we started by visiting a bamboo plant (I didn't took any photo of it). We then went to visit a temple, and a very famous one: Kinkaku-ji, or the Golden Pavilion. We were still very lucky regarding the weather, which allowed for some nice pictures in the late afternoon.

In the early afternoon, we went to a temple surrounded by a forest: Kiyomizu-dera. Its orange color goes really well with the intense green of the forest.

Last day in Osaka already… We went during the morning to Osaka's aquarium: Kaiyukan, which is the biggest aquarium in Japan. Not much to say about it, apart that it was really crowded: you should really try to do its opening! Also, most of the large basins can be viewed from different spots, even on different floors so do not hesitate to go further if there are too many persons on the first spots; this was sadly not enough advertised. Otherwise, the aquarium's population was really beautiful. Even though the tanks were quite large sometimes, I couldn't stop wondering how large they should really be in order for the animals to be at ease…

First full day in Osaka! The weather was still really nice, though too warm for my taste… We started the day by visiting Shitenno-ji, a temple (hence the suffix "-ji"), just before lunch. We did not went inside the main building, nor did we had a look at the temple's garden… But we did find quite a few turtles inside some water basin, to the point where we wondered whether Shitenno means turtle in Japanese, but apparently not. Below are some photos of Shitenno-ji.

We arrived in Japan on the 9th of July 2015 together with my sister. The flight went smoothly, but one piece of luggage didn't made it. The staff at Narita Airport was really nice, and they offered to send the missing bag directly to our stay in Kyoto, as we were not staying in Tokyo and we might have missed it if it was sent to Osaka.