Tag: Japan

Nerdtour 2016: Counting down the hours to launch…

dc_sakura-001Getting close now, and I’m trying to get everything set up before I leave.  Laundry, packing, re-packing due to forgetting something, re-re-packing due to everything I want to take not fitting, etc.  At least I finished my taxes, and managed to get some pictures of this year’s cherry blossoms downtown.  Checking the weather at Chicago where I lay over for a couple of hours, and the long-range forecast for Tokyo and vicinity for next week.

Two things I plan to do to make this trip a bit easier than the ones before, one of them I’d been planning for some time, and one came out of the blue since I had no idea they even had them.  One, a service that nearly all hotels provide or at least cooperate with shipping companies to provide, is called “takkyubin”, which is a baggage-forwarding service.  If you’re hotel-hopping like I plan to, it’s great because you can turn in your suitcase at the hotel or nearby convenience store or delivery office, and for a small fee they’ll send it off to your next destination, usually delivered by the next day.  This saves having to lug the whole mess around, trying to find space on the train or subway car.  They can send it to the airport as well, which sounds horrible to us paranoid Americans, but in Japan it’s completely safe.  In fact, the main delivery company Yamamoto, has as their logo a mother cat carrying a kitten!

The other nice surprise I found is that there are at least a half-dozen companies in Japan that will rent 4G LTE wi-fi hotspots to tourists!  I was worried about trying not to use too much of the hotels’ bandwith, or trying to find a public wi-fi spot that wasn’t crowded.  This is exactly what I’m renting from T-Mobile to use here, I’ve been able to get great speeds with wide access, and according to the Japanese sites, their companies provide hi-speed hot-spots that work all over the country!  The rates are reasonable, too, the one place I’m looking at will rent the box for about $90 total for the two weeks, which even though it’s twice what I’m paying here, it’s JAPAN!

At any rate, blogging will be sparse between now and when I land in Narita, but I’ll try to keep this blog up-to-date!

Nerdtour Japan 2016: Once More With Sakura!

Sakura by moonlightSo, once again I prepare to depart for the Land of the Rising Sun, where the cherry blossoms (sakura) are in bloom!  This will be a relatively short trip, only two weeks, but the goal is to take as many pictures of cherry trees in bloom in as many iconic Japanese places as possible, given the short time they bloom.  Plus since the Tidal Basin here in DC is full of cherry trees from Japan that are now also in bloom, I hope to take pictures of them before go, too!

Blogging may be spotty, but I’ll try to at least post something each day.

The Nerdtour 2016 starts Sunday, March 27!

Anime USA 2015!

I managed to attend Anime USA for the first time in over 4 years, since they moved away from the Crystal City Hyatt to the Wardman Park Marriott in DC.

I didn’t get to see everything, but I did manage to get some photos, so enjoy!

Kiyosumi Garden, Tokyo

kiyosumi-001

Almost exactly 2 years ago today, October 23 2012, I was on the first full day of my third trip to Japan, a month-long excursion I called “Nerdtour 2012” (I blogged it on this site).  One of the best places I went was this little slice of old Tokyo park design, called Kiyosumi Garden.  It was just about 1 or 1.25 miles up the road from the apartment I stayed at, and my buddy John had been there before, so on a somewhat rainy day we set off to see this.  It’s a nicely laid-out park, with a large pond or small lake in the middle, beautiful landscaping, and more turtles in one place than I had seen in a long time!  I took this picture of a couple having their picture taken, I don’t know if they were models, or of they were a genuine couple preparing to get married.  Either way, it was a stroke of luck getting this shot from across the lake, given it had been raining off and on with breaks in the clouds allowing the sun to shine.  I plan to go back sometime in the next year, if all goes well, if not, then the year after.  There is so much more of Japan to see!

BTW, I wrote a small photo book that you can buy on Blurb.com!

“Miss Veedol”

Pangborn and Herndon, unsung heroes of aviation history, along with "Miss Veedol!" This monument is right at the entrance to the grounds of the Misawa Aeronautics and Science Museum, in Misawa, Japan.
Pangborn and Herndon, unsung heroes of aviation history, along with “Miss Veedol!” This monument is right at the entrance to the grounds of the Misawa Aeronautics and Science Museum, in Misawa, Japan.
Most people have heard of Charles Lindbergh and his historic non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean in his “Spirit of St. Louis” airplane, but how many have heard of Clyde Pangorn and Hugh Herndon, much less their airplane, the “Miss Veedol?”


A plaque describing the flight of Pangborn and Herndon in the "Miss Veedol" in 1931.
A plaque describing the flight of Pangborn and Herndon in the “Miss Veedol” in 1931.
In 1927 Charles Lindbergh set out from New Jersey, in order to prove it was possible to fly non-stop across the Atlantic Ocean, which hadn’t been done before. His success stirred the imagination of imitators around the world, and in 1931 two men decided to try to fly non-stop across the Pacific Ocean, a feat that would cover almost twice the distance and take 41 hours!


The full-sized (non-flying) replica of the "Miss Veedol" in the Misawa Aeronautics and Science Museum
The full-sized (non-flying) replica of the “Miss Veedol” in the Misawa Aeronautics and Science Museum
Originally intending to fly around the world for a world record, they had to abandon their attempt in Russia, near northern Japan. Instead, they decided to try to fly non-stop across the Pacific (the $25,000 prize the Asahi Shimbun newspaper offered for the feat wouldn’t have hurt!) Modifying their Bellanca J-300 airplane to hold almost twice the normal amount of fuel, they barely took off from Sabishiro Beach in Misawa, northern Japan, dropping their landing gear along the flight to save weight. Pangborn even left his boots in Japan, just to shave off a few pounds! The two men apparently didn’t get along on their flight, which is kind of understandable when you see how small the plane was, while holding two pilots alternating flying, sitting alongside fuel containers for nearly two days straight!


After many harrowing moments in the flight (at one point Pangborn had to climb out to manually detach a couple of supports from the landing gear they had dropped!) they finally arrived in the skies over Washington State. They thought about flying on to Boise Idaho to add more distance to their record, but weather prevented them, and they tried several other airports in Washington State with no success. Finally they had to land, and they picked a field in Wenatchee, Washington, where they made a belly-landing damaging the propeller. They succeeded, and both the towns of Misawa and Wenatchee honor their flight, Misawa with a giant Aeronautics and Science Museum (where I took the pictures here), and Wenatchee with a National Historical site, as well as a full-sized, flying re-creation of the original “Miss Veedol”. The two towns consider themselves “Sister Cities”, and the aviation club that built the new “Miss Veedol” actually flew it over in Japan, where it was on display in the museum in Misawa.


misawa003I hope this wasn’t too boring a story, but I wanted to help spread the word about the courage and strength of will that these two unsung heroes showed in their historic feat of aviation!

Nerdtour 2012: Riding on the Enoden pt.4: Shichirigahama Surfin’ Safari

Shichirigahama train stationMy journey on the Enoden line continued, leaving Hase and the Great Buddha, and heading for Enoshima.  Along the way, though, through one of the windows on the train I spotted the ocean, and thought “that looks neat, I want to see the beach!”  So, I persuaded my buddy John that we should get off at the next station, named “Shichirigahama.”

 

[one_third]surfers[/one_third][one_third]surf shop[/one_third][one_third_last]lone surfer[/one_third_last]Turns out that it’s well-known for its surf, and there were a whole lot of surfers taking advantage of the mild November afternoon and evening.

 

[one_third]beachcomber at sunset[/one_third][one_third]Man near seawall staring at the ocean[/one_third][one_third_last]couple on the beach, with Mount Fuji[/one_third_last]There were also a lot of people just out enjoying the beach, taking in the sun. There’s something about a beach, with the waves crashing on the shore that’s just peaceful and relaxing, makes it easy to get into a contemplative mood, or even to just “veg-out”.

 

[one_third]John photographs some beach girls[/one_third][one_third][/one_third][one_third_last][/one_third_last]My buddy John also found, um, “other” views as well…  “So, not so disappointed at stopping here now, are you John?”

 

[one_third]Sunset behind Enoshima[/one_third][one_third]Mount Fuji after sundown[/one_third][one_third_last]Shichirigahama Beach after sunset[/one_third_last]Shichirigahama reminded me very much of southern California, especially around the Sunset Beach area I visited a long time ago.  Sunset Beach was aptly named, and Shichirigahama’s sunset was equally stunning, I kept taking pictures and videos every few minutes, just to try to capture the view. I even got to get a picture of Mount Fuji, but just like in 2007, all I could get was a silhouette shot…

 

Here’s one of the videos I took, of the Sun just disappearing behind the mountains beyond Enoshima Island.  You can see more of the pictures at my portfolio site.

Enjoy!

Nerdtour 2012: Riding the Enoden pt. 2: Kamakura

enoden1-044So, after riding the Enoden for a few minutes, it was time to get off at the station in Hase town, where the Great Buddha (Daibutsu) of Kamakura is situated. Like most of the towns along the Enoden, Hase is a tourist town, making the most of the local attraction. A lot of tourists come because of the Buddhist aspect, and a lot more come just to gawk (yeah, I’m guilty of the latter.)

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Not being Buddhist myself, I didn’t get the spiritual feeling, but as a techie, to me the Great Buddha is an impressive engineering feat! Cast in bronze sometime in the 13th Century, the statue is hollow, allowing people to go inside for a mere 20 yen (about 30 cents US).  The temple grounds around are also very impressive, with sculptures both man-made and natural. 

kamakura-046This day was particularly fun, because there was a tour group from an elementary school, and some of the kids were split up into groups, each group assigned to speak to a foreigner in order to practice their English.  The group that approached me and my buddy John did a very good job of introducing themselves, asking if they could ask questions, and handled their English fairly well.  The questions were basic, “Where are you from?” type questions.  It was fun watching them “ambush” other foreigners, too, although I have to wonder if all of the foreign tourists spoke English.

So, here is the gallery of photos I took in and around Hase and the Great Buddha of Kamakura.

Enjoy!

 

Nerdtour 2012: riding the Enoden

So, I’m updating (only a year later!) with some more photos from my Nerdtour of Japan! This will broken up into a couple of sets of photos that are going to be on my portfolio site, but I’ll update here when I update there!

So, on this day I rode the Enoden train, a historic train line that runs from Kamakura to Fujisawa, with the main stop in the middle, at Enoshima Island. Enoshima has been a tourist spot since the days of the Shogun, and the Enoden gets its name from “Enoshima Dentetsu“, Enoshima Electric Railway. Kamakura is famous for its large statue of Buddha, which I will post in another set of photos. The train runs along the beach on the Pacific Ocean south of Tokyo, with stops at several beach towns along the way. I stopped at one of these, Shichirigahama, which turned out to have a nice view of Enoshima Island, as well as Mount Fuji (but only in silhouette, as usual…). It very much reminded me of the beach towns of southern California, especially with the surfers, and apparently the Enoshima area is known internationally for its surf. After spending way too much time in Shichirigahama, I continued on to Fujisawa in the evening, but due to failing batteries I didn’t get many photos of the city.

This set of photos is from the first leg of the day trip, from Etchujima station near Monzennakacho, through Tokyo Station and Kamakura Station, and sights along the Enoden to Hase.

At any rate, Enjoy!