Photo Overload!!!

Hisashiburi ne!!!!
Soo you may have noticed a lack of picks on here and you can blame me, because I discovered facebook is MUCH easier and faster to load pictures onto. However, I just discovered a link to each album that allows for public viewing! So if you want to see what we have been up to lately (and there is a lot) please check out these albums!!!

#1: Its Sakura time again!!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2298436&l=602ff&id=58013737

#2: A day of Ninja training

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2301164&l=1b0ba&id=58013737

#3: Birthday Bonanza!! We actually had a total of 3 parties; bowling on my b-day, Karaoke (with an Ali!) on Ian's b-day, and a combined blowout last friday (from which more pics will come..)

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2300296&l=6190e&id=58013737

#4: Small Bean Island!! This one takes slightly more explanation. Basically Ali and I had to pick a destination for this weekend, and ended up changing our minds about 5 time - until that is, we came across a little place called Shodoshima (Translation: Small Bean Island). Obviously we had to go.
However seeing as we decided this halfway through Saturday (the day we were supposed to leave) and the island is about halfway across the country and takes much travel, we were just a bit rushed!
I've posted our itinerary so you can get an idea of what we went through, and let me say, I have to hand it to Japan for their meticulous punctuality. The majority of our changeovers (and there were many) ranged from 3 minutes, to a wopping 13 minutes!!
Yatta!!!


Trip Details: 4:30 pm: leave nagoya and head to Okayama (2 hour shinkansen ride)
Sat. night: check into the local Toyoko inn; Ali debates the risks of them hunting me down if she steals the pajamas. Then we find salad, juice, and hot sake. Okayama is cooool.
Sun 6:20am wake up
7:11: catch train to port. We later find out that there was actually a port IN Okayama, and this train ride was unnecessary, however if we had caught that we wouldn't have gotten the chance to ride a train for an hour filled with Highschool boys. Anyone who has seen highschool kids here will know that this was hilarious.
8:35: Catch ferry
10:10: Hello Small Bean!!
11:11: After MUCH confusion, and a brief terrifying moment where we thought we would have to take a ferry back at 1:30 (because 3 hours is just not enough for Small Bean) our tour starts. However during our wait for the bus, we realize that Small Bean is actually quite famous for Olives.....
Olive Chocolate? Olive Mochi? Olive Candy? Anyone???
11:11-3:17 : We wind through the mountains via bus, cable car and feet; we visit a gorge; have someone compliment our eyelashes and feed us free noodles; buy olive paraphernalia; See a few monkeys; and then the tour ends
3:30: With AMAZING teamwork we pull off running from the bus terminal to the ferry port, grabbing our backpacks, buying our tickets, and jumping on the ferry to okayama
4:45: bus to station (and a nice sleep..)
6:28: Shinkansen to Kyoto/Nagoya.
8:00: Ali gets to Kyoto
9:00 I get back to Ichinomiya
Ummm yeah. We pretty much spent 30 full hours travelling nonstop halfway across the country for an island called "Small Bean"

Best random trip ever...

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2302642&l=a5f23&id=58013737

TARA!!!