Japan (Tonami-Kyoto-Osaka-Kansai) - Day 4 - 19 May 2012

At 7.45 in the morning, we departed from the hotel to our next destination, Kyoto. When were about to leave from the parking lot, all the employees of the hotel we stayed in, gathered in front of the gate and waved their hands to us! What a warm welcome and goodbye! I was touched by their sincerity.

The journey to Kyoto took about 4 hours, and before going to Kyomizu Temple, we stopped by at a hotel called Avanshell Kyoto to have out western buffet style. The food was quite nice, especially the corn soup! I really love Japanese style corn soup, so tasty!

The delicious western-buffet lunch

After lunch, we directly went to Kyomizu Temple, or commonly called Kyomizudera (-dera, from the word tera - which means temple). We had went to this temple before, in 2003, so we actually not very excited about this visit. But yeah, there are a lot of cultural activities you can do at a temple. So first, we queued up for the omikuji (fortune-telling), where you had to shake the container until a stick with a number written on it came out. I got a so-so fortune while my sister got a bad one (we knew our results after asking one of the employee  - because we cannot read kanji :p), so we looked for a place to tie the paper of her bad result as what suggested.

Japan (Nagano-Tateyama Kurobe-Tonami) - Day 3 - 18 May 2012

We started the day quite early in the morning. At around 8.15 am, we departed from the hotel to commence the highlight of the tour - Alpine Route Snow Corridor in Tateyama-Kurobe. When were about to leave from the parking lot, the okami herself sent us off. Before, she even greeted us one by one in the exit of the hotel. We managed to take some pictures with her.

My breakfast. The soumen (cold noodle) was delicious!

 The journey by bus took about 2 hours. At around 10.30 am we arrived at the entrance. It was freaking freezing cold! We felt like fools because we didn't prepare anything except the thick jackets given by the comittee. I even wore sandals! We didn't expect the weather would be this extreme and the tour company didn't tell us too! I was panicking how we were going to survive in this freezing weather. My sister managed to find a pair of socks given by Singapore Airlines before, but that's all.

Luckily, there was a gloves seller there, but she didn't sell socks! We asked her where we could buy socks, and she told us upstairs at the souvenir shop. We quickly rushed there and finally managed to secure 2 pairs of gloves and a pair of socks, which costed us about 1,100 yen T_T.

We tried some means of transportations to reach the peak until we finished the whole trip. First, we rode the trolley bus to get to Kurobe dam, which was indeed very beautiful (and freezing cold as well, we were glad we decided to buy the gloves and socks). Then, we rode the cable car, continued by ropeway, and another bus. We finally reached Murodo Peak at around 1 pm, and it was very crowded. We ate lunch first at the restaurant there, it was a set meal with nabe (Japanese style hot-pot) and it's quite delicious.

Set meal for lunch

Japan (Nagoya-Anjo-Nagano) - Day 2 - 17 May 2012

After having a nice breakfast at the hotel, at around 8.30 am, we departed from the hotel to do the business, which was a factory visit to MAKITA factory in Anjo. Our local guide was a nice Indonesian lady who had lived in Japan for about 30 years. When we arrived at the factory at around 10 am, we were guided to see the process of making the spare parts and machines. In the end, we were allowed to see the showroom and exhibition, and they served us with drinks. While having a drink, we conversed with the local guide to practise using our Japanese. 

A nice breakfast

 At 11 am, we went from the factory for our lunch place, which was all-you-can-eat yakiniku! The name of the place was Stamina something (I couldn't read the kanji). There were a lot of varieties besides yakiniku there, for example, sushi, curry rice, noodles, pasta, gratin, ice-cream, waffle and a lot more. We had a very hearty and delicious meal over there. How I love the place!

After the stomach was full, we traveled to Nagano our next stop, at around 2 pm. It was a long journey, about 4-hours bus ride. At 6 pm, finally we arrived at Ikenotaira Shirakaba Resort Hotel. We were told that there would be a gala dinner starting at 7.30 pm. However, since the hotel is equipped with an onsen - open public bath, we thought of experiencing it first before dinner.

We were told before that we were supposed to be completely naked inside the onsen, so we did so. However, I was sad to see some fellow tour members still wearing their underwears inside the onsen. I guess they were too embarrassed to be naked, but I still think that we have to follow the rules though. Luckily there were only us there, so nobody complained.

Japan (Singapore-Osaka-Nagoya) - Day 1 - 16 May 2012

Pardon me for the lack of update, because I just came back from a trip to Japan! Actually this trip was supposed to be 5 days only, since it was a semi-business trip, but my sister and I decided to extend it for a week more, so we could explore Japan by ourselves.So, we explored Japan on 16-27 May 2012!

The first 5 days were a group tour, so we followed all the tour's schedule. We departed from Jakarta by Singapore Airlines at 7 pm. We had a transit at Singapore, and at 1.45 am we departed from Singapore to Osaka. Our first stop should be Nagoya, but since that day there was no flight from Singapore to Osaka, we had to stop at Osaka first, then going to Nagoya by bus.

                      

We arrived at Kansai International Airport at around 9am, and directly went to Nagoya by bus. In the middle, we stopped for a toilet break, and my sister and I bought a nice croquette. Since we spoke some Japanese, the auntie asked us where we were from, and when we answered Indonesia, she told us that she had gone to Bali. Wow, Bali is just so popular!

Yummy croquette

At around 2 pm, we arrived at a restaurant to have lunch. The restaurant served us Kishime - Nagoya-styled noodle with tempura. The waitress told us that we supposed to dip the tempura into the broth. The Kishime was indeed delicious, and the tempura was very crunchy.



Kishime with tempura



[Review] Barcelo Sants Hotel, Barcelona, Spain

This was one of the hotels I stayed in during my semi-business trip to Europe Mediterranean (France, Spain, Monaco, Portugal) August last year. This hotel is located in Barcelona, precisely just on top of Sants metro station, so it is very convenient to travel around Barcelona using metro. Moreover, it is just 4 minutes walk to Catalunya Square, one of the top attractions in Barcelona.

What I love about the hotel is the room! The hotel adopts the futuristic-style, so every room and every inch of the hotel are designed futuristically.  The hotel's facilities and amenities are very complete, and they even provide wi-fi in room! (which is very rare as most hotels in Europe only provide wi-fi in the lobby area). There is even a minibar inside the room!

 

The hallway and the door to the room

The breakfast is also delicious. A typical buffet of European-American dishes, but the varieties are superb! This was where I was first introduced to tortilla (Spanish Omelet), which made me addicted!

[Review] Golden Rose Hotel, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

I am in the mood of writing now, so I will review one hotel in Ho Chi Minh City, where I stayed on my trip to Vietnam May last year. This hotel is located in District 3, and is quite close to War-Remnants Museum and Reunification Palace.

The hotel's name is Golden Rose hotel, and it's quite new. We booked the Premium Deluxe Twin Room for 2 nights stay through agoda.com. The price is reasonable, about US$50 per night, including breakfast. Although the room is a little bit small, but the amenities in this room are great. The bathroom is modern and quite spacious, and provide cold as well as warm water. The bed is comfortable and the air-con works well. 

Breakfast is wonderful, it is a mix of American and Asian buffet. The drawback is that the location is quite far from district 1, where all major attractions and shopping center are located. Although we can walk, it takes about 20 minutes to district 1, and since we are always in a hurry we have to take a taxi. Taxi fare from this hotel to district 1 is about 20.000-35.000 dong. Staffs do not speak fluent English, especially the female ones. Sometimes it is hard to understand what they are saying, but they are very friendly and they are trying really hard to help us in finding the way and other stuffs.

[Review] YWCA Fort Canning Lodge, Singapore

This hotel is located just in front of Fort Canning Park, and behind Park Mall in the Orchard vicinity. It takes about 5-7 minutes to walk to Dhoby Gaut MRT (by shortcut through Park Mall's parking lot), which is the interchange station for 3 lines, green, purple, and yellow. And to Plaza Singapura, it takes about 10-15 minutes walk.So, it is very convenient from here to start exploring the city, as well as to go shopping :)

To go to Dhoby Gaut Station, you need to go to Park Mall's parking lot, which is located on the left side of the hotel, and find an elevator there. Go to the 1st floor, and you will come up inside Park Mall. Go out from the mall, and you will have to cross the road, and voila! The station is just in front of you! To go to Plaza Singapura, just cross the road one more time, go left and you will see the mall. On the way back, do the same, but this time, you have to go to the 4th floor using the elevator. If you are confused, ask the front office or the security guard, and they will explain it to you clearly.

We booked the Standard Twin Room through agoda.com, and we were assigned to the room in the 5th floor. The check-in staff served us politely and efficiently. The room itself is not really big, but it is more than enough for the two of us to put our 2 luggage and to wander around the room. The bathroom is not big, but efficiently designed. And I just love the water pressure, nice and strong flow of warm water!

 

 

Singapore! -Day 3- Final day!

We woke up not as early as before, and after having breakfast, we went out again to Orchard Road, to finish exploring the area and do our final shopping. Before going out, I requested for late check-out at the front desk, but they said that the hotel was fully occupied so they couldn't fulfill our request. However, I bargained a little bit with them, and we managed to get a check out time at 12.15 pm :)

We rushed like mad, because there were so many things that we had to buy (most were for my relatives and friends who asked us to buy them something). We managed to buy some kitchen appliances for my Mom (from the bazaar in the basement of Ngee Ann City), ROYCE chocolate (this is so freaking delicious!), carrot cake (Singapore traditional dish) that my mom and grandma like very much, medicines at Watson, other things and finally the takoyaki again! We did all of the shopping in 2 hours, and managed to come back to the hotel at 11.55 am. We used the remaining 20 minutes to do a final packing, and at exactly 12.15 pm we checked-out and went to Changi International Airport by taxi.

Singapore! -Day 2-

We started the second day by going to Chinatown early in the morning. When we arrived there, most of the shops had not opened yet, but our favourite bakkwa (smoked and roasted strips of pork with a consistency similar to jerky) shop was already open. We placed our order to the nice auntie there, and she told us to wait 30 minutes. So we just strolled around the area.

After finishing our business in Chinatown, we went to Bishan Junction 8 to visit the 'POPULAR' bookstore (in case you are confused, Popular is the name of the bookstore :p). I wanted to find books for my teaching materials, because Singaporean English books are usually very good. After having lunch there, we went straight to Novena Square to find a plus-size clothing store recommended in the internet. We did found the store, and the auntie was so nice. She gave a lot of discounts to my sister when she bought 2 pieces of clothes. Then, we went back to the hotel to wash up and get ready for the concert.

Singapore! -Day 1-

Last February, precisely 17th-19th February 2012, my sister and I spent the weekend in Singapore. We went there actually, to watch "Super Show 4" by Korean boyband Super Junior. The concert itself was held on Saturday, 18th Feb, so well, why don't we spend the rest to just wander around Singapore?

Although we have visited Singapore for many times, at least once a year, the city is never boring to us! We always find something new whenever we step our foot there. What I love the most is the transportation system, especially the MRT. Soooo convenient! I always enjoy my trip to Singapore, no matter how often I go there :)

The trip started on very early in the morning. We had to catch a 6.30 am flight from Jakarta to Singapore by Jetstar. We arrived at Soekarno Hatta International Airport at around 5 am and proceed to the web check-in counter. But is was really annoying! The counter officer worked so slow, and before us there was a large group of more than 10 people trying to do the web check-in at once (what I know is, you cannot do web check-in if you are a party of more than 9 people). It took us a long time to queue up, and finally we decided just to queue up in the normal check-in counter because apparently, it moved much more faster. So, because of the queue in the check-in process and a long queue in the immigration as well, we ended up in the boarding gate at about 6 a.m, and it supposed to be the boarding time.

How disappointed we are when we were told that the flight was delayed! Moreover, the delay was 1.5 hour, so we would depart at 7.45 am. It really annoyed me because before I had to pay an extra $60 because I changed my flight from 9am to 6.30 am, and now it's delayed! In the end, the plane departed from the airport at about 8.20 am, and we arrived in Singapore almost noon.

We directly went to our hotel. Usually, when we go to Singapore, we always stay at Grand Central Hotel, but this time, because the price at Grand Central has raised up so high, we decided to try another hotel. The hotel is called 'YWCA Fort Canning Lodge Hotel'. It is located near Dhoby Gaut Interchange. I will review this hotel in my next post.

My first entry!

Finally I have decided to write a blog! Before I was too lazy to do this :p

In this blog I will particularly write about my travel journey, but maybe I will write random things also. Maybe a couple of first entries will be about random things, since I will go on my next trip probably in February. Or maybe I will share about my previous trips. Let's see. ^^

Anyway, that's all for now, see you in my next entry!