We decided to use our final full-day here by travelling by train to Yokohama. So, after the predictable lack-lustre breakfast at the Marriott and arranging transport to the Airport tomorrow, we headed for the subway station, just down the road. Around 45 minutes later, we were in Yokohama, and after a short walk, the Harbour …
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Japan Holiday – Day 9
An ultra lazy morning as we’d mostly packed last night. After our last breakfast at the Hyatt, we took a taxi to the Station and caught the 10.56 bullet-train back to Tokyo arriving spot on time – 2.40pm. We re-checked back into the Marriott hotel – room 627 (just opposite the room where we were …
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Japan Holiday – Day 8
It’s Sunday, so time for a lie-in. Until well after 8am actually (very unusual for us!). We went down to breakfast at 9.15 and it was absolutely packed – so much so that they set up the bar as a temporary eating area. We think it must have been because a Tour was due soon, …
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Japan Holiday – Day 7
We had a lay-in, before pigging out on the excellent breakfast a little later and then heading off to Kyoto station for Osaka (the second largest city in Japan). We took the subway to the waterfront area to visit the well known Aquarium and when we got there, it looked like the rest of …
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Fake emails
Just a quick note to say ‘ooops’ – it looks like someone has hacked into my occasionally-used Google-mail account and has been sending emails to all my address-book entries. Sorry about that – I think I’ve now fixed it, so if you get any more after today, just let me know!
Japan Holiday – Day 6
We slept well – so for now, all is right with the world! 🙂 We were up at 7 and ready to tackle the extensive range at breakfast – yum! With brekky over it’s time to head west once more, and today it’s Hiroshima and Himeji Castle (the only castle in Japan to have been …
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Japan Holiday – Day 5
Hmmm, we didn’t sleep well last night and by the time we did, three seconds later, the alarm went off! So it was rather a rushed breakfast in the hotel restaurant. For the short time we spent in there though, we enjoyed the range of food on offer. We’ll appreciate it more tomorrow when we’ve …
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Japan Holiday – Day 4
At last, we slept right through – perhaps we’re at last, getting used to the time-zone. Ironically, on the day we had to check-out, we slept-in until 8.30am! Breakfast was the usual disappointing selection of luke-warm half-English-style; more boiled vegetables; duff pastries perfected by a non-baker; yoghurts and cereals. As for the coffee, it tasted …
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Japan Holiday – Day 3
We were both up by 7.45 today and after yesterday’s disastrous day, weather-wise, we were hoping today would be different. I took a look out of the window and it looked good – Dry and a clear blue-sky. We had breakfast in the hotel – it was busier than yesterday with at least a dozen …
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Japan Holiday – Day 2
I was up about 7am after a sleepless night. Actually we’d both slept very intermittently and we think it was due to the time difference. The first thing I did when I got up was look out the window. Although it’s not a Bank Holiday here, we had typical Bank-Holiday weather! Rain!!! We have a …
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Saving Ryan’s Privates
(Well, I thought it was funny!) Further to yesterday’s entry where I’d mentioned that we’d spotted that the toilet seat was plugged into the mains electricity, all is now clear! Take a close look at the symbols in the picture above (click on it to make it larger) – are you thinking what I’m thinking? …
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Japan Holiday – Day 1
We landed at Narita Airport around 9.00 (25 minutes ahead of schedule) local time, which was a good start! Once we’d got through the elaborate security (photograph and fingerprints!) we collected our bags and headed for the coach. To our surprise, we could see a local Representative with our names on a card, and after …
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Films seen on the flight to Japan
‘Gran Torino’ starring Clint Eastwood A retired Korean-war veteran leans to live with his neighbours – sort of! ‘In the Loop’ starring Peter Capaldi The big-screen version of the TV series. Political double-crossing from both sides of the pond. Fruity language throughout with a hilarious storyline highlighting the incompetence of politicians. ‘Knowing’ starring Nicolas Cage …
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Japan Holiday – Travel Day
John, our taxi-driver arrived at just after 9.30. We had a reasonably trouble-free journey down to Heathrow and about two-hours later, we were walking into Terminal 3. We’ve booked with Virgin and splashed-out on ‘Premium Economy’. I’m not sure what that gives us over-and-above the economy passengers, but I guess it’s greater leg-room and posher …
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Bat out of Hell… err…Feldkirchen
8.30 local time. For those of you who were disappointed to learn that Michael Schumacher is not returning to the race-scene, I have good news! I can confirm that after extensive facial plastic surgery and an enforced two-stone weight gain, he is now driving a taxi from Feldkirchen to Munich Airport. Overtaking on hairpin bends, …
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The Bauer Hotel, Feldkirchen, Munich – Day 2
I’m pretty impressed with this hotel. After a luke-warm reception when I checked in last night, service levels have exploded into 100% total customer focus! Our allocated staff member – Angela – for my two day event here has been a whirlwind of efficiency and she’s been consistently one step two steps ahead of me …
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Germany calling…
Well, here I am at the Bauer Hotel and Gastof in Munich – a rather sweet little hotel about 20 minutes from the airport. I’m here for three-and-a-bit days for one of my clients. It’s about 21 degrees at home but they seem to be having a mini heat-wave here – phew! it’s 3.45 in …
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Princess Project!
Ann went over to Denise’s today to polish up her MS Project skills.
Paul and Karen’s for a feast…
Paul and Karen invited us round for one of their legendary feasts, so as soon as we got back from the film, we headed straight there. We’d estimated we wouldn’t be there until 9, but the film finished earlier than we thought and we were soon chatting and drinking with Paul, Karen, Tom and Julie. …
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Film: The Time Traveler’s Wife
We drove to the local Odeon to see the just-released film: The Time Traveler’s Wife from Audrey Niffenegger’s book of the same name. I hadn’t read it, but I do recall it being at the top of the best seller’s list back in 2004. I’m not normally attracted to romantic movies, but I was intrigued …
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Biscuit and Bon-Bon get a ‘wash and brush-up’
The cats went in for their six-weekly ‘service’ today by Patsy. It’s always a challenge to get them in the basket to take them there – all claws, teeth and blind panic – they know you know! This time, strangely, they were pretty well-behaved and we got them both in without any personal wounds. They …
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DVD: Iron Man (Blu-Ray)
A (very) rare morning-off today as I’m well-ahead with my work. Time to catch-up with some DVDs. I bought this DVD a while ago and then forgot I’d got it! On inserting the DVD, it immediately accessed the ‘net and downloaded some extra goodies in the guise of a quiz about the film – neat! …
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Fit for a Prince too!
A few weeks ago Ann spent a five-days in London ‘going back to school’ learning about Projects in a controlled environment (zzzzzzzzzzz!) – alias PRINCE2. The Course would ultimately lead to a formal qualification in project management and it’s a great qualification to have when managing any project. From my experience, its an absolute must-have …
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Let’s Dance (Week 7 of 7)
Well, here we are, seven weeks (and three left feet) later, we’ve now had the final dance-class of this series. It all starts again in September, but I’m not sure we’ll be able to commit to it. It’s all been very enjoyable and Bob and Marjorie have been excellent (and patient) tutors – but 9pm …
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HTC ‘Firestone’
What is this new phone that the ‘net is talking about? – it’s supposedly the ‘iPhone killer’ – the ultimate in mobile phones/PDAs. Dubbed the ‘Firestone’ by its makers HTC, there seems to be two images ‘doing the rounds’ but they may of course both be fake! Allegedly, the specs are: Quad-band GSM/EDGE connectivity Dual-band …
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Techy Session with Jane
Jane spent the morning here learning the basics of Dreamweaver together with image management courtesy of the excellent FREE utility, Irfanview.
New web-site
I drove up to Stamford to see Nick and Celina. They’ve bought a holiday cottage in Haworth and need a web-site so they can advertise and let it out. I aim to create most of it this week before I travel to Germany next week.
‘XML Parser’ – Ehh?
Well that was a pleasant surprise! I had a problem with my PDF creator on the main PC – it worked fine on all the other PCs on the network, but not the one I use the most. Every time I tried to create a pdf file, it threw up ‘cannot load options’ error message. Reinstalling …
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TV: Being Human (Series 2)
BBC3’s sleeping giant – Being Human returns for a second series sometime soon. Series 2 promises to be deeper and darker than series 1 whilst retaining its quirky sense of humour. For non-followers of the series, it’s the unlikely story-line of a ghost, a werewolf and a vampire sharing a house in Bristol. Series 1 …
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Tolethorpe Hall – The Tempest
We went to Tolethorpe Hall tonight to see The Tempest and we planned to see Chris and Pete M there too. The weather has been a little unpredictable this week (ahh, the irony…weather…tempest…geddit!?), so rather than risk a picnic, we ate at The George Hotel, Stamford. Janet picked us up at 5.15 and together with …
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