Goodye, Kelly. Hello, Takemi.

Breakfast was the best yet in Kristin’s opinion and we all agreed the blueberry ice cream was the best we’d had.   Yes, a small scoop of blueberry ice finished off the breakfast of miso soup, egg with shrimp and peas (not the jolly Green Giant kind), sashimi, pickled vegetables (as always in Kyoto) and grilled fish.

Hiromi and the ryokan manager, bowing and waving, saw us off to the taxi to the Kyoto station where we caught the shinkansen to Shinagawa station in Tokyo.  Kristin was very sad to leave.  These people treat you like royalty. We felt badly that Japanese women on kimono insisted on carrying our bags down the rocky steps exiting the building.  Once at Shinagawa, Kelly caught her Narita express train to the airport and Cory and Kristin boarded another shinkansen back to Nagoya to connect to a train to Nakatsugawa, in the Gifu prefecture.  Sure, we had to do a little back and forth to see Kelly off, but this was her first time using a passport.  The Tokyo train stations are intimidating, to say the least.

We were added to the list of over 350 guests who have stayed with Takemi and Nobuko.

Train to Nakatsugawa where our host, Takemi, a retired English teacher and longtime friend of one of Cory’s co-workers, picked us up from the train station.  We were looking forward to relaxing for a few days with him, his wife, Nobuko, and their two Golden retrievers, Ross and Ali.  They had another friend staying with them, Ginger, from Orange County.  We were added to the list of over 350 guests who have stayed with Takemi and Nobuko.  They kept us well fed during our trip. Tonight, we had teppanyaki (grilled on iron plate) - vegetables, shrimp, chicken, and ramen noodles.  We slept well in the relative quiet of Nakatsugawa.