Sayonara Japan

The trains looked cool

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The train trip went really quickly.  Sean had to catch up on a week's worth of diary, while Adrienne had a much easier time, and we had our new mp3 players that needed a decent test run.  There had been a bit of a rush to the train station because Sean was writing an email saying congrats to Amy and Tokes for their wedding the next day.

A walkway took us over the roads to where the international ferry terminal is and where we exchanged our travel coupons for actual tickets, as well as paying an additional surcharge of Y900.  The people at the ferry terminal let us store our bags in their office and advised us that we had to pick them up by 6pm.  Adrienne wasn't feeling very good.  She hadn't managed to get much sleep, as Sean and Peter were talking until nearly 1 am... oops.  We had 5 hours to mull around and had to do something so as luck would have it, there was the Shimonoseki tower nearby.  We missioned off there and had an amazing view of the harbour, a beautiful bridge, some transmission towers (don't worry Mark and Robin, we got some photos - we'll email them to you) and factories billowing out pollution into the sky.

Random exercise thing in a department store that's meant to simulate riding a horse

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Normally the NZ ferries have really expensive food and in order to hedge the risk of being screwed we headed to a supermarket, the aptly named Food Holes.  Actually it turned out to be better than a hole and was a really good supermarket.  You could pick up 5 litre bottles of whisky for next to nothing and although we were sure it was top quality, we stuck with getting water.

Adrienne was suffering a bit by that stage and we headed back to the a bit earlier than planned to sit down for some relaxing and to get some duty free shochu (type of alcohol) for Korea.  Customs was cleared easily and we headed onto the ferry.  We were travelling 1st class in our own little cabin with 2 bunk beds and an ensuite.  Sounds grand but it wasn't like NZ, so no champagne and hot stewardesses (or stewards for Adrienne).  Turns out that food was actually a very good price and there was vending machine beer.  We also managed to find out that we were the only gaijin onboard.

Shimonoseki bridge

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The view leaving Shimonoseki was a sparkling vista of lights, the tower lit up like a candle and the water dead calm.  Good omens for a trip, if you're that way inclined.  We explored what we could of the ship and turned in for the night, waiting for our Korean experience.