This week I have spent time in two very contrasting locations-the concrete and neon rush of Tokyo city and the peaceful and excessively green surrounds of Nikko National Park. I came back from Nikko National Park yesterday and felt somewhat relieved since it was just pouring with rain while we were visiting the mountain shrines. Toshogu Shrine was quite beautiful with its complex of elaborate golden arches and it was situated on the side of a mountain surrounded by vast japanese cedar trees, many of which were apparently planted in the 1600s. There were so many shrines around Nikko that one could easily spend all day looking at them all. The whole area was just picturesque, particularly the view of of Chujenji lake from akechidaira platform and Shinkyo bridge. Climbing along the mountains from akechidaira was quite an adventure, and not necessarily a good one, although very memorable. I will get into that in some other entry.

The areas that I am staying at in Tokyo is actually one of the older districts and has some great temples and shrines. There is a huge shrine called Sensoji, very close to my hostel in Asakusa. I visited it on the first day that I arrived. The promemenade that leads to it, is jam packed with tourists and little shops and as I wandered around Asakusa and even around my hostel I remembered why I like tokyo so much. There are ridiculous amounts of detail everywhere one looks-tiny, tiny shops, japnese neon signs flashing wildly at night, mini shrines and parks located in the most unexpected places, strange theme parks like ice cream city (which I visited), purposefully placed ornaments in front of peoples miniture homes, vending machines selling beer, powerlines all over the place, camera stores that occupy entire blocks (great for me), etc, etc.

Any way I got to go and make use of the day. Hi to Everyone that is getting this journal entry automatically!

Eve