The Traveling thing (Golden Week mega update!! Part1!!)

Hhhherrreess Simon!!! ^_^
With a MEGA update for ya :)
Ssssoooo for my first bit of traveling in Japan we have to backtrack to Tuesday. When two other teachers (Alex and Brent), and two receptionists (Ayumi and Chikako) went on a day trip to Kobe:

Kobe is a port city very close to Osaka. We took the Shinkansen from Nagoya station at 8.46am, arriving at Shin-Osaka by about 10am. After arriving at at our destination there was only one thing on our mind. Food!!! :P So where else would we head to? But Chinatown of course!! lol!!

(The last pic is of Alex and Brent (haven't got any of the girls, but I will be getting photos from them which will :P)).
Thing to not about China town in Kobe is that its China town but not as we know it. Shops are very small with limited space, so most of the selling and eating takes place in the streets. An interesting and tasty experiance :)
After filling our bellies we went off to see some tourist spots. First up was the port. Kobe port was destoyed in an earthquake in 1995,resulting in many deaths.


(1st pic-Kobe port tower, 2nd pic-Prototype electromagnetic ferry,3rd pic-An old ship,4th pic-The museum,5th and 6th pics-damged parts of the port which shoe the damage caused)
The port has been rebuilt since and there's a lot of information there detailing the events of that fateful day.
After that we decided to visit the european houses town. Confused? well basically it's this town built ages ago to house important european visitors. The town has a house for a lot of european countries including Holland, Germany, Denmark and of course England. The houses are built to a european design and i think to a style from that country too.
We went round and saw most of the houses, and even climbed to the top of the mountain.

(The view from the top, if the closely at the third pic you can just make out the port tower, we were at a short time ago).
The last thing to do was of course to have dinner, and sample the local speciality, Kobe beef.
Leaving with a once again full belly, we headed home via the now familiar Shinkansen :)
I leave you with a pic of the shrine at the top of the mountain and also of a building plucked straight out of the mother country.




S