Wet, wet,wet

The forecast was for showers but apart from a brief break in the rain mid-afternoon it was very soggy.

Visted Gail's sister Lyn who lives in a village a 45 minute ride away. Her husband Jack is the High Sheriff of Bedfordshire, a position that has been in existence for over a 1000 years. They are mentioned in the Magna Carta and had a key role in managing the Shires. These days it is an independent non-political Royal appointment for one year. Jack has to attend all royal visits to the shire and officiates over the judges, police and emergency services and other agencies concerned with crime prevention and law enforcement. There's no remuneration involved. The uniform includes a velvet jacket and breeches, tights and, of course, a sword. Unfortunately I forgot to take my camera, so no photos.

We went with Lyn and Jack (not in uniform!) to the Shuttleworth Visitor Centre www.shuttleworth.org to look at the collection of vintage cars, motorcycles and aeroplanes. Very impressive and a good place to go on a rainy day because it is all under cover in a series of interconnected sheds and hangers. Jack took lots of photos for me on his smartphone. I am hoping he'll be able to email some to me in which case I'll retrospectively slot some into this post.

Then we headed off to a nearby village for a pub lunch. I had one of my favourites - steak, stilton and stout pie with all the trimmings.

Gail and I Got soaked on the way back in a sudden rain and hailstorm. No opportunity to stop and put on our waterproofs because of the heavy traffic and no hard shoulder.

Ace Cafe

A UK Ulyssean, Frank, whom we met when he visited Australia a couple of years ago and again when we came to England last year, lives about 20 minutes from the Ace Café on the North Circular in northern London, so I had arranged for him to show me how to get there. A friend who lives in Merimbula gave me an Ace Café badge several months ago, so I had to go there when I had a chance to legitimise it.

I met Frank at the Toddington Services on the M1 motorway and we hammered down the M1 and then round the North Circular to the Café.

It was BMW Day today, so about 30% of the hundreds of bikes that came and went while we were there were beemers, some of them dating from the 60’s and possibly earlier. Three other UK Ulysseans turned up and Frank and I also had a long chat with Linda who with her husband Barry, owns of the Café. If you want to know more about the Ace Cafe see www.ace-cafe-london.com.

Frank and I then rode to Windsor with the intention of having lunch there. But little did we know that there’s a pageant on there today and this evening to celebrate the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, and the place was absolutely packed, so we meandered back towards Milton Keynes and after he had put me on the right road he headed home himself.

Arrived in England

Friend Colin, who has been looking after the bike for us since we used it last year to go to the Isle of Man TT and to tour Ireland and Scotland, has done a great job, it’s registered and polished and raring to go. I had it serviced before it was put away and Colin has had the battery on a trickle charger and ran the engine until it was hot every now and then. Today, our first day in England, I have been sorting out our motorcycling gear and fitting the bluetooth communication system into our helmets.

For a test ride I rode the bike into Milton Keynes town centre to buy a money travel card from the post office on to which I can load cash rather than carrying loads of paper money on the trip. There are other cards that give a better exchange rate than the Post Office but this one is almost unique in that it can be purchased over the counter instead of having to wait a couple of weeks for it to arrive in the post.

Saturday 13 May

We went for a ride to Birmingham to visit my old university which I attended from 1968 until 1972. Some years ago I met a young guy at a Hash House Harriers meet  in Tanzania who was wearing an Aston University t-shirt. He was the son of the vice-Chancellor and told me the University had expanded to cover much of the neighbouring area that had been terraces of back-to-back slum housing and that the Sack of Potatoes pub where I had drunk many a pint was still there but was now on the campus. Had to go and have a look.

We blasted up the M1 and had no trouble finding it at all. That part of Birmingham has changed mostly beyond recognition, but Aston University is still recognisable by the main lecture building, the students guild (which used to be called the students union) and the pub which is called the Sacks of Potatoes, though I remember it  being the singular "Sack", though it was a long time ago and my faculties at the time were no doubt addled by the vast quantities of beer.

A security guard, when I explained why I was there - a nostaligia trip - let us in to the main building which now has swipe card entry on every door to keep people like us out. Most of it was recognisable but there is a new flash foyer and the old lino floors are now carpeted and there are artworks on what had been stark walls. The Sack of Spuds was much the same inside. The stinky beer soaked carpets have gone and it now has varnished floorboards. The street outside has gone and there's a lawn giving it a village green look to it.

 Then we headed back via Royal Leamington Spa. It got the Royal tag because 11 year old Princess Victoria once stayed there overnight on her way to Birmingham. On that basis I’d have thought almost every town in the country could claim to be royal, as sometime over the millennia a king, queen, prince or princess must have eaten, slept or been to the toilet there.

We had lunch in the old spa pump house. The town used to be famous because of its saline springs. The drinking water in the café tasted as if it still comes from the same source!

Last day in Tokyo

This morning we got on the subway and headed for the Imperial Palace Gardens. The forcast was for drizzle so we though we'd try to beat the rain and visit the gardens in the morning and then go to the Ginza shopping area in the afternoon.


The gardens cover 210,000 square metres and occupy the site of the former Edo Castle. They have been open to the public since 1968 and are surrounded by amazing stone walls and moats.

Because we were early we almost had the place to ourselves.

After exporing the gardens we walked to Ginza, having lunch on the way at an Italian restaurant near Tokyo main station with a $12 early bird (before noon) special of dish of choice plus a salad and a drink. We hadn't had any breakfast so we didn't take long to wolf it down.

Ginza was very disappointing. When I first came here about 30 years ago Ginza was very Japanese. It had hundreds of neon signs in Japanese script and huge department stores selling domestically produced goods of every kind. Now it is mostly Cartier, Bulgari, and all the other stuff you see in any big city in the west and the high rise department stores are anonymous stroctures in glass and concrete. After half an hour of wandering around we fled back to Asakusa on the subway. Ginza isn't our scene at all.

The 10 square kilometre area of Chiyoda that includes the Palace area, Ginza and the Diet (their Parliament House) is said, at the height of the Japanese land price bubble, to have been worth more than the value of the whole of California.

A comment on Japanese protocol. They always keep to the left on footpaths; there is absolutely no litter in the streets despite an almost total absence of litter bins; on the subway the people standing always face the windows and not another passenger; in shops and restaurants your purchases and change are always handed to you with both hands and a bow; politeness is everything. Yet they are very friendly people and keen to help with directions if asked. For a westerner Tokyo is a very easy city to get around in on foot or public transport. The ticket machines on the subway have an "English" button, which if pressed changes the whole display to English and a voice gives instructions in English.



More Tokyo

The plan was to then get the subway to Ueno but instead we were feeling energetic and decided to walk. A very interesting walk through narrow residential streets with a total absence of parked cars anywhere. It seems that on street parking is totally illegal so if  any of the residents want to own a car they have to park under in a space under their apartment block or in one of the carparking facilities that have a lift to get your car up and down from street level.

Finally we reached Ueno Park which was our destination. Ueno hill was the site of the last-ditch defence of the Tokkugawa shogunate in 1868. When they were defeated by the imperial army  the Hill was tranformed into Tokyos first public park. It as temples, shrines, a boating lake, buskers, a zoo and cafes. At the south end of the park there are hundreds of homeless men who live in cardboard and plastc tarpaulin shelters. Apparently many are failed businessmen who went bust in Japan's financial crisis. We saw about 300 hundred of them queueing for a lunchtime handout of food in a corner of the park from what seemed to be a religious organisation as their were a couple of musicians singing what sounded like religious songs. They had to line up in a quasi-military fashion and walk in step with each other when called forward in groups. It looked very humiliating and very sad. Not a smile among them. It clashes strongly with the general prosperity that we have seen everywhere despite the Japanese economy having effectively been in recession for years. Everywhere is spotlessly clean and the roads and footpaths are in excellent repair, there are no empty shops and everyone except the homeless are very well dressed and seem to be spending plenty of money.

We lunched in a cafe just outside the park and then went to the National Museum which we wandered round until we were suffering from culture overload and then headed back to the hotel via a cafe where we had coffees for the equivalent of $7.00 each.

In the evening we went for a walk along the Sumida River along a lit tree lined path. There were a few other walkers and half a dozen joggers. Under one of the bridges were several down and outs settling into their cardboard box tents for the night with their shoes neatly placed outside. After eating we walked to the Sensouji Temple again to see it floodlit. Very impressive, but it's hard to reconcile the fact that one block from the wealthy Buddhist worshippers in their suits and expensive dresses and accessories are people living in cardboard boxes.

Tokyo

Getting through passport control when we arrived at Tokyo took about an hour and a half. The queue zigzagged backwards and forwards until we finally got to the desk, were fingerprinted and photographed and issued with our visas. Then, after collecting our luggage, we negotiated the Tokyo metro and subway system to our booked hotel in Asakusa. We had to change trains just once but need the help of locals to find the right platforms. Most seem to be able to understand English even if they can't speak it.

The Chisun Inn is a modern hotel with small but very well appointed rooms. The only downside of our room is that the window faces onto a blank wall about 1.5 metres away. Most of the 200 hundred rooms are the same as the 10 storey building is wedged on 3 sides between other high rise buildings.

After a comfortable night's sleep we went in search of a place where we could get breakfast with a vegetarian option for Gail. In the end we resorted to Macdonalds, where she could have hotcakes, then as we left we noticed a cafe opposite that did a rice and salad breakfast plate. perhaps we'll go there tomorrow and I'll have a more traditional Japanese breakfast than Maccas bacon and egg between two hotcakes which is their version of the MacMuffins we get at home.

Then we explores Asakusa on foot. First Japan's oldest Buddhist temple, the Sensouji Temple dedicated to the goddess Kannon, which was first built in 628. It is entered through the Kaminarimon Gate which has a huge lantern flanked by the gods Fujin (god of wind) on the right and Raijin (god of thunder) on the left.

Through the gate is a market street selling mainly touristy stuff and then the temple itself.

To the right of the temple is the Asakusa Shrine, a Shinto shrine dedicated to protecting the Buddhist Temple in a typical Japanese arrangement.

Then we walked to Kappabashi-dori, the restaurant and hotel wholesale district where for about a kilometre the shops sell cooking equipment and the plastic food that Japanese restaurants arrange on plates in their windows to show what delights can be eaten within.

We're on our way at last

Sunday 5 May and we have started on our journey. The couple who will be house-sitting for us gave us a lift into the village bus stop where we caught the bus to Canberra where we were met by some of our kids and grandkids for lunch at Café Essen, one of my favourites. I had a full fried breakfast for lunch!

Then onto another bus to take us to Sydney airport or an overnight stay at the Formule 1 before catching the early morning JAL flight to Tokyo. For dinner we walked to the domestic terminal and ate at one of the eateries there and then walked back to the hotel to watch the Estoril Portugal MotoGP on TV. Casey Stoner in flying form again – so fast that it was a fairly boring race. I hope the French MotoGP is a bit more exciting when we are there in a couple of weeks’ time.

Next morning we caught the shuttle bus to the airport where we discovered that our discount JAL premium economy tickets enabled us to avoid the check-in and immigration queues and gave us access to the Qantas business class lounge where we tucked in to the complimentary buffet breakfast.  An excellent  good start so far. I like this premium economy stuff, particularly when it cost us just a few dollars more than ordinary economy because we booked early.

Flight delayed a quarter of an hour due to the late arrival of the aircraft and when we boarded, in typical polite Japanese fashion, they apologised to each passenger for the delay. Gail caused them to break in to laughter when she replied “it was a pleasure, but I had no choice”, a very un-Japanese response. One of them replied “mmmm, I guess it was like that” and more laughter.

Excellent seats. 20% wider than normal economy and 20% more legroom plus a side table. Now it’s 9.00am and I’m drinking Suntory Malts beer, one of my favourites, and eating squid and soy crackers. Gail's vegetarian meal of chickpea chermoula has arrived. Looks good. Side dishes of salad and fruit and a cakey thing. Not sure whether this is breakfast, brunch, or a Tokyo-time lunch, but who cares.

The menu options for omnivores like me are a bit of a surprise – no Japanese food apart from optional miso soup. A bit different to when I used to fly JAL business class before I retired several years ago and used to fly JAL to Tokyo every couple of years. In those days there was a western menu and a Japanese menu and I always enjoyed the Japanese option though often I had no idea what I was eating. About 95% of the passengers on this plane are Japanese but they must be happy with the options so perhaps it just goes to show how westernised Japan must be these days. I guess I’ll find out when we get there.