Despite the way it appears on a map, Japan does not seem like a small country once you're actually there! It takes a long time to get from place to place, and it's never cheap. So travel definitely takes some careful planning. But travel is one of my favourite hobbies, so I made it a point to go places as often as I could. It would have been nice if I could have zipped up to Tokyo every weekend on the Shinkansen ("bullet train"), but that would've taken the better part of a day, not to mention being very expensive! In fact, it took me seven months or so to get back to Tokyo since the first time I visited there during the 3-day JET program orientation at the beginning of my stay in Japan. (I ended up going to Tokyo four times in all) However, even though I couldn't travel long distances at the drop of a hat, I found that I managed to travel to most of the places I had hoped to see in Japan during my year on JET. I will be posting summaries and pictures of my various trips as I find the time to do so.

Around Yamaguchi-ken Kumamoto Hiroshima/Miyajima Osaka, Nara, Himeji

Kurashiki Beppu Tokyo, Nikko, Hakone Kyoto