Day 5 - Kurashiki - First day of 2012 – Jūnihitoe Ceremony and Bikan Area

2011 was in the past and I was already in 2012. On top of that, I was blessed to be in my favourite holiday destination – Japan.

After such a nice day in the mountains and amazing food the first year of the year was going to be a truly religious experience. I went with my friend to give the first pray of the year in 2012.  According to the tradition we went to the most important shrine in Kurashiki called Achi-Jinja or  阿智神社  located on the top of a hill called  Tsurugatayama or 鶴形山.

This hill is located right in the middle of the cultural and touristic area called Bikan. Bikan due to its beauty and proper has been used in many movies and series that are uncommon on this side of the world.

View Achi Jinja - Kurashiki in a larger map

Day 4 Okayama & Kurashiki - Japanese New Year 正月 - Saijou Inari 最上稲荷神社 - The unexplored Japan

Let's forget about the breakfast part and let's go straight to the point of today's trip to this amazing place which I didn't have a clue about.

Saijou Inari 最上稲荷神社 - vermilion torii

The first thing I'd like to tell you is that the place even though it was in Kurashiki, it was a bit outside of the actual city. We had to use to GPS to get there and to be honest with you at this very point I don't even know how we managed to get there since the GPS was giving us the wrong directions.

Day 2 Okayama –岡山 and the Beautiful Okayama-jo -岡山城

Good Morning Kurashiki!

View from my friend's terrace at 7:45am

Oh I slept so well the night before that I was ready for a great day. And as usual I had been very lucky in terms of weather. Not a single cloud in the sky even though other cities in Japan some snow had fallen on the last couple of days.

Both of us woke up quite late so we didn't have breakfast and instead waited a bit to have a proper lunch. We drove to Okayama and parked very close to the Okayama castle. I don't know if it doesn't look good but we parked in a stationary shop some 300 mts away from the castle. My friend was a bit worried but honestly, what could happen? Nothing, so we left the car and headed towards to castle.

Just before crossing the bridge I saw this motorbike that caught my attention because it has one particular thing that I really liked, the happy face on the exhaust.

Happy-face Motorbike Exhaust in Okayama

Day 1 - Okayama and Kurashiki - 中国地方: 岡山 倉敷

Arriving in Okayama 岡山

So I finally left Kansai and now I was all the way West in Okayama.
That was just my last stop with the Shinkansen and I have to say the Shinkansen express might be a bit expensive but it is extremely comfortable.
Please make sure you ask someone in the train station where your carriage actually stops and don't be like me who pretended to know where exactly it was going to stop because that's only going to cause you some troubles.

Nara Station Shinkansen

Inside Shinkansen Hikari

In my case, and now I can laugh about it I wasted some 15 minutes walking from one carriage to another. I repeat don't think the train is not going to be packed in case it didn't in the station you go it. I'm saying this,because most likely you'll have to move in the next train station.

I recorded a video on my way to Okayama so you can have an idea of how things look like inside the Shinkansen.