Friday 28th December: Travelling to Helsinki Our journey to Japan began on Friday 28th December 2018 in Manchester airport. We boarded the 5.50pm flight to Helsinki excited to be spending a night in Finland before heading to Tokyo. We landed at Vantaa airport in the freezing cold, surrounded by thick snow. I've always loved the snow in Finland. It makes everything look picturesque. We headed to Espoo and met the family and had a sauna before bed. We got up early the following morning and took Gapu and Reku for a walk to the nearby forest. We came across another dog, a chocolate lab, who's owner told us he was from the same guide dog school as Gapu and Reku. We then went to Sello to buy a few bits and pieces before our flight in the afternoon. It was nice to see the Christmas lights and decorations were still up. We had lunch, packed our bags and headed for the airport. We took the train and got through security very quickly. Our 9.5 hour flight was delayed so we found ...
I'm back in work after 5 glorious days in Finland last week. I'm happy to be back at work, diving into some design work, feeling refreshed and re-energised from my trip, but I'm also missing Finland once again. We spent most of our time in Espoo catching up with friends and family and enjoying obscene amounts of cinnamon buns, coffee and, of course, enjoying sauna. We crammed a lot into 5 days, here's a brief overview of our 5 days in Finland... 1. Wednesday So we arrived late Thursday night. After a midnight feast of macaroni box, we headed off to the 24hour Prisma to buy a few bits and pieces, mostly tasty snacks to scoff before we headed to bed. The following morning we took Gapu for a walk around Espoo, calling at the local Alepa for more tasty snacks! In the afternoon we went to Helsinki University where Tuomas was giving a lecture. I sat in the back with his parents trying to understand extremely advanced mathematics. The post-lecture pizza and drinks...
The second week of our trip in Japan took us to the north of Tokyo to the Takaragawa ryokan onsen in Minakami-Machi, Gunma. We travelled by train to the north where we greeted by gorgeous white snow. We traveled to the onsen by bus and started our retreat to the Japanese mountains. Takaragawa onsen in Minakami-Machi, Gunma. After signing in, we went to our room which was a traditional Japanese ryokan room with sliding doors and a large table in the centre of the room which you would sit at, cross legged. We put on our yukatas and headed out to the hot baths. The snow was falling into the hot spring river that ran through the onsen creating a winter wonderland. We relaxed in one of the larger baths for a while, enjoying the warm water and the beautiful scenery. We felt relaxed and very lucky. That evening, we had a delicious 4 course Japanese meal which was beautifully presented. This included shabu-shabu where we cooked our own meat and vegetables. The food just ke...
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