Day 14

Today we had a private tour guide, Toshei-san, takes us around Kyoto. It was so great. He was so smart and such a fun guy. We started at the Fushimi Shrine which has thousands of the red torii gates. We went through some of them, but apparently to go through them all would take over two hours. After that we went to the Nijo Castle. It is most famous for it's nightingale floors-they squeak when you walk on them- that were designed to protect from intruders. It had a lot of neat artwork on the interior, but unfortunately no pictures allowed, but the gardens outside were stunning as well. Next was Kinkaku-ji or the Golden Pavilion. It was beautiful, and definitely a huge tourist attraction. There were all sorts of school groups and big tour buses full of people. And the Japanese love Americans. School groups would stop us to practice their "engarish" with us and they absolutely adored Eden and Olive. If there is one Japanese word that will stick with me from this trip it will be "kawaii," which means "how cute." Most of the time we felt like we were traveling with little celebrities. Hopefully it didn't go to their heads. Our final destination for the day was the Kiyomizu-dera Temple. A Buddhist temple built around a waterfall that they consider to be sacred, "kiyo mizu" meaning "pure water." It was very neat as well and had incredible views of the city of Kyoto. Having a personal tour guide in Kyoto was amazing. We were able to cover the big sights and really learn a lot in the process. Toshei-san was awesome, and this was another really great day.

Day 13

Today we woke up early to board the Shinkansen, or bullet train bound for Kyoto. Eden had been eagerly awaiting going on the Bullet Train. She was more excited about that than anything else I think in going over to Japan. So we had a short two hour ride to Kyoto and checked into the Hyatt Regency and had a little lunch. The excitement from waking up early and taking the bullet train took its toll on the girls who passed out at the table before they even had a chance to eat. After that we took more trains to Osaka, a little further southwest from Kyoto. They have a very neat castle there that randomly closes at like 3:30 p.m. so we missed going inside, but we were able to walk around the outside, in the pouring rain and get absolutely drenched. Olive especially liked jumping in every puddle she could fine. After that we headed over to Dotonbori to eat. They have some crazy restaurants there and it was neat seeing all the huge sea life. There was a huge mechanical crab, an octopus a puffer fish and what not. We had some dinner and then headed back to Kyoto to crash.

Day 12

Today we were over by the Tokyo LDS Temple where Kym and I attended an institute class. After that we had a picnic in the park across the street and the girls had fun playing on the playground there. We had told Eden and Olive that later that night we would be taking them to a family from the branch named Napierski. They had offered to watch them while the adults ate out at a great sushi restaurant called Rainbow Roll Sushi. Several times that day, out of the blue, Eden would start talking about skiing. We couldn't figure it out, until finally I realized that when we told her we were taking her to the Napierski's she mistakenly thought that we were taking her to get a "new pair of skis." We all got a good laugh from that.

Day 11

Today we went to Tokyo Disneyland! Yay! Which is pretty much exactly like regular Disneyland except for they tell you to please remain seated with your arms inside the ride at all times in Japanese instead of English. It was so much fun though. We managed going on a day that was not crowded at all, so we pretty much walked right onto any ride we wanted. We did the teacups, Dumbo, It's a Small World, the Merry-go-Round, the Haunted Mansion, (which scared the girls a bit), a Jungle Cruise, Pirates of the Caribbean, etc., etc., etc.

We watched two parades and ate at the Blue Bayou where you can watch the boats setting off on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. Eden was especially excited that she was tall enough to go on Star Tours. They put a little wristband on her and everything and she was just thrilled about that. Olive was too pooped to get jealous and she slept in the stroller while we all traded off going on the more intense rides. Dietrich and I went on Space Mountain a couple of times and it was the funniest thing ever, because the second time we went there was a group of teenage girls riding behind us and they were just screaming and talking in shrill Japanese, that we of course couldn't understand a word of, but that combined with the rush of the ride just sent us both into laughing fits. It was really a great day though. We all enjoyed ourselves.