Sayonara Japan

No Japanese breakfast today! We wanted to get ready, check out and visit a bamboo forest just outside of Kyoto. But before we needed to pay the Ryokan which didn't accept credit cards so it was off to the 7eleven again and get cash. On the way back I spotted a small local supermarket. We really stocked up on Japanese foods and snacks. Then, after we brought it back to the Ryokan to leave it with our bags we went to the train station and jumped on the train to Saga Arashiyama station in the west of Kyoto.

 Our JR rail pass should cover all transportation to day. It was raining the night before and this morning, so the bamboo forest was damp but this only improved the atmosphere. It was a nice stroll through the forest and we even got a quick peak of another temple and had a big dumpling to go. We planned out each train we had to take to get back to the guest house, pick up our bags and then take the next train from Kyoto to Kansai Airport to be there in time for the plane.

  One thing that should not be missing from a longer train journey in Japan (the Haruka train we took was going to take an hour and a half to get from Kyoto to the airport) is a bento box. We got two different boxes in the supermarket and then went to the train.

 No problems getting to the airport but when we arrived we realized the plane was delayed an hour. No problem so far, so I spent it getting a nice bottle of Japanese Whisky (Nikka "Yoichi" single malt 15 years) and writing on my blog. The flight was a bit choppy and when we landed we knew we had to hurry because the last direct bus to Donong would leave at 21:40 which would give us only 40 minutes to get there. This is usually not a big problem but with Incheon being a huge airport it could be close. We had to get off the plane, take the train to the main terminal and then get trough immigration and customs and to the bus stop.

  To cut it short, we didn't make it. I always seem to end up in the slowest queue at immigration. We got to the bus stop 2 minutes late. I don't understand how a huge airport like this can have services cut at 9:40pm. So now we had to take the subway into Seoul and then change twice to get the right train to Donong. The Arex is a train that connects the airport with Seoul Station and takes about an hour to get there. But by that time it was already time for the last train, which was a problem since we had to change another time and it was a possibility that we would not make that one either.

  Yuni knew there was a but from Seoul station to Guri, from where we could change to a bus that would get us home. We found the right bus and it was approaching midnight... This year we'll celebrate Yuni's birthday on the bus! Another hour later or so we finally made it home. It was nearly 2 am. We caught up with Yuni's parents and were happy to get some sleep.