Tag: coffee

mooching in Monzennakacho

All I seem to do is eat. We went to see the early blooming cherry blossom in Monzennakacho and had an ice cream despite me saying before we left the house that I wasn’t eating anything sweet anymore. Something that I tend to claim quite frequently. We did share, so not so bad.

Then we went for coffee at BAKU Coffee Roasters – I had an iced latte, husband had drip coffee. I wish they could put cold coffees in normal cups/glasses instead of plastic. Coffee was espresso based – nice and strong with not much sourness which I don’t ...

Matsumoto + Lake Suwa – Feb ’24: part two

Lake Suwa doesn’t sound great in English (especially if you’re used to the water in England at the moment), better to go with the Japanese name, Suwa-ko.

We arrived fairly early and it was cold! No odd socks today, I had thermal leggings on. We took the local train from Matsumoto (half the price and only about 15 minutes longer – who’s winning?) and got off at Shimo-Suwa Station. We practically ran to get coffee and a piece of banana bread – really nice because it wasn’t overly sweet.

I don’t know when I started liking shrines so much and ...

Matsumoto + Lake Suwa – Feb ’24: part one

We spent a few days in Nagano and very pleasant it was, but really cold. The people were very friendly – I don’t want to offend but compared to Tokyo (and I know it’s because it’s a capital city, they are the same everywhere), extremely friendly.

We took the Azusa train from Tachikawa at 8:24 and arrived in Matsumoto at 10:37. It was full, so I’m glad we booked and didn’t just roll up on the day like we had planned.

We stayed at Hotel 168 aka Iroha (if you know Japanese, you’ll get it). I didn’t, my husband had ...

federal cafe bar

We’d tried going to Federal Cafe Bar in the Northern Quarter on the Sunday we ended up going to Idle Hands. There was a queue and we decided to try again on a weekday. Well, we rolled up on a weekday and there was a queue! It was also raining that day so that was our punishment for impatience. ‘Patience is a virtue I need’ were words in a song from school that I have obviously not learnt yet… We joined the queue – two groups in front of us and a member of staff came out pretty swiftly ...

国内旅行: Tokyo to Hagi 2of6

It was kimono class today but the teacher just dressed me, so not much was learnt. I’ve only ever worn a yukata before and that was nice and breezy. The kimono nearly killed me – it was so tight I could only take little, short gulps of breaths but not really breathe out. I was wrestled into it but I was a little too long. The kimono was my husband’s grandma’s who has sadly passed away now, but it was a nice memory and I hope if she was watching, she wasn’t too upset with my ungainliness.

I didn’t walk
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