For The Birds.

I'm going to take a break from castles and take a look at some of the birds I saw on my trip. I was seeking out a youth hostel on Lake Biwa but alas it was full up. I did manage to land a cabin in Otsu later.

Some hawks floating around Hikone Castle.

A few ducks swimming in the moat surrounding Hikone.

A cormorant fishing before the junk shows up. (Click link for tons of cormorant photos.)

I spent two nights in Otsu outside of Kyoto and travelled around using it as my focal point. I stayed in a beach-side cabin off Lake Biwa and enjoyed kicking back on the beach in the early morn watching the various seabirds flocking around.

Be it ever so humble, my room in the cabin.

The following morning on the beach.

A few days later at Nagoya Castle, a crow was scamming rope from a fence while his spouse looked on approvingly.

A few more days later, some swans at Matsumoto Castle.

Finally, a crow picking away at a garbage bag.
(Full disclosure: this is not a real crow, rather a prize from a capsule machine.)

Happy Anniversaries!

Ernie's Bar had it's first Anniversary on Saturday. There was a huge crowd (70-80 over the course of the evening) and each time I went, it was too damn crowded with 25-30 people shoulder-to-shoulder and I departed and came back twice only to find it still too damn crowded. By the time I returned at 3:00, it was less crowded but it was full of dudes, so Dave & I went for a nightcap elsewhere. A good party for him, but claustrophobic conditions prevented me from enjoying myself there. I did have fun at Suu's, 305 and BBs though.



I popped into the local Game Centre to UFO catch a few items as presents for pals and the only thing worth catching was (Hikonyan), a cat who is the mascot for 彦根城 (Hikone-Jo = Hikone Castle, which is celebrating 400 years.

But the most important one is the 53rd anniversary of everyone's favourite 怪獣/Kaiju, Godzilla. His movie debuted in 1954 and to celebrate I went out and bought a box of ゴジラ ヒーローズ (Gojira Heroes). (Actually I bought the box before I knew about the anniversary, but I needed a segue.) Within were 20 mini-characters and I was lucky enough to get the complete set without acquiring any doubles, though I didn't get the Secret one.


They are all cool, but my favourite is ミニラ (Minira/Minya.) I hated the creature in the movies but I love the cutsie figure.