The Journey to Sado Island

So, Naomi and I decided we were going to go away this past weekend to Kyoto. We completely forget it was a holiday weekend and we tried to book our hostel 5 days in advance, that's a big no-no in Japan-a place like Kyoto you need to book months in advance. So we looked at a map of Japan and randomly decided to go to Sado a little island northwest of Nagoya not knowing anything about it (to figure out were Sado is, it is the tiny island off the west coast near Niigata) just that it is halfway across the country. We figured looking at the map it would probably take 5 hours to get there by train and ferry. Boy, were we wrong-this weekend we used every type of transportation there is expect plane to get to Sado including, bike, subway, train, bus, ferry, taxi, and foot. Needless to say getting there was much more difficult then we expected, and MUCH MUCH longer. Getting to Sado was an adventure in itself. But I am very proud of us, we did so well and NEVER got lost-not once. Lots of very nice people helped us along the way, it probably helped that we looked liked very confused foriengers who had no clue what we were doing.

Let's start at the very beginning, it's a very good place to start...

My alarm clock went off at 5am, yes you read that correctly 5am-and if you know me well you know that I am NOT a morning person but I made the simple sacrafice this once. We needed to be in Nagoya by 6:30 so we had to ride our bikes to Fujigaoka subway station which is about 15 minute bike ride away. From Fujigaoka we had to take the subway for 1/2 hour to the Nagoya train station. Here is Nagoya Train Station at 6:30 in the morning-it was surprising busy at 6:30 on a Saturday:












After much confusion and 2 very nice gentlemen explaining to us where to go and how to put our tickets in the machine (remember 6 in the morning and we had multiple tickets in Japanese) we were on our way. First train ride; a 3 hour ride to Nagano-I didnt see any Olympic Rings-I looked. Second train ride: 1 1/2 hours ride in a very sketchy train to Niigata. The scenery was absoluetly gorgeous-we went through valleys and mountians looking at the Autumn colors, perfect time to see the foliage.
This is outside Nagano

Once we got to Niigata, we had to figure out which bus to take. We went to the tourist info and the lady was awesome. She didn't speak much English but she wrote down for us 1:30 so we had to wait an hour for the bus to take us to the port. Everytime a bus came we would freak out and start to get up to see but the lady crossed her hands and tapped her wrist (crossing arms like a X in Japanese means no, much like when we shake our heads). She was great-we loved her and decided she adopted us :) So we had a hour to burn at the train station so we started watching all the taxis and decided which driver we would choose to take us to the port if needed-very stimulating conversation actually. Finally, our bus came right on time and we were off to the port. But once we got to the port once again our confused forienger faces came in handy and one of the employees who spoke some English came to our rescue. And we finally made it onto the ferry:


The ferry ride was a very interesting experience. We traveled 2nd class on the ferry which means we sat on carpet and didn't have a actual chair to sit on unless we went to the cafeteria. Each time you go on the carpet you had to take off your shoes, so there were piles of shoes by each section. A very cute older couple decided that we were hungrey and gave Naomi and I a orange. They were soo cute and keep saying "It's tiny"-we named it the friendship orange. And being in Japan and knowing the gift giving rules (sort of) returned the favor and gave them some of my Halloween chocolate from home. We took a nap on the carpet and spent time outside watching the birds swarm the ferry as the passangers threw food to them and enjoyed the gorgeous view:



2 1/2 hours later we made it to Sado at 4:30 in the afternoon-and had a welcome party:


We walked into the port terminal with this gorgeous music pouring out into the ferry and as we walked into the building we saw this group of traditional Sado music and dancing. It was so amazing, the dancing was so graceful and the flute, drums and singing was so peaceful and lovely. What a warm welcome to Sado...

Thats all for now, it's 1am and I have to get up for work tomarrow, I promise to continue our saga at Sado soon. There is still so much to tell including; the taxi chasing our bus, the climb up the mountian, gold mine, phantom bear, beautiful old temple, onsen and the journey home.


On a different note, I will be going to my first formal Japanese party this weekend. One of the Japanese teachers is getting married, I am soo excited and happy for Yumiko-she is such a lovely person. I will fill you in soon-i promise :)