It was an early start for Mish has he had to get up to stand in line to get tickets for the canal gondola. He managed to be 2nd in line, and got tickets for a ride just before lunch. When he returned back to the hotel, with a hot coffee for Robyn, the girls were hard at work on their homeschooling activities.
With school done for the day we headed into town and went to the Japanese Toy Museum. They had an impressive display of children’s toys from all parts of Japan, from the old days. These included dolls, finger/stick puppets, masks, wooden toys, kites, spinning tops, etc. They also displayed the spinning top that holds the Guinness record for the longest human powered spinning top, just over 1hr and 8 minutes. It was interesting to see that girls recognised a number of toys. While the toys may have changed construction material and aesthetics, many of them are still found and played with children today.
We finished with the museum just in time for our gondola ride. It was a charming 20 minute ride up and down the canal. We learned a bit more about Kurashiki from our gondolier, who tried so hard to tell us the history of the canals and the houses around in his (very) broken English.
Afterwards we spent a few hours walking through the town and shops grabbing a few bites to eat here and there including a whole bunch of deep fried food, as that is all the store sold (I suspect that if they had fruit/vegetables it would have been deep fried as well!). From the stores we bought some things for ourselves, and Japanese dress for each of the girls.
Along the way we found an ice cream place which sold white peach ice cream, and after yesterday’s taster, we all had to get some! It did not disappoint! Absolutely delicious! With happy tummies we decided to check out the Folk Craft Museum. Parents and children had rather different expectations as to what this museum would hold. This museum was dedicated to beauty that can be found in functional everyday items, which meant that we got to see various items that would have been found in Japanese homes over the last several centuries. The craftsmanship was amazing!
We returned back to the hotel to set some laundry on and to jump back into the public baths at the girls request. The girls loved the experience yesterday and wanted to repeat it. Once clean we headed out to find some dinner. Mish wanted to find some Mamakarizushi (herring sushi). Unfortunately due to translation failure he got some pickled whole fish… Let’s just say that the heads were a bit hard to swallow!
Hopefully tomorrow we will have some more luck with food!
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