"CL" <flothru@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:d4ds9f$ero$1@nnrp.gol.com...
> mr.sumo.snr. wrote:
>
> Start out at Zozoji in Daimon which is one corner of the old Shoguns' 
> palace precincts.  Inside the grounds of the temple is a second temple 
> dedicated to Tokugawa Ieyasu as a god.  Behind those buildings are a group 
> of Tokugawa family graves and the obligatory field of "water baby" 
> statues.
>
> Walk out the front gate of Zozoji and you'll go under the Daimon (good 
> photo op).  Continue down the same road toward the Kokusai Boeki Sentaa- 
> and just after the entrance to Hamamatsucho-eki there is the entrance to 
> the remnants of a huge garden that belonged to the vacation house of one 
> of the main daimyo.  It's maybe a hundred yen a head to go in.  They have 
> a Fujimi (one of the hills you used to be able to stand on to see 
> Fuji-san) and the classic Chinese water / mountain / plain layout.
>
> When you get done doing a round of the park, head back out the gate and 
> continue on down the same road.  The next stop is Hamarikyu, which is an 
> old hunting lodge of one of the daimyo that's been turned into a nature 
> preserve.  Check your maps for the easiest way to get there.  All you 
> _have_ to do is to walk down to Kaigan-dori (the next main road which is 
> eight lanes of smoky, out of tune, diesel tractor trailers with an 
> overhead kosoku ramp to hold the ambiance down to the level of your nose) 
> and hang a left, then continue on for about 500 meters.  It's a 20 minute 
> walk or you can grab a taxi and get there in about ten minutes due to the 
> screwed up heavy truck traffic.
>
> Hamarikyu has about eight different sections and lots of signs that 
> describe what it is you're looking at.  Most seem to have been translated 
> by Mrs. Watanabe's fourth period English class just after they'd completed 
> the unit on nouns.  The one cool thing at the park for furriners is the 
> tea house over the salt marsh where you sit them down and do the 
> traditional sweets and green tea number for a couple of hundred yen a 
> head.
>
> There is a water taxi stop at one corner of the park where you can catch 
> the boat for Asakusa.  Good opportunity to drink beer while your mother 
> tapes all of the buildings on both sides of Sumida-gawa.  It's also a 
> great opportunity to photograph the Flying Golden Turd on top of the Asahi 
> Beer headquarters.
>
> Walk them up to Sensoji and let them turn back into tourists.  If they're 
> hungry, there are lots of restaurants on the back streets around the 
> temple.
>
> If you start out around 10:30, you'll be done by about 16:30.  You can 
> either chikatetsu back to your hotel or take a taxi.
>

Basically followed your route exactly - missed out the Hamarikyu and went 
straight up to Asakusa.  Great day out.  Afforded sumo jnr.'s grandparents 
plenty of photo ops and wore them out - not too much, but enough.

Now we're back in sunny Nagano the real struggle to find something to occupy 
the time will begin.

Stupid, thicky, dumb-arse me has spent the last four months laboring under 
the impression that their flight out of Japan (onwards to Brettland) was on 
Monday 9th May.  The penny dropped earlier this evening that in fact they 
were ARRIVING in Austria on the 9th - departing here on the 8th - the last 
day of a very long Golden Week holiday for many!!!!  Realistically, working 
on a 9.00 PM departure from Narita, and the fact that they can kill any 
excess waiting time in the business class lounge,  I wonder just how many 
extra hours I should add to the normally four-hour trip from here to the 
airport?

--
jonathan