Another onsen!

That's 3 in less than 48 hours for us, but we're very aware that they'll soon become impossible again.

It wasn't a great night last night. Tom was up several times, simply by coughing himself awake. He went back down fairly quickly each time, but it's not nice to see him suffering. Still, as usual, he's been bright and cheerful today, but hasn't eaten so well, probably because of his throat as well. Either that, or he's finally fed up with rice.

Anyway, we decided to head slightly further afield for a day out today, so headed just over the border into Ishikawa Prefecture, to a little hot spring town called Yamashiro. We booked a private onsen suite for just the 3 of us in a very plush hotel, which was extremely pleasant, although Tom was being a bit of Mummy's boy and cried every time Nik gave him to me in the bath. As I said, he's not quite himself at the moment.

Still, after we finally emerged from the hot water, I got chatting to a couple of university professors and Tom had his best ever crawling session up and down the hotel's vast and luxuriously carpeted lobby. This caught the attention of virtually all the hotel staff, who came out to watch. Tom put on a superb display of crawling, standing, grinning, clapping, waving etc., and when we finally got round to leaving, almost all of them were at the front bowing, waving and pleading with us (well, just Tom probably) to come back.

Slow, but uneventful journey back, pausing only for a session at the local 100 yen shop, which wasn't quite as good as the equivalent shopping frenzy last time we were in Japan. We may have another bash in Kobe on Friday. We did stop at a clothes' shop on the way to Yamashiro this morning, where we managed to get 4 outfits for Tom at very good prices.

So, a pretty good day all in all. Back to Kobe tomorrow, via Kyoto to see another old friend of mine. It's been a nice 3 days here in Fukui. Shame we didn't have a bit longer.

Sorry about the lack of a photo today. We forgot to take Nik's camera. We did get some "live" onsen footage in Yamashiro, but I can't upload it from the camcorder here.

Nik here, finally got a chance to get on the computer. Thought I should add that we have had a developmental break through today. Whilst Matt was chatting with the professors in the hotel lobby, Tom decided to play with a coffee table. He pulled himself up at one end and cruised to the other end so he could try to pull the no smoking sticker off it. He did this more than once, so it wasn't a fluke. Since we've been back at Dylan's he's been pulling himself up on the sofa and cruising to the end, dropping down then crawling back to the start to do it all over again. So, I think we can now say that Tom is officially cruising. I would have taken some video evidence, but my camera wasn't to hand and I didn't want to move and potentially disturb him (especially as I was one of the pieces of equipment in his route)

His cough hasn't been too bad today, it was pretty bad last night, he got himself into coughing fits that just wouldn't end a couple of times last night, meaning I had to get up and sort him out (he has his own bedroom here) We are hoping that the onsen today will have helped clear his sinuses. I guess we will find out tonight as it is always worse when he lies down.

Oh, I would also like to add that the onsen last night was complete and utter bliss. Matt and Dylan took Tom on their side, leaving me free for half an hour of complete relaxation. I had the longest shower and then dips in 3 pools before lying down in a strong bubble pool to be pummelled for 5 minutes. I ended up looking like a lobster, but was very very relaxed, in fact I think it was the most relaxing thing I've done since Tom was born. As I don't speak Japanese I didn't have to make small talk to anyone and not being responsible for anyone was lovely. It was pure heaven, just a shame it couldn't have been 30 mins longer and include a massage...