Home

We made it - a little frazzled around the edges but we are here.  The trip home wasn't too bad - we got a Shinkansen from Aioi to Shin Osaka and then the Haruka limited express to Kansai airport.  Had a quick look round the shops etc and then got on our flight to Paris (full this time, but we had seats with extra leg room and a lovely old lady sitting next to me).  Tom was very well behaved - he didn't shout, cry, whinge, fidget or anything.  He did ask to go to the toilet what seemed like every 5 minutes, but apart from that he was very well behaved.  As seems the norm, he fell asleep on take off, was asleep for about an hour.  Then played quite nicely until I decided we needed to get him asleep again.  Unfortunately I couldn't get him off - but he tried really hard, so I can't complain.  I played with him again for another hour or so, and then tried again with success.  He then slept for the rest of the trip (about 4 hours), in fact I had to work quite hard to wake him up as we were descending into Paris.

Charles de Gaulle airport was horrible.  First of all we managed to get ourselves in the only security queue that wasn't moving.  We were stuck there for an hour - great fun!  Tom again was good, but he soiled his nappy and there wasn't anywhere to change him.  In the meantime all the other queues were working efficiently.  Typical.  As soon as we got through I went to the toilet with Tom - no baby change!  Had to sort him out in a tiny cubicle, and ended up putting the soiled nappy in a bin which said no nappies on it (I was not going to carry it around in my bag!)  All of this put us and particularly me in a really bad mood, which was a shame as we had arrived in a good mood.  

We then went to find something to eat - we had two choices: spend a stupid amount of money on fine dining or spend less (but still a ridiculous amount of money) on boil in the bag and microwaved mediocre food.  We went for the second option - it cost €21 for two paper plates of very average curry and rice - outrageous, and this being the country well known for good food - what about a nice French boulangarie, or a 'local' restaurant with a menu du jour?

Rant over, eventually the time for our flight to Birmingham came.  Phew, AND the pilot waved at Tom as we walked across the tarmac to it.  We actually arrived in Birmingham early: we got through security and collected our luggage before we should have landed.  This was great, except our taxi was expecting us to take 25 minutes to get through, so we had to wait quite a while for it to arrive.  However, it was a pleasant evening, so it wasn't a huge problem.  We finally got home around 11pm - so it was a 24 hour journey, door to door.  Tom went straight to bed and we followed very soon after.  Didn't do too badly for sleep except that Matt and I are used to sleeping on futons and not disturbing each other, each time one or the other of us moved the other woke up.  Not good - we are now seriously considering getting ourselves some futons for home now (except we aren't that sure if you can get them here)

Anyone got any sheep we can borrow?

No photos from the trip back, but here's a photo of the meadow that greeted us this morning - we weren't expecting such growth - Matt almost killed himself attacking it with the mower this afternoon.

So thank you Japan - not the traditional destination for a family holiday, but it should be.  We really did have a fantastic time.  

Notes to selves for next time:

+ Don't take any trousers or long sleeved tops for Tom if we go at the same time of year - he didn't wear any except on the flights (in fact Tom and I were in shorts and T-shirts every single day)

+ Matt to take a wide angle lens 

+ Make sure we take my big backpack empty to fit all shopping in on the way back

+ Matt to take pillow with him - bean filled pillows and him don't mix

+ I would like to be able to speak and read some basic Japanese before I go again

+ Take decent camping pans next time - the cheap ones we got warped the first time I used them (frying gyoza)
+ On arrival if not immediately validating the rail pass - spend the extra to use a shinkansen - the journey from Kansai Airport to Aioi was awful.  JR now take credit cards.
+ Take blow up chairs - we didn't get used to sitting on the floor!

Matt here - a big thanks to Nik for doing such a sterling job with the blog every night. Fantastic. It will be a great journal in the future when we look back on this holiday.