Monday 14 November 2016 After a relaxing Sunday in DC we caught the overnight flight to Brussels. Having spotted a huge arch from the taxi on the way into town I decided to go and investigate. After short stroll from the hotel I came across Parc Cinquantenaire, or “Park of the Fiftieth Anniversary” Most buildings of the U-shaped […]

Saturday 12 November 2016 Sylvia had been at a conference in Washington DC all week. I arrived last night. Just down the road from the hotel a Statue of George Washington stood in the middle of a round-about on Pennsylvania Ave. Off to the left some distance down on F Street is the International Spy Museum. Although most […]

Sunday 6 November 2016 After a fairly long day, mostly in the air, I arrived, via Denver, in Anchorage Alaska. Steve and Chantel met me at the airport. Steve has been down to NZ a few times, both visiting and hunting. My friend Ross and I visited Steve just over three years ago and had a great […]

Saturday 5 November 2016 Whilst enjoying a glass of wine at the hotel in LA on Friday night I got a call from Steve letting me know that the All Black’s game was to start at 3pm Saturday, not 7pm as we had all presumed. A few phone calls to change the flight was a very costly […]

Sylvia: Saturday 29 October We flew into Osaka arriving late Friday evening. We managed to board the bus to Kyoto right at the last minute for a fairly easy transfer to our hotel in Kyoto. Kyoto is very different from Tokyo – still clean and tidy (although not as clean as Tokyo) but older, a lot less busy […]

Friday 28 October 2016 Sylvia’s work had organised a short cultural induction as in her new role as Regional President for Royal Canin in Asia Pacific she will be spending a bit of time in this part of the world. First we headed to the Yu Gardens, situated in the centre of town and with the entry through […]

Monday 31 October As we left the hotel in Kyoto we found a sign pointing to the subway. This lead down to a 5m wide passage that ran the two blocks under the shops to the station. Kyoto surprised me with its transport infrastructure. With only 1.5 million people they seem to have city trains running every […]

Monday 24 October – The Hidden Mt Fuji I took the 9.40am bullet train south to Odawara. My speed app topped us out at 280kmph, a bit slower than the European trains. I was surprised by the normality of houses in outer Tokyo.  With 13 million people in the city and 37 million in the Tokyo-Yokohama urban […]

Sylvia: Saturday 22 October We had a leisurely start to the day with breakfast in the hotel then headed down the road to the nearest subway station to start our exploration of Tokyo. I had studied a number of guides and come up with the most recommended route for our weekend here. The subways here […]