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A collection of 24 posts

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Day 25. Homeward Bound.

Not much to say here. Woke up, showered, got the traditional 7-11 breakfast of yogurt and orange juice, checked out, and took the train to the airport. Security was a breeze and I finally found my comb. Rather the security agent did, when she went through my toiletries to find

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Day 24. Motorcycle back to Tokyo. The last day.

I woke up early to make sure I got the motorcycle back on time and was treated to an unobstructed view of Fuji! For about 1 hour was able to get pictures of Fuji while I rode back towards Tokyo. There were only a couple twisty roads that day. I

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Day 23. Motorcycle Day 2

Day 2 of motorbiking started of great with roads so well maintained and every hundred feet there was a new corner. Cars would slow down and flash their emergency lights to let you pass. I thought it was going to rain all day as well, per the weather app on

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Day 22. Motorcycle Day 1

Motorbikes!!! I had been looking forward to this since I started this trip back in July. I had packed my day pack with only the necessary things the night before and left at 8am to get to the motorbike rental place at 9am. After a short briefing on the roads

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Tokyo Day 21

Our last tourist day in Tokyo. There were only a couple of things I wanted to go see: Akihabara, and a World War II museum. We went to the museum first since it closed at 4pm. It was interesting seeing the history told from the Japenese perspective. The Akihabara, a

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Kyoto to Tokyo Day 20

Travel day. Woke up and did some laundry before checkout at 11am. We went to the train station to get breakfast/lunch. We were able to relax in the train and watch watch the world go by. We had to change trains once we got to Tokyo station. The signs

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Kyoto Day 19

Not a whole lot going on today. Another hike up a mountain, but whatever, we are experts now. The Shrine at Kurama is nothing special but the forest and mountain that it is on, is fantastic. Honestly there isn't much to say here. I'll post some

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Kyoto Day 18

Biggest walking day yet. Over 31,000 steps according to Zach's pedometer. We went to see Fushimi Inari Tashi, Bamboo Grove, and Monkey mountain. Each one of those places required hiking up a mountain to get to the destination. I hope to add some more photos to this

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Osaka, Nara Day 17

We arrived in Osaka pretty late and made our way to the Japan Rail (JR) 'help desk' to exchange the vouchers I had bought online for actual tickets. After standing in line for what seemed like hours we got up to the front where a nice girl, with

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Hong Kong Day 16

Woke up early. Had to do laundry. $48HKD ($6.19 USD) and 2 hours later we had our laundry done for us at a laundry place just around the corner. We had breakfast at a coffee place again and made our way to the airport. Remembering how crowded the airports

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Hong Kong Day 15

Having slept in until 1130, I was the last one up. Zach had gone to get coffee and sent me and Joel the address. I arrived before Joel. Somehow it had taken him an hour and a half to find the place. :P We poked fun, had some breakfast and

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Hong Kong Day 14

Arrived at the Hostel after a very efficient train ride that provided a gorgeous view of the harbor and part of the city. The efficiency of HK made an impression, because was a different way of life than that in mainland China. It was evident that Hong Kong has more

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Shanghai Day 13 Shanghai Tower

I slept in today. Though, I think I got a bit sick. So I was in and out all night. The A/C turned off in the middle of the night, causing the room to become super hot. We walked around Pudong and went up Shanghai Tower, the second tallest

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Shanghai Day 12 Out and about

As you may have already imagined the sleep we got on the overnight train was less than great. Needing to use the restroom and grab a coffee we went to find the first coffee place we could find. My experience so far had been that you would find more random

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Xi'an Day 11 Overnight train to Shanghai

We were able to wake up a bit later than usual since our train didn't leave until 8:35pm. I woke up in time for breakfast and then went back upstairs to pack my bag and take a short nap. We checked out and left our bags at

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Xi'an Day 10 Terracotta Warriors

Since we had booked a tour with the hostel all we had to do was wake up early and be ready to leave at 9am. The Hantang House was fantastic. The rooms and adjoining bathroom were amazing. Anyway, after a nice breakfast, musli and cappuccino, we were rounded up by

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Beijing Day 9. Tiananmen Square and travel day to Xi'an

We woke up and had breakfast at the hostel before going to check out Tiananmen Square. A 30 min walk later we were there! My god was it massive! There were so many people there to see the square and the forbidden city that it actually took away from how

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Beijing Day 8. Great Wall

Headache. Massive headache. It must have been that fruity mixture with rum in it. Slept on the bus all the way to the Great Wall. More specifically Mùtiányù. We took a cable car to tower 14 and hiked over to tower 25. The last tower had some narly stairs. We

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Beijing Day 7. Travel Day

After a restless, what may only be called; nap, Zach and I woke up and took an hour subway ride to ICN. Our initial flight from ICN to TAO went off with out a hitch. TAO to Beijing (PEK) was delayed an hour and a half. This was unfortunate for

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Seoul. Day 6.

Tourist day. Best coffee is at 'Kopi Gajah'. Took a look around one of Seoul's old palaces. Neat to look at and probably more interesting if I had more knowledge of the history. Briefly stopping by the 'Blue House', Korea's version of

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Busan to Seoul. Day 5.

Sleeping in is GREAT! We were able to relax a bit because our train didn't leave until 1pm. So after eating breakfast, showering, and a failed attempt at doing laundry takes 3 hours), we proceeded to the train station to take the 3 hour train ride back to

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Seoul. DMZ. Day 3.

After a night of restless sleep we woke up early to visit the DMZ. The tour was organized by the USO, so it was in English. The Joint Security Area was off limits today due to some military exercises. We did get to go into the third underground tunnel that

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Seoul. Day 2.

Today I took my time. On everything. I woke up at about 830am, after having been in and out of sleep since about 3am, only to make sure I made it down to get breakfast in time. I did an initial test on wash clothes in a bag and hung

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Seoul. Arrival.

After a 13 hour flight from Toronto, CA, I was a little tired, but mostly nervous as I had no idea what to expect of S. Korea. I didn't even know the address of the hotel I was staying at. This worried me a bit while going through