Member Since: 14 Jan 2008
Location: Aberdeen
Posts: 2514
Jeez Nige in three weeks time he won’t even have a shed
Its not the height of the fall but the sudden stop at the bottom that hurts!!
3rd Nov 2023 3:55 pm
al cope
Member Since: 08 Nov 2005
Location: Oldbury, WM
Posts: 10351
Shouldn’t this be re-titled “Our man in………….”
AlVolvo XC90 B5 Plus Dark
Gone - MY18 D5 HSE - Corris on 22's with Black Pack
Now gone - MY16 D4 SE Tech, Loire Blue, Almond Leather, Privacy, plus some other goodies.
Old - MY12 D4 SDV6 XS Auto - Ipanema Sand with Almond Leather - Plus other niceties, and D4.com sticker
Older - D3 TDV6 XS Auto - Lugano Teal with Almond Leather, 20" Stormers, Shiny Tailpipes, DVD/TV - and obligatory D3 sticker
Ancient - D3 TDV6 S - Tonga with Ebony, 20" Stormers, satnav & DVD
3rd Nov 2023 5:36 pm
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
nigethecat wrote:
!, Come on Tony, we need to get a move on !
Can you cut the grass and tidy up the junk mail while you’re there.
3rd Nov 2023 10:40 pm
Moo D3 Decade
Member Since: 13 Aug 2010
Location: UK
Posts: 14377
Rescue01 wrote:
Jeez Nige in three weeks time he won’t even have a shed
What shed? Nothing there when I cleaned ip the splinters left by Nige after his timber foraging. New Defender L663 110 SE (known as Noddy!)
Sold Volvo XC90 R-Design (known as Basil)
Sold - D4 HSE (Known as Gerty)
No longer the Old Buses original owner
231,000 miles and counting
05 S manual owned from March 2005
D4 Face lifted
Still original injectors and turbo
V8 Front brakes
BAS Remap, Allisport Intercooler and deCat
EGRs blanked
T-Max split charge
Hanibal Expeedition rack
Prospeed ladder
Duratrac tyres
IID BT
BAS FBH control
3rd Nov 2023 10:56 pm
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
As long as there is oil in the tank and gas in the bottles we will keep warm and be able to cook. Oh, hang on - the gas bottles are kept outside! Looks like it’s salad for dinners!!
Strangely, looking forward to getting home, will be nice to sleep in our own bed. Plus certain things here are waaaaaaay too expensive for our budget, looking forward to a nice big juicy steak! Subject to gas bottles still being there!
3rd Nov 2023 11:27 pm
Moo D3 Decade
Member Since: 13 Aug 2010
Location: UK
Posts: 14377
Bed you say..🤔 Saw this in Nige's car the other day: It looked super comfy.....
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New Defender L663 110 SE (known as Noddy!)
Sold Volvo XC90 R-Design (known as Basil)
Sold - D4 HSE (Known as Gerty)
No longer the Old Buses original owner
231,000 miles and counting
05 S manual owned from March 2005
D4 Face lifted
Still original injectors and turbo
V8 Front brakes
BAS Remap, Allisport Intercooler and deCat
EGRs blanked
T-Max split charge
Hanibal Expeedition rack
Prospeed ladder
Duratrac tyres
IID BT
BAS FBH control
3rd Nov 2023 11:43 pm
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
Hope he didn’t pile the logs straight on top, that’ll result in terrible splinters!!
4th Nov 2023 12:41 am
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
And a “few” pics from Matsue, all while watching The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard, didn’t know Ryan What’s-his-name spoke fluent Japanese!
Matsue has a lovely castle.
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As seen in the manhole covers. It’s a thing in many towns to show off their features in ironwork, best in full colour.
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And lots of other “art” on the streets, so to speak.
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And these cheeky chappies near the station. Yes, it was raining.
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Lunchtime back home? Steak for SWMBO and Bento stuff for me, all for under a tenner.
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And remember the Captains’ Curries from Kure? In one of the local produce shops you can buy the DIY version from the captain of one of the Heli Carriers.
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Night all, got to get some beauty sleep to be well rested for fun and frolics tomorrow.
4th Nov 2023 1:30 pm
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
Last few pics from Tottori, as far N as we are heading away from this part of Honshu. We were going to head a bit further along but now booked on a Highway bus across the hills to Kobe. We’ve shunned the old JR as it’s double the cost to get the Limited Express trains to Kobe which would take 1hr 30m, regular “local” trains take ~4 hrs. The bus does it in 1h 45m and is the same costs as the local trains, plus a lot more comfy!
Mind you, in Matsue we thought we might not make it as we received this emergency message on the phone.
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The “This is a drill” bit could be a bit bigger and I at first read it with “not” in the middle. Wondered is this chap was running the plant.
We were thinking of visiting the visitors centre for the plant that day but glad we didn’t. Two non-Japanese speaking tourists wandering into their exercise might have been taken as part of it!
Will continue later, I think I’ve broken the pic upload system. Again!
8th Nov 2023 7:55 am
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
Another sweeeeeeet Japanese garden. This one wasn’t our fave as it was tiny, the most expensive we’ve been in and packed with cruise ship peeps. Bus loads and bus loads and bus loads of them. Note to self, check CruiseMapper before heading out!
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Very grey shot of the local lake to E of Matsue.
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And the rabbits outside the Art Museum. We didn’t go in the art museum, apart from through it to get to the main road and out the wind, as it was pretty expensive (¥1,300) and we couldn’t find any pics of what was in it.
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Gone fishing.
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After all that exercise needed sustenance and stopped at the local chicken joint at Matsue station. Run this through your local translator:
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and you’ll see why we tucked into this for lunch. Mine was heavy on garlic so no worries re vampire that night!
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On the way here (Tottori) stopped at Yonago to visit the flower gardens a short and free bus ride away. We dumped the bags in the lockers at the JR station (¥500) only to find free lockers at the garden.
Halloween is gone, peeps here are whipping themselves into a frenzy for Chrimbo!
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Snowman and A/C unit in the background, sums it up perfectly.
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But it’s still in the mid 20s and deffo no sign of snow!
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This is a picture of a picher, try saying that after a glass of vino!
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Deffo getting a bit autumnal, just a little touch.
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And a couple of pics with Mt Daisen in the background. It’s an extinct volcano, just hope it knows that!
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And now for something completely different, and totally unexpected in this part of the world, honking big sand dunes!
“Museum” with sand sculptures. I’m sure I’m not the only one that did a little Sand Dance when no-one was looking. Needless to say SWMBO was neither impressed nor joined in!
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Love the local biccies. Well what you have sand you have to have camels, it’s the law!
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And talking of camels!
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And the main event. No D3 to plough through the sand, all on foot, but well worth it from the top.
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And me doing my best Derek of Arabia pose. And yes, that is still blue sky and hasn’t been photoshopped on.
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And that’s all folks for today, apart from sweeeeeeet bus back to town:
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And back to the JR station for lunch. I thinks we’re both looking forward to stuff that’s not deep fried, and Mrs DSL is getting distinctly rebellious re the use of chopsticks!
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Gonna miss miso soup though.
8th Nov 2023 8:23 am
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
Evening all, guess what, it’s sumo time!!
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Not much happened over the last few days, now over the mountains and back in busy Japan. Lots of peeps, lots of lost looking tourists and trains that went on and on and on. None of your cute single carriage trains here! Had a few nights in Kobe, didn’t do much as weather wasn’t up to our usual standards, but got some bookings done for a future trip.
Lovely castle in Tottori before we crossed over “the hump”.
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And lots of what we were calling eagles, though we now suspect they’ve all been buzzards.
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Thinking the bears have scared off the eagles though.
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At last found a shop that has my size of t-shirts! I’ll have what he’s having!!
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Was very strange getting a long haul bus, and very comfy! Good views of the interior of Japan.
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Next trip to Japan we’ll prob do more l/haul buses. Booking bus was all done on a Japanese-only website with lots of screen grabs been run through Google Translate, luckily we ended up at the right place at the right time.
And in next pic you’d almost think we were home and just screwed up getting from LHR to Wimbledon.
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It was a collection of “foreign” houses, for the “England” one a weird collection of memorabilia roughly centred around Sherlock Holmes.
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Loving the deer stalker.
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And possibly the strangest, an explanation of The Full English for our Japanese friends. It did look nice though after so much Japanese food.
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Also in duty were this cheeky trio. SWEEEEEEEEET.
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And while on the theme of food, little stall in Kobe Chinatown that did scrummy roast duck raps. Really scrummy!
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Well that’s almost all from Honshu, off tomorrow on an ANA 737 (SWMBO is going to be most miffed if it’s a MAX!!) to Okinawa. Hopefully back to nice warm temps as it was pretty nippy this morning and we’re used to warmer weather. Still it makes the bags lighter as we’re wearing most of our stuff. Here’s a gratuitous sunset as seen from our hotel looking out to Kansai Airport.
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Catch you lot from Okinawa.
13th Nov 2023 7:53 am
Gareth Site Moderator
Member Since: 07 Dec 2004
Location: Bramhall
Posts: 26772
You’ve certainly ‘done’ Japan. Is it homeward bound now?
13th Nov 2023 11:59 am
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
Not quite, got another week and a bit before getting the flight home, well ANA to Frankfurt then on to LHR on BA next day. Got a busy schedule in Okinawa planned, and a few days in Tokyo Bay area. Going to be strange getting back, feels like we’ve been in Japan for months!
13th Nov 2023 12:06 pm
Gareth Site Moderator
Member Since: 07 Dec 2004
Location: Bramhall
Posts: 26772
A famous song by the Vapors just came to mind!
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13th Nov 2023 3:36 pm
DSL Keeper of the wheelie bin
Member Since: 11 May 2006
Location: Off again! :-)
Posts: 73075
That song has gone through my head a few times on this trip.
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!, Come on Tony, we need to get a move on ! 
