Traveling with girlfriends | A running account from Setouchi to Kyoto

Write a running account

In the past two years, I have been to Japan five times. Except for the trip in March 2017, I wrote a short travelogue during the trip, and after returning from the Echigo-Tsumari Art Festival in August 2018, I wrote "Seiryo Art" The official account invited me to write about my visit experience, but other things... Speaking of which, I have never written a good travel diary about Japan. Being so lazy is really not like me who takes V.S. Naipaul and Somerset Maugham as my role models.

This time I went to Shikoku and Kyoto for 13 days, and I didn’t write anything on the way. After I came back, I still remembered the feeling of being in the Teshima Museum of Art and the Storm House. I thought it was probably one of the most extreme experiences in my life, so I compiled a list of the trip. I first wrote an article about my feelings about the Setouchi Art Festival, "5 days, 3 islands, we experienced the rebirth of nature at the Setouchi International Art Festival."

After writing this article, my laziness crawled up again. Just let yourself go if it is just a passing thing... However, there is another voice encouraging me: "No, you have to write. If you write it, it will no longer be a passing thing. Just like It’s the same as the Setouchi Art Festival. If you don’t write about it, how would you know how you felt at that time?”

Indeed, sometimes I feel that my thoughts are truly formed and straightened out when I am writing, rather than wandering thoughts.

Okay, let’s write.

To be honest, it has only been more than 20 days. Now that I think about this trip, I probably can’t catch anything. Discussions about “chameleons, owls and koalas”? Going to the hotel's public bathhouse every night instead of using the bathroom in your room? That smiling firework in the photo of people taking a toast after circling the top of Inari Taisha Shrine? A hearty nap in the Ritsutsuki Pavilion in Ritsurin Park? A sharing in a coffee shop near Shimizu Sansaka about how to go from wandering to finding your own direction after graduating from college? Or the three-hour journey from Takamatsu to Matsuyama by JR... I decided to let myself recall it and write it down in the form of a running account.

@Naoshima

Settled in Setouchi

In early April, after a project meeting with Sissy in the office of "Reishi", we drank tea and started chatting about something that everyone was passionate about. I said that I might want to go to the Seto Inland Sea next, but at the time I was still thinking It's just an uncertain idea, because I still don't seem to understand how to settle in the Seto Inland Sea and what the traffic laws are.

Then Sissi said that she happened to have been there at the end of last year. She said that she could go from Osaka to Takamatsu, live in Takamatsu, and take a boat from there to a small island every day, like Naoshima and Toshima. Chichu Museum of Art and The Teshima Museum of Art is worth visiting. I wonder if you need to make a reservation during the art festival. You can check the official website... They also shared with me the experience of riding the green velvet carpet rocking giant slow train from Takamatsu to Tokushima.

After hearing what she said, I immediately knew what was going on. I went home that night, checked the information, calculated the rough itinerary, and booked a round-trip air ticket from Osaka to Kansai.

When I was undecided before, two friends said, "Call me when you want to go." But they both said that it might be difficult to arrange a vacation in the near future. Maybe, no matter what you do, someone has to make the decision first, and other interested people will give priority to your arrangement, so just follow it.

We arranged a 13-day trip and stayed in Takamatsu for 5 nights, including one day each for Naoshima, Toshima, and Shodoshima, and another full day for wandering around Takamatsu’s Ritsurin Park and neighborhood lanes. Then go to Matsuyama, which has the oldest hot spring in Japan and one of the three most beautiful castles, for a day. The remaining 7 days are in Kyoto.

@小豆岛

Find two girlfriends

After two days, I felt a little lonely going alone. Kyoto, with its monastic and aristocratic temperament, is more suitable for quietly experiencing the fun, but in the Seto Inland Sea area, transportation is more torturous, so if you have friends traveling with you, you can also relieve each other's boredom.

At that time, I was chatting in a small WeChat group of 6 high school girlfriends. I threw out a friend recruitment tip to the group: "From May 24th to June 5th, I will go in and out of Kansai Airport in Osaka, and go to the Seto Inland Sea and Kyoto to eat, drink, and have fun." Are you interested in going to the art festival?" and took a photo of the rough schedule handwritten on A4 paper before booking the flight and sent it to the group. I didn’t have much hope at first, because everyone had been clamoring for a group trip to Chongqing during the Qingming Festival holiday, but everyone had their own arrangements.

Unexpectedly, as soon as the message was sent, Xianhui immediately "raised his hand" and said, "I'll go!"

Then there was a lot of chatter and various questions and answers in the group. I went to do other things, and at about noon, when I looked at the messages in the group, hundreds of messages popped up, among which Zhizhi also said that she would go too. But she seemed to be busy after she finished speaking.

At this time, Xianhui pulled Zhizhi and I into a small group called "5.24 Osaka entry and 6.5 Osaka departure Japan trip" and said that we would discuss relevant arrangements here without disturbing everyone. Zhizhi said that he just had a meeting and would check the air ticket arrangements immediately. I uploaded a screenshot of my flight itinerary and said that I could refer to the arrival and departure times to facilitate meeting at the airport and leaving together at the end.

By the next day, both Xianhui and Zhizhi had booked their tickets. During this process, Xianhui, who set off from Nanning, kept struggling with whether to book a connecting flight in Hong Kong or a connecting flight in Macau or Xiamen. In the end, she booked a connecting flight in Nanjing. She arrived one evening in advance and booked an airport hotel so that she could stay there. Join us calmly. The departure from Chongqing was very straightforward and I booked a connecting flight to Tianjin. I arrived in Kansai half an hour earlier at noon the next day.

After that, I booked accommodation and made an itinerary plan. I guess Xianhui didn't think much of it, because halfway through the trip, she suddenly realized, "Why did it take so long? 13 days! I have to go back to work!" Then Zhizhi and I found a coffee shop and did some ideological work for her for a few hours.

In this way, during the month when I was busy and looking forward to this "high school bestie trip", I continued to discuss in the group what the weather will be like. What clothes should I bring? What shoes to wear? How big a suitcase should I bring?

Xianhui said: "I will just bring a carry-on suitcase and not check it in or buy anything...".

Zhizhi said: "If I bring a red suitcase and wear a red skirt, will it catch everyone's attention?"

I said, "Well, maybe. I will also wear red clothes to look good in photos..."