Sunday Catch-up ~Art Week

Well, it's been a good week, and I've got a few photos to put up for a change :]

I had a bunch of night shifts this week which was great for doing whatever I wanted in the daytime, with just a bit of extra sleep-in time XD So one evening, Dad & I went on a little drive around to enjoy the evening and stopped at the Telford Steam Railway for a while. There was even a gent who worked there just doing a couple of things to one of trains and he let us in for a closer look and told us a little info about the place, how cool was that? x3

Another week, more pretty lilies x3 These yellowy ones are the only ones of their type in the garden.

Later on in the week I went with a friend to see 'Hiroshige’s Japan', an exhibit in the Wolverhampton Art Gallery. I'm not sure if I was allowed to take photos...but it didn't say I couldn't, so? Aha. It was worth the look anyway, although it wasn't a large collection. I learnt a bit about wood-block printing and got a lot of wanderlust. This was one of my favourite paintings, showing a man riding his horse into a small village in the snow.

I'm not sure if you can see what's going on here, but basically Face and I took a drive after winning a table on ebay xD When we collected it we hadn't measured the car or the table so it was kinda pot luck as to whether it would fit or not. As you can see, it did! Juuuust. I have a rather small Daihatsu and it still managed to get a full size table and 4 chairs in the back XD Now the challenge is to find somewhere in the house to put it until we move into our place.

Today a friend and I met up in Wolves and went to check out a little car display at Bantock House. There were only like 6 old cars there, all of this type (I don't really know what you would call this kind of spoke-wheeled car) but we had a look and got some photos.

Later we went onto Birmingham and spent hours mooching around the place looking for these owl sculptures that'd all been painted by different artists in varying themes. It was a lot of fun, I like collecting and I like mooching around, so this was my kind of day! We found just over 30 in the centre of Brum, which I'll tell you more about another time :] We then went on to have all-you-can-eat sushi for tea, where we rolled out from about an hour and a half later. OMG sushi is so filling x.X
I hope you had a good week too? Sadly I'm back on a normal shift pattern next week but hopefully I'll find more fun (& cheap things!) to do x3



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Exploring Odaiba, Tokyo

Still passportless, still dreaming of travel. Particularly prominent in my mind is our trip to Tokyo last year, and how much I want to go back!
I thought I would tell you a little about what there is to see in and around Tokyo, maybe you'll see why it keeps playing on my mind, or maybe it'll encourage you to go too!
Japan was a big leap for me for travel. Although I've been wanting to go for a long time, I was really afraid of the language barrier. When we finally booked to go I was still really afraid, but with Face encouraging me I was even more keen to go. As it turns out Tokyo is such a high traffic area for tourists and foreign business men I really had nothing to worry about, I even had a couple of people apologise to me for not being able to put their english across to me clearly enough for me to fully understand. I was like, are you kidding?! I'm in your country, with zero language skills and YOU'RE apologising to ME?
So today I thought I'd tell you about what we found to do in Odaiba, a popular small island for couples to go as there's so much light entertainment.

We caught the subway, a huge help in our touring about as there were english maps available and the ticket machines can be changed to English so you know where you're booking a ticket to! They are also as prompt as they are famous for and most run every 10/15 minutes :] While we waited we checked out some nearby vending machines anyway XD

First thing we did when off the subway was go find Joyopolis, a large arcade run by Sega. You need to buy special token and then you can use those to play on some of the big games, like a drifting racing game Face had a go on where he actually had to get into a car to play! It moved to go with the game which was pretty cool x3 I'm not big into arcades, but I went into a horror shooter with Face where we were sat in a cart and had to shoot at zombies on the screen as we 'traveled' around the game. I didn't do very well but I had fun XD We also played on things I find more enjoyable, like this complicated version of air hockey, which since playing here I've also seen in numerous places across the UK XD

Across from Joyopolis is a large shopping area which also has more vintage arcades. I played a few rounds of pinball over there and we had a good mooch around the souvenir shops, I could've bought so much! I managed to limit myself to a couple of keyrings and some tabi socks XD

We went out then to save spending all our time in the shops, and went to find some food. Because it is an entertainment place there are a lot of fast food places, and terrible as it is, we had to try a Japanese McDonalds! I'm sure we were judged as we were in there but there is something about foreign Maccies tht you just have to try them and see if they are any better! As it turns out, it was better than UK McD's XD
From there we wandered on and found a small version of the Statue of Liberty in the bay that overlooks the rainbow bridge! Very random! We took a few shots then went to see what this strange shaped building was all about... v

It was the head office for a TV company, but they had built it as a tourist attraction too as you could go into the ball piece and look out over Odaiba and the city beyond the harbour. It was quite interesting and if I remember, not too expensive for a lookout point. We sent a while wandering around there as there was a little leaflet stamping game for kids that I was determined to complete for the journal I was doing :x

When we left the weather was starting to cloud over even further and it was making the day seem a little dark, I was starting to get afraid that we would miss seeing everything as it was getting late. However, as we wandered round the back of one of the blocks of buildings we came across a candle sculpture and then this massive 'life size' Gundam statue! It's a popular feature of Odaiba and lots of people were getting their pics taken with it. Nearby was a shop for everything Gundam, but we didn't go in, instead wandering down the front to find 'MegaWeb' which turned out to be a car museum! Just Face's thing XD It was free to get in and we even got to sit in a Delorean and see some drift cars.

Further down the front was another huge arcade, this one was completely massive! Face was enthralled and while I played for a while and explored the gatcha machines, I was soon overtaken by jetlag and napped next to Face while he was on a winning streak on some huge 2p-type machine. He had a go on some grabber machines before we left and eventually won some snacks for us XD

As we left I got some shots of this impressive ferris wheel which had light patterns that changed constantly. We would've had a go, but it was getting a little chilly and we weren't sure when our last subway train was, as it was already 10pm! We certainly managed to fill a day around Odaiba and probably could've again, it's definitely a must see when going to Tokyo x3
Did you like my little rundown of exploring Odaiba? Would you like to see more of what we did around Tokyo? Let me know x3



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July Photo-a-Day ~Week One

I realise that my photo a day for July was supposed to be updated on Saturdays, but I didn't predict how busy I was going to be this Saturday! So far I'm 11½ hours into a 16 hour shift, but thought I would type on my break :]
So, let's jump straight in, shall we?

A Statue of a Dog or Horse
This one was taken while over at Wolverhampton racecourse checking out a camera show :3 You'd think the photo for this day would be 'camera' right? But no, it goes to this statue of a horse I found while there and I thought it seemed like a good chance to tick this one off the list as you don't come by statues of horses or dogs very often, right?

A Pond with a Fountain
Another thing I don't see very often, so took the opportunity while in The Quarry, Shrewsbury. The Quarry is a beautiful spot and we sat and admired it's wonderful landscaping and gardens, this pond and it's surrounds reminded me of some of the Japanese gardens me and Face found while over there x3

Transport
Some of these prompts I already had an idea for when I started the challenge, but I didn't see this for this one XD While out and about in Wales, Dad and I stopped at a aqueduct next to a viaduct and while we were walking next to the canal a train came over, he even blew his whistle and waved at us as he went past! I was pretty impressed!

Camera
Heeeeere it is ;p I knew it wouldn't be long before I managed to fulfill this prompt, the question was just with which camera? This camera is borrowed from a friend in Wolverhampton who also likes to collect old school analogues and I took it out while visiting Horseshoe falls in Wales. Hopefully I'll have got some good shots when I get the film processed x3

Reflection
This was taken at Ilam house (manor?) Friday, a beautiful day and perhaps a little too warm to be wandering around some old house's grounds XD Still, finding this spot was a bonus and we watched the reflections of the river under the bridge for a while in the shade before moving on again.

A Castle Turret
I'm not entirely sure on this one, if it counts or not. It's a decorative part of the gardens at Ilam manor, but it is distinctly a castle turret, isn't it? Let me know if you think I cheated on this one ;p

Free Shot
I thought I would use this week's free shot on this adorable greengrocers in Llangollen x3 I always take a photo of this place if we pass through as I just find it so...authentic? I imagine back in the day there would be a shop like this every couple of streets with displays outside to make people buy from them, but you rarely see it these days. What really topped this place off was the lovely cherries they sold! We had to get more on the way back the first lot had been so good XD
Hope you enjoyed the beginning of July's photo a day, which was your favourite shot? Are you doing the challenge with me? Let me know x3



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