I woke up this morning early enough to enjoy the arrival (luckily without any harbor pilot issues today).
While the Diamond Princess was sailing towards Nagasaki a flying ferry flew by. It was nearly literally flying as you can see below.
I’m sure the bridge looks closer to the ship than it was, but larger ships certainly would not be able to dock in the city.
A few more photos of the harbor and dry docks while approaching the pier.
I tried something different this morning, I set up the GoPro in the middle of the ship to try and capture going under the Megame bridge. I’m not sure it will work as planned because the camera was facing the sun quite often.
I decided to visit some more nearby places today rather than take the tour to Shinabara castle which would have been a very long bus ride.
Today’s port guide…
Today’s onboard activities:
I started my day by visiting Glover Gardens which was on the hill near the ship. I found the magical diagonal elevator (Glover Sky Road) and it went up most of the way while there was another normal elevator that took me the rest of the way to gate 2.
I walked around the Glover Gardens for a couple of hours. It had a nice view of the city of Nagasaki and the story about Glover was interesting. I took a ton of photos, but I will spare you most of them. I recommend clicking on the link to their app which not only has great photos, but descriptions of the buildings in many languages, including English!
石畳や石段、長崎港を一望できるロケーションと共に、歴史、文化の香りに包まれた場所です。
So as you can see, you can save a bit of time by reading the app, it was interesting, but I thought the next building was the most interesting. It was the Nagasaki Traditional Performing Arts Museum.
Similar to the Nebuta Festival in Hakodate they have a different festival in Nagasaki. The museum had a bunch of the of the floats made to look like ships and a very nice video explaining the festival and the activities. I highly recommend visiting it.
As I left through the main (lower) entrance I took a few pictures of the signs and this bust of Glover.
I went to Oura Catholic Church next which was nearby.
It was significantly more expensive 1,000 ¥ vs 620 ¥ at the Glover Gardens. The church didn’t allow photography and was pretty basic. The stained glad windows were just solid triangles, no art. There was a museum with some history, but in all honesty I would recommend skipping it.
I walked down the hill past a shrine to the tram station to go to Suwa shrine.
The tram took about 30 minutes and only cost 140 ¥.
When I got to the station for the shrine I found some nice art work in the underpass.
There were a few stone tori gates to walk through on the way to the Suwa shrine.
Once I got to the shrine I felt a bit underwhelmed until I started to wander around. I found some interesting things, including a lot of red tori gates.
On the way down the hill I found a small, free zoo. They had a chipmunk, badger, peacock, chimpanzees and a rooster of all things. Oh and the zoo had free Wi-Fi.
Statue in Nagasaki Park
I started to walk to Kofukuji temple, but got distracted by another old building, Jinsouji on Google Maps.
Then I stumbled into Sanpoji Temple.
And I finally arrived to the Kofukuji shrine which was quite interesting and nearly 400 years old. I really liked the bell tower as there was a bell shaped window in the exterior wall. There were also large wooden fish hanging which were in fact drums.
From here I walked to the Meganebashi Bridge otherwise known as the spectacle bridge and I even found a turtle on the side of the water.
I felt like I was running out of time so I took the tram back to the ship. I arrived around 4:30 PM with an hour to spare. I did find a couple of mosaics while I was on the way back.
Once I got back on the ship I went to Club Fusion to exit Japan (immigration procedures). So yes I got yet another stamp in my passport.
I dropped off my stuff and went to the elite lounge for a colortini and some food. They had chicken wings and mini burgers tonight.
I went outside to enjoy the sailaway and like all the ports in Japan the locals had a band performing to send us away. I took a couple more pictures of the Glover House and Oura Catholic Church.
I had dinner in the main dining room, mostly seafood, but I survived. I started with the fruit cup and tried the chilled apple soup. I had the seafood skewer for my main and the crunchy banana for dessert.
The show tonight was a repeat, so I just relaxed a bit while getting ready for another busy day tomorrow.
I did however have yet another late night pie.
Today’s timeline:
