suigo sawara & suigo itako ayame festivals

Saturday we planned to check out the Sawara & Itako Ayame (iris) festivals

It is at the far east end of Chiba prefecture, so it took us over 2 hours just to get to JR Sawara station.

Stumbled upon a Pokemon manhole in front of the station

From the JR Sawara station...there is a shuttle bus, 600 yen, to take you to the Ayame park...about 20 or 30 minutes from JR Sawara station by bus

Along the way you will see these "rivers" called suigo

Admission at the Sawara Ayame Park is 800 yen per person

And there are tiny suigo that you can pay to ride through to see the flowers

You can also see people taking care of the ayame

So pretty!

In front of the park is another Pokemon manhole that I stumbled upon.

To the right of the park is a tiny area where you can catch the water shuttle to Itako or take a tour of 3 of the 12 bridges in the area

We took the water shuttle to Itako...1000 yen per person

This is the water shuttle

Put your life vests on..

I don't ever recall having to wear a life vest and think this might be my first time.

Where the suigo meets the Tone (toe-nay) River, you'll need to go through a water lock since the water level of the suigo is lower than the water level of the Tone River.

It was cool to experience this.

And then the water shuttle speeds up and you travel up the Tone River to Itako

We were surprised at how big the Itako Ayame Festival area was...and it is FREE!

From up on top of one of the pedestrian bridges

You can also take suigo rides and they also have weddings (yomeiribune) at certain times of the day which you can watch if you happen to be there.

I hadn't realized this until afterwards, but Itako is located in Ibaraki prefecture...

There weren't too many choices for lunch, most restaurants were overloaded with people waiting...so we just grabbed some dango from Sawata

I wished we could've chosen what combination of dango we wanted, but they only had pre-packed types...yomogi dango with sweet bean paste 260 yen (tax included)

At this event, they were asking for donations to maintain their park.

I gave them a small donation and received this fan...one side

the other side.

We're glad the weather was pretty cooperative. 

It was originally forecast to rain but we were lucky it only drizzled

Dunno if we'd go to see this again because it was really far! but we were glad we got to experience this.

Suigo Sawara Ayame Festival

1837-2 Ogishima

Katori, Chiba

Hours: 8:00-18:00

*800 yen per adult under 65

**discounts for 65 and older

Suigo Itako Ayame Festival

1-5 Ayame

Itako, Ibaraki

Hours: 8:00-17:00

*FREE

3 minutes walk from JR Itako station

this and that

Sorry my photos uploaded all wonky, so this post is kind of all over the place...update on the reno…

So, they were gonna replace the number plates for our apartments...
 

This is how the new one looks...

Our new door knobs...

They planted these dietes bicolor, part of the iris family, in the front of our building

this is where they planted those irises...

After seeing the irises, I thought, good then that krazy lady across the street won't have any dried leaves to throw in our lobby...

And then yesterday, I saw that they also planted all these other plants with “plenty leaves” in the same planter space...wait till krazy lady sees this...

And then because everyone gets lost in our building, they painted numbers on the floors...

They gave us these key “holders” with sensors in them...this is so that when we come home, we don't have to take out our keys...the sensor in the key holder is supposed to open the lobby door.

I asked what happens when the battery in the sensor key holder runs out, and the guy said that just the key can be used to open the door too...

Because of safety reasons (skimming the key numbers), they couldn't put the key holders together for us, so Kat had to “read” the directions (thank goodness for pictures) to put her key into the sensor key holder...and she'll have to do the same for Satoshi’s key too....it’s so big I guess he won’t be able to fit it into his wallet 

our new door phone...the screen will show you who is there and you can buzz in people that are in the lobby...you can also see who buzzes your apartment when you aren't home, it will take a video of them...will have to instruct Satoshi on how to use this too...

our old door bell, in front of of our apartment

the old door phone, that was inside our apartment, you could only talk to the people right outside of our apartment

our new door bell, thought it would have a camera, but it is only a voice type 

Krazy lady has been active this week (probably because of the full moon?!)...yelling at the reno dudes & delivery dudes

Our rainy season has started this week, the weather dude says that the normal heavy rain that is usually seen at the end of rainy season is happening now...so expect to see a lot of damage in the coming weeks...

It's Friday the 13th and was full moon the other day, lots of krazy stuff happening all over....Have a safe weekend!

ikumi mama's doughnuts

At the JR Kawasaki station, they have an area for pop up stores.

Ikumi Mama's Doughnuts was there this past week.

I've often seen them at JR Shinagawa station, and thought we tried her doughnuts, but I guess I never wrote up about them.

Satoshi said he saw this on his way home and had to get it...Neko monaka 

How cute is Japan's packaging...

Inside are 2 cat shaped wafers (neko monaka) and sweet bean paste to fill the two…oh and a wooden spoon

How cute is the monaka (wafers)....

There is more than enough sweet bean paste for the two

The monaka is so fresh! crisp and light

I'm glad we got to try this and these are perfect for gifts.

ps today’s the day they install the door phone, supposed to take 4 hours…hope they’ll finish early, please send good mojo

teapond

Have had Teapond on my "to try" list for some time now, probably from when we lived in Osaka.

At the time they only had their one shop here in Tokyo.

Today, they have some in the Kansai (West Japan) area and ship overseas as well.

The shop is quite tiny but they do have a tasting area, though it was quite crowded when I went in so I just grabbed a few items and quickly got out of there....

Instead of buying one big bag of one "flavor", I bought their "tea for two" bags...there are 2 sachets of tea in the package...432 yen (tax included) each

These are the teas I purchased: 

Fanfare...black tea base,  mango pieces, rose red, sunflower

Princess Lychee...black tea base, rose pink, cornflower

Mango Voyage...black tea base, marigold

Love that they give these “business cards” that have the brewing instructions as well as descriptions about the tea.

We enjoyed these as cold brew, the lychee one was a little too perfumy for my liking but I’m glad we got to try these.

They not only have flavored teas but also have all sorts of varieties of teas, I'll be back.

Teapond

1-1-11 Shirakawa

Koto, Tokyo

Open daily: 11:00-19:00

oshima milk bakery

On Sunday, we went to see Satoshi's friend's rakugo performance.

It had been awhile since I went to one of his performances.

My blog archives says the last time was during the pandemic... 

Since we arrived a little early in the area, we walked around.

Love the tiny shops that line the street

We stumbled upon Oshima Milk Bakery...which uses milk from Izu Oshima, an island that is part of Tokyo prefecture.  

They have a tsubaki (camellia) festival that I want to check out, hopefully next year.

Order at the counter and pay...

Satoshi had their shio pan (salt bread) and milk...630 yen (tax included)

He said he enjoyed these...

Kat had their pistachio scone...500 yen (tax included)

I enjoyed this.

It had lots of pistachios in it and had a nice texture, I think they use yeast in it so it was more like bread, than flaky (buttery)

They had about 10 different types of scones to choose from.

My tummy doesn't agree with milk these days, so I didn't want  to chance it...this shop sells different flavored milks.

Up on the 2nd floor you can take your items to eat

We enjoyed their air conditioning while we ate and also looked at their photos of Izu Oshima

I'm glad we tried this place and would definitely like to try other scones here...I'll be back.

Oshima Milk Bakery

1-8-3 Hirano

Koto, Tokyo

Hours: 11:00-15:00

juban

There is a tiny Chinese restaurant in our area that I've always wondered about...Juban

I thought Satoshi said he had tried this place, but apparently he had not
 

We ordered the sweet sour chicken...1200 yen (tax included)

The sweet and sour flavor was super light, though when we got to the end of this dish, the sweet and sour flavor was stronger, guess we had to mix the sauce better.

The thick sweet and sour sauce keeps everything hot hot hot! so be careful...I burnt my tongue...

5 piece gyoza...660 yen (tax included)...gyoza snob approved

These were huge!

beef with takenoko (bamboo shoot)...1600 yen (tax included)

I was bummed because a lot of the bamboo shoots that I ate was too fibrous

Dunno if we'll be back, but I'm glad we checked this place out.

Juban

6-5-3 Ikegami

Ota, Tokyo

Closed: Tuesdays & Wednesdays

Hours: 11:00-14:30 & 17:00-21:00 (Saturdays & Sundays), 17:00-21:00 (Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays)

*cash only