April 4 - Kobe, Japan (Day 2)

 We overnighted here and our tour this morning met at 8:45 so we had a relatively easy morning.  Right next to our ship is a ferris wheel that is lit up and has wonderful patterns built into it as it turns.  We like to keep our curtains open at night, but that was a bit of a challenge last night.  We had to pull them just so in order to keep the bright lights from shining directly into our eyes.  It was lit up quite late.

A couple of things I've been observing:  the Japanese take great care with their gardens and you'll see manicured trees that look like giant Bonsai trees (an oxymoron I guess).  I've been trying to get photos, but it's hard from the bus.  Here is one shot I was able to get outside an office building.  Maybe these trees grow this way naturally?

And we haven't seen any beat-up or dented cars.  They all seem to be new, or at least look new and clean, and are taken good care of.  And we've seen lots of stacks of cardboard for recycling neatly tied up waiting on the curb for pickup.  A very few times we've seen evidence of homelessness, but even then their belongings are kept neat and tidy while they're away.

Steve and Leona were on our bus again today.  Our first stop was at Mt. Rokko where we boarded a cable car to go up to the summit at 3,000 feet.  The weather really cooperated and we got very good views.

The cable car loading

It was a steep climb and took about 10 minutes

The beauties seemed to be growing wild

The next stop was at a sake brewery where we watched a movie explaining how sake is made the old-fashioned way.  It's rather labor intensive and takes a few months from beginning to end product.  There was an exhibit and a tasting room.  I didn't really care for either of the samples, and Michael isn't a big sake fan, so no purchases were made by us.

A self-service sampling machine.  Our samples were poured by the staff.

The brewery grounds were lovely

On the way back to the bus we passed these two interesting manhole covers.  

Back at the ship in time for a quick lunch before my haircut appointment.  Lynda, from India, was quite nice and interesting to talk to, but when I got back to the suite, Michael asked when my hair appointment was.  He couldn't see any difference.  Ah well.  Then we took a walk to a nearby store that sold a variety of goods where I found a new wireless mouse.  I brought my mouse from home, but forgot the dongle that you need to make it talk to the computer.  We brought our new Chromebook, which is small and light, but I left the dongle in my laptop at home.  We found one at this variety store for around $8 which seemed a bargain.

On the way back we saw this parade of new workers on their way somewhere all in their new black suits.

This tower was right next to our ship also.

Our group had to break up into 2 teams for trivia today and our team came in 2nd with 9/15 which gives us bragging rights.  Then Steve/Leona, Jan/Tom and we went up to Sette Mari for dinner.  

The drummers performed for our departure and even the ferris wheel had a "Bon Voyage Seven Seas Explorer message" on the wheel.  What a nice sendoff.

The ever-changing ferris wheel

Tom, Steve and Leona