Day 9 - Day Off

With no alarm set today, I actually got a lie in!! Didn't wake up until 7.45, by which point Alix had already gone and by the sounds of it so had most people in the tents around me. I had a message from Emily about going to Yamaguchi and we agreed to meet at 9am. This meant I had to get a bit of a groove on and get showered and fed ASAP. I joined Mike in the canteen, the queue was the longest I'd had for a while so I didn't actually get out until 9.15.

 

Once we'd suncreamed up and I'd been to the loo and cleaned my teeth, we were ready to go. There was a free shuttle bus to the train station, but as we left we realised we didn't actually know where to catch it from!!

 

Typically, as we found the right place the bus was just leaving. The next one was to be at 12.00. Another few hours to fill, we decided to visit the World Scout Centre and other Pavilions.

Every country had a marquee to put up a display it play a game or plug their next camp. It was great fun visiting the different countries, and we got a few badges out of it! My favourite had to be the UK Pavilion, which had been turned into the British seaside. We had a giant deck chair, a sand pit with sandcastles, Punch and Judy and hook-a-duck. Genius!

 

The time came to get on the bus, which ended up very very full. I still managed to have a nice nap for the half hour it took us to get to the station. We met some other UK guys and we all struggled with the ticket machine together. A lovely Japanese lady took pity on us and bought us all the right tickets. The next train was in an hour though, so we plonked ourselves in the waiting room.

 

Finally, we made our way to the platform and got straight on the train. Seven stops down the line and we were in Yamaguchi. Me and Emily left the others at the station and I decided the best plan was to just walk in a straight line and see where we ended up.

 

It was a lovely little city, on "Shopping Street" we saw some very interesting shops and restaurants. We met a lovely old guy who spoke to us in very good English. We think he may have had slight dementia though as we were asked the same questions over and over again. We asked him how to get the Temple, but he told us it was too far and he wasn't sure.

 

Back to my method, we just walked and walked. We stopped for a rest in a residential area and a group of Malaysian Scouts came across us. They were great company, and had a map! I took the lead with Daryl, and it turns out me and Emily were actually on the right track.

 

It didn't take us long to get to the Rurikō-ji Temple at all. It was quite a sight to behold, the Five Storey Pagoda stood at 321m tall and was centuries old. I climbed all the way to the top of the graveyard to find a great view across the city. It was still very hot though so we stayed in the shade for a while and swapped badges with our new friends.

 

To save ourselves from the heat, we got a bus back to the station. First of all we were the only ones one there so I amused the others by singing the Jamboree Song. At the station, out train was already on the platform.. the others ran over the bridge to get on but me and Daryl just walked - and still made it in time.

 

We played a few games on the way back, I got a bit confused with the tea/coffee game.. but I've got it now so watch out! Daryl had a Polaroid camera so we played with that for a while too, but it was soon time to get off. The bus was waiting and we jumped on.

 

Back at camp, our Malaysian friends had to go and sign in at their HQ so me and Emily joined the dinner queue. It looked very interesting today, a Japanese Bento box. When we got to about three from the front, the queue was stopped. They'd found boxes where the rice had gone bad so were checking them all. We left and went for pizza!!

 

At the World Food Zone, I got a slice of pizza from "Pizza-La" and french fries from "Bear's Kitchen". They were so bad, it was good! We watched the sunset and then went back for some shaved ice. I wanted it without any flavour but he wouldn't let me, so Blue Hawaii it was.

Back in the Food Houses, we gained Dylan and his American friend Gavin. It was really busy and we learnt that the whole Jamboree site was actually open to the public! There was such a festival atmosphere, with now probably close to 100,000 people milling around.

 

We visited the many different stalls selling their wares. There's one where you can have a keyring engraved with your name in kanji.. I'm tempted to go back for one tomorrow. The local people are so sweet, we were stopped several times and asked for photos. Gavin knows some basic Japanese so he put us in everyone's good books!

 

There was also a parade, we watched some of the floats, then Emily went to work. We had heard that the were fireworks by the beach so went to get a spot. It was the longest firework display I've ever seen, and could have finished at least 10mins earlier. We were trying to "ooh" and "ahhh" but they weren't impressive enough.

 

Heading back to the Food Houses, we picked up Callum. We spent time wandering around, chopsing, and taking the mick out of Callum. I was desperate to see the famous hammocks that Dylan and Gavin got to sleep in for work, so we walked over to the subcamps. It was still so busy and it just have been 10ish by now... past my bedtime!

 

We stopped off at Lincolnshire to find Gemma, Emily, Nathan and Ben. We didn't stay too long and then Gemma joined us on out trek to GDV. Unfortunately, the guys in charge didn't let us have a nice kip on the hammocks, we didn't even get to see them properly!

 

We walked the short way back to camp and about midnight, it was time for sleep. Back to work tomorrow, we'll see what new system they've come up with while we've been gone...