The Wanderer Returneth

I'm back from my holiday, and very tired!
So in the end I didn't really plan much. I Just booked a night bus and bought some cheap train tickets. I was initially thinking of going to Hokkaido, the northernmost Japanese island. Flights were expensive though and the overnight train was fully booked. So instead I got an overnight bus to Sendai (about 6 hours) and bought a 十八きっぷ, or 'jyuhachi kippu' which basically means 18 ticket. Its a ticket that's only available in school/university holidays aimed at students but which can be used by anyone.

Basically you can use any local train you want to using 5 x 1 day tickets. It's a lot cheaper than using the bullet train or even express trains but obviously has the downside that its pretty slow and also needs more planning to co-ordinate catching the right trains.

So anyway, overnight bus to Sendai (about 6 hours). The initial impression was that there wasn't much there so just went onto Matsushima, looked around there then got a train to Morioka. Stayed in Morioka for two nights and used it as a base to visit Hachimantai (a mountain) and jodo-ga-hama (a beach). Then went onto Aomori stayed there for 3 nights and visited Hakkoda-san (mountain) and went hiking in nearby mountains. Finally had a quick visit to Akita before getting another night bus home (8 hours this time).

Link to the pictures below...

http://s214.photobucket.com/albums/cc250/davingtonsmythe/Northern%20Honshu/