This is my second to last week in my current job, so had the potential to drag, but the following things have made it splendid!

1. Kerry's Birthday Trip to North Devon: we took the in-laws to Devon for Kerry's 70th over the Bank Holiday weekend and it was incredible! We hired an Airbnb with a stunning view of Woody Bay (see above) and spent the weekend walking, eating and exploring. I feel it is easy to overlook just how beautiful the UK is, but last weekend really brought it home to me. I am so grateful I was able to spend time in such a perfect place with my family.

2. One year in our house: Saturday 23rd May 2015 marked a whole year since we moved into our wonderful house in North London. I never thought a place could give me so much pleasure. Every day, good or bad, I feel overwhelmingly grateful to live in this rambling Victorian house which we have made our own. I strongly believe that if you enter a home, you should know the people in it, even if they are not in at the time. I feel our home has that feeling and it is just the best! I am so excited to renovate it gradually and to fill it with our family over many years to come. 

3.  New glasses: this may seem a trivial one, but this week my two new pairs of glasses from Glasses Direct arrived. They were super cheap (under £70 for both pairs) but they look great and I am very much enjoying using glasses as an accessory rather than just a necessity.

4. #poirottombs 1st birthday: yes, I realise I am a crazy cat lady but we celebrated our cat's first birthday, with a personalised bowl for our favourite furry. He brings so much joy to our lives and I am very, very grateful we decided to acquire a cat before we acquired a bed or a sofa this time last year!!

Photo from Saturday date night at Quo Vadis, our 'go to'' bar in Soho

I believe in cultivating gratitude. I have been keeping an intermittent gratitude journal for almost six months now and it has really emphasised just how truly lucky I am. In the chaos of every day life it is often easy to overlook the tiny but deeply significant things that make life the glorious adventure it is. For that reason I intend to reflect on these things every Friday and list the top five or so things I have felt grateful for in the last week.


1.  Date night with Sam: last Saturday night Sam and I went out for a proper date in Soho. We had cocktails at our favourite bar and dinner at new seafood restaurant Rex and Mariano. The food was delicious but what I am truly grateful for is that nearly 10 years since we first started going out, he is still the first person in the world I would choose to spend time with.

2. Baby Lucas: on Sunday we went to visit Sam's cousins and spent time with their beautiful new baby, Lucas. He is smiley, cuddly and seemed very taken with Sam, and vice-versa!

3. Law: sounds geeky, but I am so lucky to do a job that I love. I had my first Judicial Review permission hearing on Monday and whilst it was terrifying, I found preparing my submissions and making them in Court wholly absorbing. I am so glad I am able to fill my life with work that makes me want to get up at 5,30am!

4, The Ballet: last night Lucy and I went to see Woolf Works at the Royal Opera House. It is a new work loosely based on the works of Virginia Woolf, in three parts. Whilst the second part had a little too much going on for my taste, the first and the third parts were exquisitely moving. The third part depicted a woman's mental collapse with such aching melancholy I was unable to say very much for the hour afterwards. The fact that I was able to experience something so incredible on a Thursday night, steps away from where I work for just £13 blows me away. 

We spent our last day in Japan slightly outside Kyoto, visiting the epic Himeji Castle. Very few Japanese castles have survived intact, having been destroyed either through natural disaster or war, but Himeji is the jewel in the crown and has been lovingly restored to its full former glory. 

As soon as you step off the train in Himeji the stunning white Castle comes into view. The day we visited was a particularly special one as it was the first day the Castle had opened to the public after years of restoration work. The grounds of the Castle had a particularly festive atmosphere with Japanese families picnicking in the and men dressed up as Samurai warriors, happy to pose with stupid English tourists!

 

The above photo is Sam's favourite of our trip!!

The Castle itself was stunning; a glorious white façade, set perfectly against a blue spring sky. The fact that soft pink cherry blossom decorated the trees surrounding the building made it look like a castle in fairytale. I enjoyed the tour of the inside of the Castle rather less than viewing the exterior; it is fair to say crowd control had not been mastered by those in charge and the 'tour' involved a melee of Japanese tourists squeezing through a series of very low ceilinged turreted rooms. The view from the top made the whole experience worth it though!

After Himeji we took the train to Kobe, home of the world's best beef, with one intention: to eat Kobe in Kobe! We did, and the experience did not disappoint. In typical Japanese style the restaurant the inter-web recommended to us, Royal Mopr, had an inauspicious entrance. We entered via an anonymous lift and small passageway into a dark velvet clad room. We were greeted by a smartly clad waiter and shown to two chairs in front of a grill behind which stood a chef in his whites, ready to cook our chosen piece of Kobe to our liking.

And OH MY GOSH, it was incredible. The beef was melt in your mouth delicious. Although it sounds strange it had the richness of cream and when paired with the wasabi and grilled garlic with which it was served it was just divine. One of the best food experiences of our trip (and possibly my life). As you can see below it was a very happy end to the first part of our time in Japan.

Exhausted after our pilgrims trail, we got back into Eric the Toyota and wended our way to the mountain town of Koya-san (well I say we; for the first part of the journey I slept and Sam heroically drove with just our Japanese sat-nav as a guide). I awoke from my slumbers as the road became windier and was rewarded the most incredible views. Koya-san is a mountain town and the journey to the top is epically beautiful. The 'other-worldly' feel of the place is emphasised by the striking contrast in weather at the summit. Having hiked in our t-shirts the day before we arrived to softly falling snowflakes in Koya-san.

The town is the centre of Japan's Buddhist tradition and home to the largest Buddhist cemetery in Japan. We stayed in the Eko-in monastery, a deeply spiritual place where we were received graciously by the young monks who lived in the monastery whilst completing their religious studies. 

The highlight of our stay in this incredible place was our night-time tour the Okunoin cemetery with a monk called Nobu. It is hard to describe Nobu other than to say he radiated spirituality and peacefulness. He guided us through more than a mile of gravestones, with careful explanations of the Buddhist tradition to which he had dedicated his life; dealing with the complexities of subjects as vast as forgiveness and enmity with true grace. 

Finally, he took us to mausoleum of Kobo Dashi, a much revered monk who is believed to still be meditating beneath the ground, over a thousand years since he first began his communion with the Gods. As Nobu asked us to close our eyes and say a personal prayer whilst he prayed for us, I could truly feel the holiness of this very special place.

The next morning we awoke at 5,30am to witness the monk's morning prayers and fire ritual. It unlike anything I have ever seen and the monk's chanting and continual beating of a drum was hypnotic. The fact that it involved a female monk made me very happy even in the sub-zero temperatures of the early morning temple!

Our early morning meant we were able to set off on the road to Kyoto in excellent time. The trafficky journey was made considerably better by the fact we found both coffee and baked goods on the road!! It turns out three days without coffee is too much for Team Tombs.

We arrived in Kyoto at approximately lunch time and after a sad goodbye to Eric the Toyota and a much needed hot shower in our Airbnb we set out to explore this wonderful city of contrasts. It is impossible to describe all our wonderful experiences in Kyoto but indulge me in setting out my top two:

• Sunset in Gion - Gion is historically Kyoto's Geisha district. Its winding streets used to be home to traditional Japanese tea houses in which the Geisha entertained their clients; now they are filled with little shops selling delightful Japanese eats (matcha cream cone - umm ... yes) and modern Japanese women dressed in traditional kimono carrying selfie sticks and experimenting with life as their grandmothers may have experienced it. Truly a clash of cultures. We stood at the Temple at the top of Gion and watched the sunset over this fascinating place.  

The last few months I have been meeting goals I didn't know I had set myself, so I am looking forward to taking this month a little slower and meeting these realistic goals:

• Celebrate my father-in-law's in style in Exmoor (and do all the planning that the weekend needs to make it really special);
• Make sure my hand-over at work is smooth and well organised;
• Paint our kitchen steps yellow;
• Finally sort out the 'coat situation' in our hall;
• Keep attending Thursday 75 minute hot yoga at Yogacentric, as I might actually be making some progress! 
• Bake Jamie Olivers' chocolate and beetroot cake;
• Finish 'Memoirs of a Geisha'.

I have been a terrible blogger of late; although with some excuse: in the last month and a half or so we have spent nearly three weeks abroad (the subject of this an a few more posts!), a lot of weekends away and I have a secured new job.

Our trip to Asia was long in the planning. Sam has always wanted to travel to Japan and Vietnam has been on my wish-list for as long as I can remember. In the spirit of compromise we decided to do both in one big trip!! The basic itinerary was a week in Japan, a week in Vietnam then a final few days in Toyko from where we would be getting our flight home.

In order to avoid writing a single monster blog post I have decided to divide my thoughts on what were two and a half of the best weeks of my life into five posts:

·         Onsens and the Kumano Kodo;

·         Koya-san and Kyoto;

·         Vietnam beach and jungle;

·         Our cookery course in Hoi An (aka, the best day ever!)

·         Tokyo;

So, Japan. I didn’t really have any idea what to expect. Sam had planned this part of the trip and I was along for the ride. And what a ride it was.

Our first night was spent in a traditional Ryokan (a Japanese guesthouse) an hour and a half (two hours if you are in English tourist with a Japanese Sat Nav!) drive from Tokyo. Having taken a night flight straight after a Friday of work we arrived weary and jetlagged and were immediately transported into another, fairy-tale world. A beautiful Japanese lady in a kimono took us to our simple, elegant room and gently urged us to change into the robes we would wear for the exquisite 14 course dinner we would shortly be served.

Dinner was followed by our first onsen experience. Onsens are the natural pre-cursor to the spa; hot springs in which to bathe. This particular onsen was nestled into the side of a beautiful mountain and it is hard to describe the dreamlike quality of stepping into the perfectly warm water, thousands of miles away from home on a dark and starry night. The Tombses big adventure had begun.

We spent the next day driving to the start of the Kumano Kodo, a day we had written off to travel in Eric the Toyota but which was in fact filled with unexpected adventure. Japan is so wonderfully diverse; our stop-offs during the day included Lake Ashi and a glimpse of the glorious Mount Fuji, ‘Toyota Town’ – industrialisation on a scale I have never seen – and a deserted beach with flinty grey stone and crashing waves. 

The Kumano Kodo is an ancient Buddhist trail and we trekked two days of it, spending a night in a very quirky walker’s hostel where little English was spoken. The owners were very surprised to see Team Tombs; particularly when we arrived several hours past the allotted time, by the light of iPhone, but were very welcoming all the same!

We started our trek at the stunning Nachi Falls, which are surrounded by Buddhist Temples and the captivating smell of incense. Having taken in this incredible sight then hiked onwards up steep hills densely packed with verdant green trees, a landscape which over the course of the two days began to feel comfortably familiar. The reward was stunning views out towards the sea glistening in the distance. For the whole of our trek we barely saw another soul and it was immensely rewarding to feel we were somewhere so completely different; particularly at dawn on the second day. That said, the pilgrims were not wrong when they described the trail as “arduous”; it isn’t for the faint hearted but it is 100% worth the effort. I feel we saw a side of Japan that few tourists do and I am immensely grateful for it.