TANKS Travel Tales - a travelogue.......

Travelling at your own pace....... Apart from business trips where are usually characterised by fixed timelines for flights and strict agendas to adhere to, I always love to take it slow and easy at my own pace whenever I travel on personal vacations. For this reason, I typically prefer not to travel with a large group on vacation. A smaller travelling party allows me to adjust the pace of the trip and to modify the itineraries as and when needed. Solo travelling of course means I have only to seek agreement with myself for any changes in travel plans. My vacation trips are usually loosely based on a simple itinerary which only outlines the flights I am taking and the cities I will be visiting. Apart from these, the daily itineraries for the whole travel period are not decided upfront. I usually decide where to go and the sights to explore on the day itself. This flexibility is especially useful when unexpected travel road blocks crop up such as inclement weather. When I w

Located in Nikko, the Nikko Tosho-gu (a.k.a. Toshogu) is both a Shinto shrine as well as a mausoleum that is dedicated to the founder of the Tokugawa Shogunate, Tokugawa layasu (1543 - 1616).  The Toshogu shrine is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site listing of the Shrines and Temples of Nikko. My visit to the Toshogu shrine on 5th October 2014 was partly clouded by the impending arrival of super Typhoon Phanfone. Although Nikko wasn't in the path of the typhoon, the accompanying rains sort of "wash-out" my day trip to Nikko. I started the day trip early in the morning and the bus journey from Tokyo to Nikko passed through parts of Saitama Prefecture offering picture-perfect views of the countryside despite the drizzle which got stronger as the tour bus neared Nikko. Because of the rain, I was unable to take much photos of the lavishly decorated Toshogu. The most famous of these decorations being the wooden carvings of the Three Wise Monkeys, who toge