Nagoya - Day 1!

Guh. I forgot how crap travelling on the night bus is. Luckily, Zoe and I got the WHOLE back row seat to ourselves (like 5 seats across) so we got to stretch out kinda. We got to Nagoya at like, 6:30 this morning. So we decided to get some breakfast before we went to the hotel. We nipped into a McDonalds. It was kinda nice, the food there tastes the same as the food at home.
Anyway, we caught the train to the area of town our hotel is in, but it took us like, an HOUR to find it. We ended up seeing it, but I didn't think the hiragana was right, so we walked around more...and then it turned out it WAS the right hotel. Ahaha. We ended up dropping our luggage at the hotel, and we decided to go find the castle. While we walked to the castle, we found a little shrine, so we took some pictures.

 (This bottom one is where we prayed at the shrine.)

After the shrine, we walked to the castle. It was HUGE! 7 floors tall! It was the same size at a 14-story building according to the movie we watched about it.

 

The screens were lovely! And that box is supposed to look like I'm riding in a palanquin.

 

That big gold statue is a dolphin. Apperently it's the mascot for the castle. There used to be 2 big dolphin statues on the top of the castle before the castle was burnt down.

 

On the top floor there was a viewing room so we could see the whole city.

 It was amazing! So much fun!
 It was really interesting to see the things on display.
After the castle, we walked to the Oasis 21 building to do some shopping and see where we were going to be hanging out for World Cosplay Summit. The top of the building has water on it, and it mists over the sides of the building so it cools the air. It's an open air mall. It's kinda underground though. It's neat.
Inside Oasis 21, there was a Pokemon Center, a Jump Shop and a Ghibli shop! It was amazing!

 I ended up buying a few things while I was there. I tried my luck with a game in Pokemon Center, if you got a special pokeball from a machine, you won a prize. I got a normal pokeball so I got a cellphone strap. Zoe won though! She got a Pichu stuffed toy. I bought a hand towel from the Jump shop as well. It has Trunks on it! I forgot how much I love Dragonball Z.

 After Oasis 21, we went to the building that the changerooms for the World Cosplay Summit are in and got some information about the way things are going to be run tomorrow. The guy who helped us was really sweet. Ahaha. Then we went back to the hotel and had a nap.
After that we walked around the area. There was a giant ferris wheel in the mall near the house. We went on it! It was HUGE. I got kinda scared near the top lol. It was fun though!

It's been a good day! So much fun! Now though, I need to rest for tomorrow! Can't wait!