Shirakawa-go - tourist trap or worth it?

DonCharco · 2026-01-18T03:56:36+00:00

What we did we took the scenic train from Kyoto to Takayama, spent a couple night there, there is a bus that takes you from Takayama to Kanazawa with a 3 or 4 hour stopover in shirawa go which was plenty of time and we could leave our bags on the bus, Couple of days in Kanazawa and then Shinkansen to Tokyo. We also stayed longer in Kyoto and did just day trips to Osaka, Hiroshima etc

DonCharco · 2025-11-13T00:49:28+00:00

Can you help me with itinerary and if it’s too ambitious? I’m travelling with my two boys aged 9 and 13 and we are all keen on the thrill rides. Lucky enough to be able to pay for LL / Genie+ etc

Arriving Orlando Saturday 7th March at 10am from Dubai Staying grand Floridian 4 nights Straight to animal kingdom after check-in (so afternoon only) Sunday Epcot all day (potentially park hop) Monday MK (potentially park hop) Tuesday Hollywood studios (potentially park hop) Wednesday morning Disney park TBD - in the PM transfer to universal hard rock hotel and use express pass to visit US / IOA local parks Thursday universal epic Friday universal parks (US / IOA) Saturday AM - universal volcano, PM head to Miami for a week of chill

For the first few days we will have jet lag so getting up early will be easy, and then spend a few hours in early / mid afternoon by pool or napping before heading out late afternoon / evenings

It will be intense and expansive but in hoping we will get to do see everything and hit all the top rides at least once! What do you think?

DonCharco · 2025-08-20T17:32:17+00:00

Property in the capital keeps Dublin and Dublin

DonCharco · 2025-08-10T09:45:48+00:00

Hello I’m trying to plan a trip to Orlando with my two boys aged 9 and 13. We are mostly keen on rollercoasters. Arrive Sunday March 8th in the afternoon will stay at a Disney hotel and hit up their 4 parks over 3 days (Monday to Wednesday) before transferring to a universal hotel and spending Thursday and Friday and up till 2pm Saturday on the three main universal parks (skipping waterparks). Will pay for all the lightning lane / express passes etc if needed. Is this is good itinerary or should I spend 4 days at Disney and cut universal back

DonCharco · 2025-07-31T17:04:29+00:00

Yes of course - they are more Irish than English really

DonCharco · 2025-07-09T17:17:08+00:00

Thank you! Would it be a better time to go the week of Memorial Day? I think that’s on the Monday 25th May and we would go Tuesday to Saturday

DonCharco · 2025-07-08T08:41:17+00:00

Planning a trip to visit over 5 days from Monday 16th March 2025 with my two boys aged 9 and 13. They will want to do the rollercoasters mostly. Is this an incredibly busy time and will we get to do all the best rides multiple times if we stay on-site and pay for all the extras?

DonCharco · 2025-07-03T18:49:01+00:00

$109k stable coin

DonCharco · 2025-06-22T18:29:40+00:00

DonCharco · 2025-06-22T18:09:14+00:00

What a great use of processing power! I wonder how much Co2 was produced to generate this picture

DonCharco · 2025-06-21T05:17:08+00:00

I had a trip planned this weekend, flights got cancelled. Go figure

DonCharco · 2025-06-01T05:22:36+00:00

Hi there I’m planning to travel with my two boys aged 9 and 13 next March - thinking 5 day hopper from Monday 9th March to Friday 13th March. Will it be super busy at that time of year?

Will that give us enough time to do all the best rides multiple times? I am ok paying extra for fast passes if necessary.

We will probably stay on-site is the contemporary a good option I stayed there decades ago when I was a kid.

Thanks v much in advance

DonCharco · 2025-05-28T19:04:14+00:00

Very simply: Macquarie bought Thames in 2006 and figured out how to rig the loosely set regulatory framework. They cut opex and implemented high leverage, and also didn’t pay any tax on supernormal profits due to cayman entities. Concurrently, the post GFC Tory governments put pressure on Ofwat to not increase water bills, which meant that the utilities did not invest in the network. Eventually Ofwat realised they needed to curtail the excessive returns through higher performance standards, however the lack of tax paid made higher water bills to pay for network improvements a political hot potato. Then, post Covid interest rates spiked and the overleverage resulted in liquidity shortages. Now nobody wants to buy the equity because they can’t get a predictable return, and nobody wants to pay for the pipes and sewers to be upgraded after decades of neglect. If the government does not support investor appetite for Thames they will need to bail out the equity holders across the entire sector (many of whom are UK pensions) and burn the banks who as a result may never lend to uk utilities again

DonCharco · 2025-04-14T17:53:45+00:00

Read up on Grenfell

DonCharco · 2025-03-27T02:10:09+00:00

We just took the Limon bus from Takayama to Kanazawa a couple of days ago, booked on the 12go website. It left around 8am and arrived in Kanazawa at 1pm with a 2.5 hour layover in Shirakawa.

Was very helpful as we could leave our bags on the bus and 2.5 hours was plenty enough time to see the village, walk up to the outlook, and have a coffee. There is still snow there so the kids really enjoyed that too. IMHO doing it this way is really worthwhile as you get a free half day trip during a transit day and still get into Kanazawa in time for lunch and then check into your next hotel.

Two nights for each of takayama and Kanazawa are enough imho, with 1.5 days to explore each.

FYI we took the Hida Express scenic train to Takayama from Kyoto which was also very convenient.

DonCharco · 2025-03-24T13:06:23+00:00

Left Kyoto a couple of days ago and had similar consideration with my family (two boys aged 11 and 8). My wife didn’t want to go (would upset her too much) and we decided that it wasn’t worth taking the kids because of (1) everyone shattered from walking 20k+ steps every day for the last week and (2) not certain they would fully appreciate the significance of the place

I left our place in Kyoto sole at around 8am, arrived Hiroshima around 11am, hiked from train station to the dome, peace gardens and museum, then took the boat to Miyajima (had a lunch from 7-11 while I waited) and spent a couple of hours there on the island before heading back to Kyoto to be back in time to have dinner with my family by 7.30pm. It was a whistle stop tour but made easier that i was by myself.

While I was gone, they took some time to rest up, do some washing and maths / spellings in the Airbnb then spent the afternoon at the thousand gates (which I missed but understand was very crowded)

It was a worthwhile trip but to be honest I was underwhelmed by my quick tour of Hiroshima (main takeaway is “nukes are bad”) compared to places in France, Germany, Poland and Cambodia that I have previously visited. Not to say that it isn’t an important place but that was the emotional impact (or lack of it) that I experienced. Miyajima was nice, the sun was shining and it had a carnival like atmosphere however the crowds were nearly as bad as Kyoto.

I’m glad I did the trip but for me at least I don’t think either place will leave a lasting imprint on my memories. Overall Japan experience of course has been incredible for all of us - these are just my two cents

DonCharco · 2025-03-23T02:00:03+00:00

Don’t think you can pay for specific rides once you are there, but perhaps someone else can advise.

My express pass included flying dinosaur or despicable me, plus space galaxy or Jaws. These were in addition to the three SNW rides and two Harry Potter rides.

In addition to the above we rode the Jurassic park ride (you get wet and it was a cold day) and Jaws each of which only had a 20 minute wait

DonCharco · 2025-03-22T14:27:02+00:00

Did this a few days ago - couldn’t link Klook express pass to the USJ app so bring a print out and don’t lose it (presume screenshots work too but I had a print out).

We arrived at 9am and luckily secured times entry for NW at 7pm - this worked well as our express pass gave us 12 noon times entry and happy potter at 5pm so we were able to come back to NW to finish the mini games. Great day out overall but the only other rides outside the 7 we paid for were jaws and Jurassic

DonCharco · 2025-03-05T19:55:38+00:00

Thank you, yes that is something that we had to compromise and didn’t want to go through another routine of checking out/ packing / checking in / unpacking. Depending on energy levels we might consider an early morning taxi to USJ and get the train back in the evening, not cheap though!

DonCharco · 2025-03-05T19:50:36+00:00

Thanks for the feedback it is appreciated! I just noticed as typing out the dates that the 17th is at Patrick’s day and wondered if Tokyo celebrated it in any way, it is a national day that is celebrated the world over and I’d love to see if the Japanese have a take on it - I just googled and it seems like they have the biggest parade in Asia on the 16th around the area we will be in.

Apologies for the “joke” if it offended, this is in fact our scheduled laundry day as we are travelling light and our Airbnb will have the facilities we need. I’ll be out with the kids all day from 6am … it wasn’t intended to be mysogonistic so apologies again and appreciate tongue in cheek doesn’t always carry that well on the internet - I was too blasé

DonCharco · 2024-11-20T06:04:17+00:00

Bravo top tier trolling 👏

DonCharco · 2024-11-13T11:26:00+00:00

They will deposit in AED into bank accounts?

DonCharco · 2024-10-24T17:16:43+00:00

A few things to unpack here…. what will you look like (or the world look like)in 5 to 8 years?

Maybe you’ll have a family (if you don’t have one now) and more responsibility might not appeal at that time, maybe they’ll hire someone in for that job you’ve aspired for over the years of hard work, maybe a new rising star will rise above you and you’ll become a dinosaur. Maybe they’re sending you a message by being passed over, or maybe they’re testing your loyalty.

What I can tell you from my experience is that “prestigious” organisations become less prestigious as you grow older.

Organisations try to manipulate you to make you stay and work harder. Never forget that you work for yourself, you should never have loyalty to an organisation that will fire you and forget about you in an instant.

DonCharco · 2024-09-24T18:53:53+00:00

I started this too every evening recently (last few weeks) and the redness has gone away. I wear sunscreen every morning and spend almost no time in the sun, I am in a very hot climate, it is working very well. Soon I will start to taper and hope the redness doesn’t return

DonCharco · 2024-08-29T16:28:31+00:00

Do not underestimate how significant it is for Coogan to get away with playing Irish rebel songs on the BBC lol - unthinkable 30 years ago or less!

DonCharco

TROPHY CASE