As happy as a pig in... a cafe

Today was a little later to start after a late evening on the roof for the 5 of us (we were minus Paul last night after yet another 15 hour sleep).
We had decided we would go to asahiyama to see the monkeys in the mountains and the famous bamboo forest. Once we arrived via our favourite transport, we had a short walk to the base of the mountain that needed to be climbed to see the monkeys. We decided to split into 2 groups, Paul, Anya and Colin would be taking the near vertical climb, being the monkey lovers of the group. Whilst Zak, Jazz and I decided we didn't fancy being attacked by monkeys so we'd have a wander along to see 'the GREATest view of kyoto'. We walked along a stunning river and decided to be top Instagram models and get all the best angles from every point along the river. After we had worn the camera out we met back up with the others who managed to keep all digits and bags attached. We then decided to split again but into different sets this time, Zolin went on an hour mini hike and argued with a Canadian about the pronunciation of a Japanese word and the reparations given to the native population. Whilst Jazzantha and Panya went and hired a couple of boats and got even more Instagram worthy shots. Jazz took me on an amazing date and rowed me up the river and bought me a beer from a boat! And Panya had a full photo shoot before crashing like the titanic into a massive rock in the middle of the river (luckily no "don't let go Paul" moment as the boat survived). We became a 6 again before heading to the bamboo forest which was the biggest let down of the trip so far. Quickly turned around and headed back onto the train to go to nishika Market which Paul and Anya had found when exploring by themselves.
I had 2 goals for today and the first was to get candied strawberries. Now I was excited to find these and ate the first stick without any evidence, so of course I had to buy another to get a photo. Once that was ticked off Jazz decided she didn't want to come and see me tick off my biggest dream! And went to have a wonder around the Market whilst the 5 of us headed to the micro pig cafe. Now I don't think I can put into words the emotion I had when we arrived and I realised I was able to go and play with pigs. I may or may not have cried a little and had the biggest grin I've ever had on my face. We decided as this was our last night we would check out Kyoto tower. We used the fixed binoculars for all the wrong reasons and then headed home for the night to pack.

I'm now looking into how much it costs to fly my new adopted pig home and how long it needs to go into quarantine. 

Samantha

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