We’re on board our flight to Kyoto. I’m not sure why this trip feels like the resumption of our original vision that brought us to Guam, but somehow it does.

When we were first contemplating the wild idea of homeschooling, I was enchanted with the idea of visiting Boston when we studied US history. What better way to learn about the Boston Tea party than by standing at the Boston waterfront and imagining the Patriots sneaking out under the cover of darkness? Now that we’ve been studying US history all year, we started thinking about a trip to the East coast this spring.

But… then we realized that this year may be an ideal year to see the cherry blossoms in Japan. And the week we had planned to visit the East Coast might (if we’re exceptionally lucky) be just the right time to see Kyoto in bloom. Tourism is slowly returning to Japan, but doesn’t seem to be in full swing yet. So this may be a unique opportunity to experience the season with slightly less crowds.

So we decided that the East Coast would still be equally lovely in the Fall (or when we’re living back in that part of the world). And then we set our course for a week in Kyoto.

Life has been a whirlwind lately with all the usual happy
busy-ness of life with kids – soccer, surfing, birthday parties, book parties, schoolwork, two working parents, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. So I feel woefully underprepared for this trip. And I’ve been wondering if I’ve been ruined for thorough trip planning after we somehow managed to pull off our trip to Greece – an exercise in extreme flexibility.

But we have a list of places we’re excited to visit, including the Kyoto Pokémon Center. And Tim found a family cooking class and signed us up for tomorrow. We’re looking forward to spending a week in one place and relaxing and (hopefully) really getting to know the city.