For Alex's birthday, I decided that I wanted to plan a surprise trip for us to go on together. I tricked him into thinking we were going to Los Angeles, but lead him to the international terminal instead of the car rental. Let's just say he was shocked.

I know we say this about everywhere we travel, but Japan is seriously one of our favorites. In fact, it sits right next to Scotland on our "Someday we'd like to live there" list. We’re not usually city people, we prefer the quiet and being close to nature, but Tokyo managed to change our minds. We only spent two weeks in the country, but we quickly fell in love with the culture, the people, the food, and the landscape. We’ve been wanting to plan our return trip every since.

We spent our first week exploring Tokyo. It's so easy to get around by public transportation, there is amazing shopping, the food is out of this world, and there are shrines tucked away that allow you to escape the hustle and bustle. We went to a few outdoor markets and even came across a neighborhood full of vintage shops. We went to a sushi restaurant with a conveyer belt, made our own okonomiyaki in a tiny restaurant, and ate ramen for about half of our meals. Oh, and there's a Disneyland, so that's a huge plus.

The second week of our trip was spent in Japan's Kansai Region. We took an overnight bus to Osaka (wouldn’t recommend), we saw a castle in Osaka, fed deer and stood in awe at the Giant Buddha in Nara, and climbed the stairs through the thousands of torii gates in Kyoto.

Photographs

Colorado Elopements

Destination Elopements