Beginning of trip to the alps

Sorry for the delays, been VERY busy travelling in some interesting countryside. Making 3 minute connections! Dom is getting sick of my regimentation. We left Kyoto by train heading towards Nagano. Nagano was the site of a previous Winter Olympics.

The trip was in a 'Limited wideview express', never been on one of those.
It turns out to a train has wrap around glass at the front with no apparent pillars and the passenger cabin is separated by a full height and width glass wall. Wonderful viewing in the first carriage!

Also saw an interesting thing, the 'Fat controller' was full sized and lurking on the platform, constantly looking at his watch, on his radio and looking at his large paper flow chart of train movements at this station in Kyoto.