A not so good start at Takamatsu on Sunday 25 August

The six of us had settled on a plan to grab a taxi to tackle Ritsurin Koen Park then walk back 2km through its colonaded shopping centre to Takamatsu Castle.
Takamatsu is another port where we were breaking new ground as the first cruise ship to arrive. The city of 400,000 people is the capital of Kagawa Provence (Japan's smallest Provence) on the island of Shikoku. It is surrounded by green hills, lots of islands around its harbour and plenty of activity on it. Very enthusuastic welcome from a big group of girls, plenty of volunteers, and plenty of tourist information, but unfortunately someone forgot to tell the taxis as it proved just on an hour wait (shuttle busses almost as bad) - and no maxi-cabs. Another mid 20'sC day with quite a blue sky, and despite the forecast 80% chance of rain.
Ritsurin Gardens are 400 years old, are Japan's largest Cultural Property Garden, with a Michelin Green Guide 3 star rating (the highest available). It extends over 75 hectares, has 6 ponds/lakes (some large), 13 landscaped hills, more than 1400 pine trees (with around 1000 individually tended to, shaped, trimmed etc), as well as tea houses etc. We spent 90" or so wandering the paths before heading down the road. The shopping colonade was busy, with shops of all sorts, top end, low end, with entertainment and plenty of volunteers. I spent time with a young mum, her 8 year old daughter and 3 year old son (all sporting their volunteer "ask me anything" shirts). It was still a distance to the castle and the other 2 couples grabbed a taxi (in 30 seconds) to head back to the ship. We wandered on to the castle ruins, with an intact moat, some reconstructed walls and pleasant gardens before also getting a taxi (in 30 seconds) back to the ship. My feeling is that Pat would have preferred the last hour in the shopping colonade.
At shipside there was a complimentary, on-site produced, udon noodle dish put on by the volunteers to enjoy, as well as sake sampling. One of the girls told me that 80% of the flour used to produce Udon noodles comes from Australia - "so we have a common link".
As we will now head back to Busan,  South Korea, everyone was required to process Japanese Immigration once on board. At "all on board" time, 200 on board passengers had still not done so, thus risking our on time departure. Not sure how much these recalcitrants would have cost the cruise line, but we had at least 4 tugs idling alongside us until we eventually got underway about 1 hour late.
Pre-dinner drinks with our next door neighbours in Skywalkers Lounge on deck 18 at the ship's aft. This area of Japan has plenty of islands and sailing through and past them is quite spectacular. Great sunset, then our usual late dinner (7.45pm) in the Savoy Dining room. After dinner, time on the Promenade Deck as we sailed about 2km off the coastline with bright city lights, a sky wheel and a big, colorfully lit bridge. All of this on our starboard so we were able to watch it from our balcony.
An opportunity for a rest tomorrow as we have a sea day.