Travel and Leisure
Part II of our Japanese adventure took us to Tokyo for 5 nights. Using the Shinkansen high-speed train, the total journey was only about 4 hours, end-to-end. Tip for first time users of this service, is that you want to make sure you buy reserved seats, preferably in the Green (1st class) cars, or at least the ordinary cars. We didn't get reserved seats on our 2nd Shinkansen journey, and that was a big mistake (more on that in the next episode).
Day 7: travel to Tokyo and settle in
Anyhow, we managed to find our Airbnb without much fuss, and used the rest of Day 7 of the trip to settle in, grab a bite to eat and hit the local supermarket. Getting a little tired of the Japanese cuisine, she found an Indian restaurant a few blocks away down a neat restaurant street; the place was called
Dipmahal Yotsuya, and it was great! We're normally leery of having meals that don't match the ethnicity of the countries we are visiting, but this was as good as we'd had locally, and great value to boot. Look at the size of that naan!
Day 8: Asakusa area and Shinjuku at night
We were about due for some more temple time, so we hit the big one in Tokyo:
Sensō-ji. The lead-up to the actual temple grounds is pretty neat, as you follow a long shopping street for over 200 meters, called Nakamise, which has been around for several centuries. Today, it sells a combination of street food and touristy items, but it is a lively pedestrian-only area; we got there just as they were opening up the shops, but it was packed by the time we walked out.
Admission to this temple and the grounds was free, and understandably, this was a popular tourist spot. We wandered around for a bit, and even went across the street from the Thunder Gate entrance, to the
Asakusa Culture Tourist Information Center observation deck; it gives you a great view down the shopping street and temple area. Since we saw that there might actually be some cooler weather coming (did I mention how hot it is here?), we headed to the local Uniqlo for some shopping.
That evening, I had mapped out a brief tour of the Shinjuku area, starting with The
Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building, for it's two free observation decks, at 202 metres above street level. Unfortunately, this was one of the only drizzly weather evenings we'd experience, so daytime views were not great. However, arriving just before dusk, we were able to take in the nighttime lights, and as a bonus, found out that they run an evening light show. projected onto the outside of the towers!
After taking in the brief light show, we walked the short distance to
Omoide Yokocho (Memory Lane); this network of narrow alleys and streets hosts many tiny bars and restaurants serving yakitori. If you've ever seen the original Blade Runner, this area is reminiscent of that first scene where Deckard sits down for some street food. With tourists and diners packing the area, we were lucky enough to find to available bar seats right away, and took in the experience with cold beverages and skewers barbecued right in front of us!
Day 9: teamLab light exhibit and Shibuya at night
Recommended to us by more than a few people, the
teamLab Borderless is a must-see exhibition that is difficult to describe. Part art show, part immersive experience, it is described as a world of artworks without boundaries, a museum without a map. Indeed, you walked through the dark passages of the facility with art and light moving around you, and the light often interacted with your actual movements. It is necessary to book reservations, so we had set up for the earliest (9-9:30 am) slot for the day. As such, it wasn't too busy, and we spent around 90 minutes wandering the ever-changing lightscape around us.
It was a Sunday, but the shopping mall that teamLabs is attached to was open, so we did a little bit of window-shopping before taking in some of the views of the
Tokyo Tower. If you think that it looks a little bit too similar to the Eiffel Tower, you'd be correct, as it was directly modelled after the iconic French version. Just as the Paris version is used for radio communications, Tokyo Tower was designed specifically for that purpose - and a tourist attraction as a secondary intent.
That evening, we had to go see the other iconic Tokyo experience -
Shibuya Scramble Crossing. Located in the centre of the Shibuya district, seven streets come together in this one intersection, and when the walk lights turn green, chaos ensues! We went up to the 2nd floor of the Starbucks on one of the corners to capture this image, and it is definitely a spectacle to behold. We continued walking around the busy area, taking in the energy and sights of the brightly lit streets.
Day 10: Enoshima & Kamakura day trip
Two days is really enough for us in Tokyo, so we planned the rest of our time based there to day-trip; first was the seaside towns of Enoshima and Kamakura.
Enoshima is mostly known as a touristy island that offers variety of attractions, including a shrine, park, observation tower and caves. Mount Fuji can be seen when the conditions are just right, but it was hazy enough to prohibit that view for us. We still hiked to the top, and then back down to see the caves that had been carved by the ocean, then converted to shrines. It was a tough morning of many stairs as, you guessed it, it's really hot here.
A streetcar ride took us to
Kamakura, where the principal attraction is another giant
Buddha; this one a little smaller than the one in Nara, but since the temple hall that housed it was destroyed in a typhoon, this one sits out in the open. There are a number of temples to see in this town, but at this point we were pretty templed-out. So we strolled the pedestrian shopping street for a bit, then caught the train back to Tokyo.
Day 11: Kawagoe (Little Edo) day trip
We used our last day in the Tokyo area to do another day trip, this time to
Kawagoe, known as Little Edo because the main street is still lined with Kurazukuri (clay-walled warehouse-styled) buildings that retain an ambience reminiscent of an old town from the Edo Period (1603-1867). It's a relatively easy day trip, that is, if you can figure out where the right bus stop is that takes you to the old town.
There's other temples and Kawagoe Castle there, but we decided to pass on those, but did find the interesting
Kawagoe Festival Museum. Since we were going to similar festival in Osaka, this was a great warm-up visit, and at only ¥200 to get in, a great bargain. This festival takes place in the third weekend of October, the same way it has for 370 years. Huge wooden floats are dressed up and paraded through the streets, then face each other in performance “battles” of the hayashi music played by the onboard participants.
Back in Tokyo, we had a relatively quiet night, but did discover a great restaurant,
Teppan Dining SAYA. It was a little more high-end than what we had experienced so far, but we were just happy to have something close by for us to try. We discovered that we both liked the signature dish, Okonomiyaki, which is a savory Japanese pancake dish made from a batter of flour, eggs, dashi stock, and your choice of other toppings. We tried the "Osaka-style", pictured here.
We returned to the Airbnb to pack up for the last five nights of our trip, to be continued...
Click here for Act III.
