To see Part 1 of this series, click HERE.
Day 4, Monday 30/3/15
Chilli Con Carne not so good for brekky. Wayne had sent the train stops to get to Tokyo Tower. 11:17am set out and bought metro tickets. ¥170 each.
(Roppongi-itchome) train station.
1:05 pm meal at the serve yourself and weigh it place. (Organic House deli and cafe) ¥935
1:38 pm Starbucks tea and coffee whilst looking for Tokyo Tower ¥810
We came across a little park where people were eating their lunch. The park displayed a variety of indigenous plants from the area we were looking at a lovely little magnolia tree when a very kindly gentleman came over and hand signed us that he would take a photo of us if we would like. We said thank you. He did. He graciously bowed and we smiled at each other when leaving the park.
[GM (in 2022): We never found Tokyo Tower. We must have gone the wrong direction from the train station.]
Changed plans and decided to go to Ueno Park. Caught Metro there and then followed the crowds out of the station and up the crowded road, up the stairs and into the park (just minutes from the station).
Walked around, drunk Japanese, people reserved spaces. TV crews (in paper the next day).
Dinner at Italian ristorante, La Granata in the Biz Tower, Akasaka. T – beef sauce spaghetti, G – lamb ravioli & shared 2 dressing choices mixed 11 veg salad which included a very pretty Chinese lantern fruit.
DAY 5, Tuesday 31/3/15
Tren asked about clothes stores at reception. They suggested the Ginza Region to see the Department Stores.
Set off in the morning. Brief train ride to Ginza (on the Ginza Line ¥170 each). The exit to the train station takes you right into the lower floor of Mitsukoshi, Isetan, one of the most prominent and expensive Department Stores.
Looked for a while but strong emphasis on designer items. Pretty well everything was expensive and conservative. Did quite like a nifty little pack like a bento lunch box. Didn’t buy.
Exited into the street and into Takashimaya, Matsuzakaya another, slightly less expensive department store. After a while decided to go back to the hotel to prepare to meet with Wayne.
Cuppa at the Lounge and snaffled some extra water.
We met Wayne downstairs outside the lifts in the lobby @ 1pm. It was very nice to see him, even though he kept grumbling about someone on his previous train spilling something on his cream trouser leg.
He suggested we catch the train to Harajuku & walk from there to Shibuya. We walked along a wide Avenue with lots of high-end stores, Prada…
Eventually, we stopped at a café for a tea, coffee and mocha, our shout. Wayne just had the mocha as he had already eaten lunch. Greg & I shared a sandwich.
Wayne is charismatic & he had a number of interesting & humorous tales to tell. He is now divorced, he was married for 8 years. He now has a Korean girlfriend & she is looking after his two dogs today.
After a loo break, we headed out back onto the busy street chock-a-block with groovy shops leading us up to a Torii Gate, which is the entrance to a tree lined walk up to Meiji Shrine and continues to a museum and the zoo.
We got to the shrine where Wayne gave me some coins and told me how to make a wish by throwing them into the water.
After pointing out the Olympic Stadium we made our way back on the very busy road to Shibuya. Wayne left us at Tower Records (10 floors), after pointing out where the train station was.
Wayne was keen to see us again & offered us to stay at his house when we came back from Kyoto. Greg got along with him well.
We spent quite some time going from floor to floor looking at records, CDs, books & Ts but again didn’t buy anything. We did go to the loo there!
Back on the street we came across the ‘scramble crosswalk’ where 2,000,000 cross it everyday. So did we on our way to the train station.
We arrived back, exhausted. Our room had been nicely cleaned and turned down with our night attire carefully folded on the end of the bed. These outfits are less sexy than hospital gowns, I had no success in luring Greg into our boudoir.
Greg went to the Indian takeaway restaurant that he had discovered on a previous recce. He used cash to buy Saffron Rice, Potato Gobi, Lamb Curry & Roti. The man gave Greg utensils & plates & freebie papadoms. Very nice indeed.
[GM (in 2022): I am surprised at the extent of us sticking with the food we knew. I’m sure Trenna has recorded it correctly it is just that the Japanese meals are the ones I remember.]
Day 6, Wednesday 1/4/15
Slow start, overcast & possible rain.
Akihabara – Ginza line (G6) – (G15) walk 3 mins to Hibiya line (H16) Naka-okachimachi Station (?) on Hibiya line 1 stop to our destination Akihabara (H15) – lots of electronic stores, anime & manga.
Arrived and went straight to a noodle shop near the train station. We each had a meal from the ticket machine. ¥370 and ¥410. Very nice, not sure what all the ingredients were.
Back out on the street, then spotted Yodobashi Camera and went in… Looked at the Canon G16 (successor to Tren’s G15) also the Canon G7x (¥63,390). Greg took some photos of them to remember the prices. Found and bought a red, light weight neoprene camera case $11 (?) for Tren’s Camera.
We then decided to look at Bluetooth Headphones. Tren found some ripper Bose headphones (¥2700) that actually fit her. The good thing about the headphones and the cameras were that they were working and you could actually use them. Tren connected her iPhone and started singing a Crowded House song, Greg over-actively signalling to her to be quiet.
Also looked at Travel routers and got some help from a staff member. We were interested in buying but Greg said we should go home and think about it.
Off to train station.
Our room was being cleaned when we arrived home, the cleaner told us she would take 10 minutes so we went to the Club Lounge to have a beer and a very nice glass of wine, a few nuts & antipasti.
Greg had been out scouting for restaurants in the nearby streets. Came back with the news that there was a Pommie Pub that sold cottage pie and fish and chips, beer and wine. So, ¥3700 dinner @ Hobgoblins British Pub. 7:34 pm a rainy & windy walk back to the hotel, cold!
DAY 7, Thursday 2/4/15 –
Late start as usual. Greg went to nearby camera shop BIC CAMERA, to check out whether our planned trip back to Akihabara to pick up some Duty Free was a good idea. He was out for about 1 hr, liked the shop but didn’t buy anything but he did stop outside Bingo Sports to admire some flash sports cars.
We went to the Library Lounge for cuppa tea & then headed out just before noon to our train station – Tameike-sanno (G06).
Took the Ginza line, 14 mins to Suehirocho Station (G14) @ Akihabara area. Used Exit 1. Got a little lost and after initially going the wrong way we figured out where to go. Very interesting shops.
The area looks like a mega version of ‘side-show alley’ – neon signs, spruikers, French maids, the continual noise of amusement/gaming stores & more.
Walked a little way up the dual carriageway when my pill alarm went off.
We ducted into a manga figurine shop, I had only put my PF [Panadeine Forte] in, not my D [Diazepam], Greg crawled around on the wooden floor for a bit to see if I had dropped it, but alas, no!
Greg suggested we go straight back to the hotel but I said I would be OK until around 2-ish so he could go look @ the geek & cheap shops.
In the same building but outside of the figurine shop was a small elevator we decided to head up to the 3rd floor. It specialised in arcade games, colourful buttons & joysticks. Greg was highly tempted.
We were meant to have lunch & sit down for a rest – that didn’t happen.
We just kept trawling through the stores. One of them called Don Quixote 6 floors or more of all types of cheap shit.
I liked some socks that had been folded to look like little Japanese slippers, Greg thought they were tasteless. We had a bit of a falling out, I was too harsh on him, but medication would have helped!
We spent quite a lot of time there, going from floor to floor, there was even an ADULT section which of course we went into. Dildos aplenty, S&M gear etc. we came out empty handed.
On one of the floors we did buy boxed chopsticks tipped with pictures of kimono clad women.
Then we walked down an arcade which had shops that specialise in particular components, switches & connectors, exhaust fans, he particularly loved the shop that sold valves for old radios, me (?) not so much.
Finally, Greg had seen enough.
I was starting to shuffle deliriously so we headed off (in the wrong direction) to Yodobashi Camera (with passport) to buy headphones – 4th floor & router – 2nd floor.
I asked a girl for directions & she gave them in broken English, we were a bit muddled but made it there. Got an empty router box & a headphones ID card took them to pay, wrong area, pointed way to Duty Free, young server told us we had to go to Duty Free 2nd floor for Travel Router ¥1741.
I looked so dismayed he took pity on us & went off in search of it. He found it, correctly selected my Bose Soundlink OE Headphones, ¥25,000 & then did all the paperwork associated with Duty Free purchases.
Generally there is an 8% saving on sales tax but if we used Visa we got an extra 5% off! Yay! (Australian total $285.77) After discount ¥25,137.
It was 3:01pm. By this stage I was in agony. I could feel pain everywhere, I felt extreme pain in the ligaments or tendons in my feet.
We stopped at the Vie De France patisserie to pick up some sandwiches @ 3:13 pm ¥552 as we left Akihabara Station (H15); next to Camera shop, went to Hibiya line @ Exit 3, purchased ticket, 1 stop ride – Naka-Okachimachi Station (H16), walked 3 mins to Ginza line – Ueno-Hirokoji (G15) – Tameike-Sanno (G06) walk about 1 km, steps & escalators.
We caught both trains mostly not getting lost, had to stand mostly, arrived back in room just gone 4pm.
Wee, pills, lenses out, changed clothes & ate lunch @ 4:20! Pills kicked in around 5:30, just enough to get to the Lounge for an EG tea for me & a Scotch on the rocks, anti-pasti & nuts for Greg.
Back to room where I showered, washed my hair then blow dried it with lame-as, Hotel hairdryer. I had rang housekeeping & reception but the dryer I had was the best they could do. Oh well.
Greg went out to buy a pizza @ Trattoria mar mo ¥1404. At 7:33pm & a bag of salad at local convenience shop for dinner in our room.
We went to the lounge for wine and some nuts and desert. The female attendant, very friendly showed us the wine bottles so we could take a photo of them for when we go to Kyoto so as to know what wine to buy when there.
DAY 8, Friday 3/4/15
Breakfast a little bit earlier than we have been having, ordered à la carte scrambled eggs & cappuccino which came with a foil tipped, cinnamon stick.
After breakfast & teeth etc…, Greg went to Tokyo Station to buy tickets for the bullet train to Kyoto ¥28,220 for 2, one way. ($323.92 AUS).
Greg sent me a msg saying he would go for a recce around the area. He checked out the 9th floor of Daimaru Department store. Whilst he was away, I hair-dried our undies & socks. I also tried to use dictation, not totally successfully & wrote in this diary.
SHIBUYA
Specifically to look at clothes after wandering I took a breather while Greg took a video of the ‘scramble crossing’
Hachiko Dog statue where everyone meets, including us later when we went to Wayne’s on our last night.
Down side street after searching we found a noodle place with pay meal machine out front. Owner helped Greg with machine.
Shibuya 109 Asia’s most famous department store 10 floors of women/girls clothing.
Once again, dinner @ Hobgoblins, we are pub people after all. At first we couldn’t get a table but our wait woman lead us to a corner table after consulting with her boss. (?) Tren had as the menu said ‘Australia’s most favourite pub meal, Chicken Parma, chips & salad. Greg chose the vegetarian lasagne but thought that it was not a good choice. As usual we had a beer & white wine ¥4650 finished at 8:27pm.
Back to Library Lounge for our last time for dessert. Chatted with our friendly staff attendant. She had become quite friendly with us.
Lame Video Section
Here is a 33 second video we took giving a better idea of the number of people in Ueno Park. They are there to look at the cherry blossoms, drink and to wax lyrical.
End of Part 2…
2 replies on “The Japan Travel Diary – Part 2”
Japan sounds like a cool place to visit.
I’m confused about the noodle machine 😕 do the noodles come out of the machine or do you just order through the machine?
Tren bought me a favourite scarf in Japan and now I’ve inherited the one she bought for herself and also the pink scarf she is wearing in one of the pics, this one she made. 🥰
Hi Helen, Japan is a cool place and I’m quite excited to be going there again later this year. There are vending machines everywhere and they have an amazing array of items on offer – an amazing range.
However, with the ticket machines at noodle shops, you go to the machine and pick the meal you want, and pay for it – sometimes there are pictures – often just Japanese writing – get the ticket, take it to the counter and they make the meal up specifically for you on the spot.
Yes, I think she bought 4 scarves in Kyoto and throughout this series you will see her wearing them. One of them features a skull and cross bones pattern, and I’ve decided I’m going to start wearing that one and travel to Japan with it.