We took the 3 hour train ride back to Tokyo using our Japanese rail pass to get us there. Such service: Our host met us AT the train station (love AirBnb) and walked us right over to our apartment. She took us what I call “the local” way, through an underground mall to avoid the heat for a 5 minute walk and up, across the street, around the corner and into our cool little Tokyo hideout.
We were quickly situated and headed out to the Gundam Wing Cafe! I used to watch Gundam Wing as a kid and so it was cool seeing everything in the cafe Gundam-related. Even the coffee came with a face of a Gundam on the top of the coffee! We had a meal and grabbed a couple of souvenirs and headed out for a walk.
Tokyo Metro Map. Great System.
The surrounding area was kind of crazy. It was casino-like with video games, including RPGS, with people would be playing the video games with intention to win money. Tall and skinny 5-level plus SEGA buildings and packed gaming spots galore, we walked around trying to find a WiFi spot because our wifi back at the apartment was giving us trouble. Odd, in the technologically proficient Japan, that we couldn’t even get reliable Wifi after about an hour of searching! We decided to catch the metro back home, got ready, and I helped Candace for the first time French Braid her hair and we were soon off to the club I researched for Saturday night in Tokyo!
Anime all over the walls at the restaurants we went to.
Oh yeah! Don't forget to make your notes in the bathroom notebook!! ?
Candace was excited about the bathrooms
The Club - Finding this place to be one of the top, if not the #1 club in Tokyo, we were lucky it wasn’t actually super far from where we were staying and we were able to walk there in about 20 minutes, arriving close to 11:30pm. Being that nightlife in Tokyo is similar to places like Spain, the place was deserted this “early” in the night, which was perfect for us: we were then able to easily maneuver the 8-sections of the place and scope out the different atmospheres, bars, DJ’s styles, and vibes of each area. By the time we had walked all around and seen the 4 main styles of music, checked out the sand beach lounge area with hammocks, the cool pool area and bar, the “food Truck” area, and the Sake bar, we settled in for a bowl of Ramen. By then the place was getting pretty full of people and we hung out in the pool area for a bit listening to the DJ and experiencing a crazy Foam “show” that got literally everywhere! Heading through to the room that was called “The island” we hung around the huge bar, listened to the more “top 40 music”, checked out face-painting, and some looked at the shopping. We got facepainted at two points in night, me once, and Candace twice. She ended up with a cat face, and ring around her arm and eye. I had some birds painted on my chest! With that, we just proceeded to wander among the rooms, finding performances on stages, music changing up, the place getting pretty busy with people everywhere, and other shenanigans. Wow, we were having so much fun! Eventually people started to dwindle away and the club started to end up like it was when we got there so we we decided to be one of those dwindling and caught a super late-night taxi ride home at around 4 or 5 am.
Rise and shine about 11am and got ready for a shopping day! Candace got all dressed up so that she looked so cool, almost like geisha-ish. We played various Harijuku Girls versions of Gwen Stefani’s song as we prepared to to go to the Harajuku shopping district. Arriving via metro and went up and down the strip checking out a bunch of major designers, as well as the “underground culture” Gwen speaks of in her songs. Grabbing a great fresh lobster roll, checking out back-alley shops, eating some amazing crepes at a french cafe, overall we had a pretty relaxing and cool day. Favorites shopping experiences for Candace for the day was Coco Chanel and Vivian Westwood, though the Vivian store was a lot cooler in Hong Kong she said.
Lunch - Rice balls and avocado -
French Crepes place
Salmon crepes
Assembly line food train thing!
The teenagers dress kinda crazy!
Restaurant we found -
Ramen
Little White Fish Salad
Ice dessert -
The next day we got up super early to go to the famous Tokyo Fish Market! I read online that they only let about 200 people in during the “business hours” as to not interfere with conducting of business. That at 5am they start letting people in, yet to be one of the 200 to get in you need to line up pretty much no later than 4am. Now, if you don’t do that and arrive at like 6am its said that you are likely to stand about 3 hours in line to get sushi from the Famous sushi stands. We were like Nah, we will just grab some sushi from one of the places in the fish market next to the famous one and still be eating fresh (that day) fish. So we showed up around 8am, walked around, met some people who had been waiting for 2 and a half hours for sushi and we proceeded to get in line for 20 minutes and sit down for some fresh Sushi! It was delicious and a LOT of fish for us as we don’t eat a ton of meat. However, it was cool trying so many different types from the “variety” bowl, and they did melt in the mouth. We sat at the Sushi bar and was able to see the precision cutting of the Chefs and enjoy the authentic experience.
Sushi Spot
The rest of the day we lost our camera, found it, grabbed our 7am train tickets from the grand station, shipped off a package, and wandered around the Emperors Palace, talking a nice long walk all the way around it. Beautiful grounds and perfect for a stroll, we had some great conversations and sightseeing and barely made it back in time to get ready and leave for our Geisha Dinner we had purchased and reserved! Upon arrival, we removed our shoes and were shown to our private room for the two of us to enjoy our dinner with our Geisha. The Geisha, named Yayoi, was excellent, entertaining, funny, and very interesting. She continually filled our beverages, and kept us company through the special Tempura dinner which was excellent. Then, she performed her dance and entertainment for the evening and with that we had experienced our first Geisha dinner!
Thick door!
On the Metro to our Geisha dinner ~
We headed home, put on some more Memoirs of a Geisha got to sleep for our 7am train ride to the airport and then to China. Unfortunately, we never made it to Bejing… upon landing in China at Shanghi there is a big mistake that had been made made… we never got on our connection flight to Bejing which had our tour booked on the great wall, evening shows, and a booked tour guide for 2 days… In fact we never made it there at all.
Airport -
Right...
Lol
