Hello Tokyo! — there's no such thing as a last hurrah

Oct 27

Oct 27 Hello Tokyo!

Trip dates: October 24, 2016 - October 27, 2016

Japan is the first country on our world tour. We're here for about two weeks, starting in Tokyo. The past few days have really flown by and yet, it doesn't feel like it's only been a few days because we've seen and done so much already!

Our first full day here, we went to Tsukiji fish market. No, we didn't get up in the middle of the night to see the tuna auction because we aren't morning people, and we're surprisingly not that jet lagged. The market was still interesting to explore and it reminded us a lot of Seattle's Pike Place market, just with more food samples and less English. It was also a drizzly misty overcast day, so that might have something to do with it too. We met up with our friends Albert and Karen who happened to be visiting Tokyo too (great timing!) and had a sushi lunch at Sushi Zanmai in Tsukiji. It was pretty good, the fish was fresh, but it didn't blow us out of the water. Maybe it's because we're spoiled with the selection available back home.

We stayed in the Shinjuku area so we spent a lot of time exploring that neighborhood. We went to the observation tower of the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building to get some views of the city the second day since it was hot and sunny. Despite it being sunny, it was still pretty hazy although we were able to see Mt. Fuji!

Eric and I have been walking a lot as we explore Tokyo. We walked through Ginza on our way to the Imperial Palace and then Akihabara - this place is anime nerd heaven. As nerdy as Eric seems, even he didn't recognize most of the anime figures around us. At one point, it was raining pretty hard so we stepped into an arcade for a bit. And by that, I mean I watched Eric play Time Crisis and Star Wars. So fun... :)

We also checked out the Shinjuku garden and got a brief glimpse of Golden Gai. This is a series of alleys with these tiny, and I mean tiny, bars that seat maybe 6 people. The area was cramped but in a ridiculously cute way. We managed to squeeze into one for a quick drink with our friends James and Anna, who were also visiting Japan and just got back to Tokyo that night. It's been really great to see friendly faces on the road; Eric and I are so lucky that we have so many friends who love to travel too!

There's a few more things we want to see in Tokyo, and lots of places to eat, but the majority of our remaining time here will be exploring other parts of Japan. We caught our first Shinkansen today as we head up north. It was a bit close as we decided to grab lunch at this delicious smelling tonkatsu place in Tokyo station and ended up having to run to get on the train in time. The tonkatsu was totally worth it though, and we made it on the train with a minute to spare! We will share more details and pictures of our food separately. For now, we are on our way to Aomori and Towada, where we are hoping to see some gorgeous autumn colors at Oirase gorge.