Travels in the Far East - Tokyo 2013 (Days 1&2)

Last night Dan and I took advantage of Shutterfly's 40% off photobooks to make a photobook of our family's trip to Japan this summer. Dan loves the photobooks and it is much easier than scrapbooking, so I'm in. We made one of our trip to New Orleans for Mardi Gras this year as well as one of all our engagement photos complete with text messages we had sent one another over the course of our dating history. We figured since Japan was such an epic trip (and I took 1500 photos), it deserved its own book.

Robot from Robot Restaurant.

Making the book brought up so many memories of the trip that I decided it was finally time to highlight our travels on the blog. Since we broke the book out by location, I figured I would do the same with the blog posts.

Our first stop was Tokyo. Dan and I actually met my parents in the custom's line at Narita airport since we were both on different flights coming from the states (this commonly happens as we live 3000 miles apart). We then headed to pick up our rental car for the trip only to find out we needed international driving permits to pick one up. It was a major buzzkill. After trying to call AAA's affilate in Japan as well as the US Embassy with no luck, we abandoned the idea of a car for travel by train. Unfortunately you cannot buy a railpass in Japan itself, it is only available to foreigners in their home countries before they travel. I would recommend travel by train, its awseome but remember to save yourself a lot of money by buying a railpass before you leave!

Beautiful Sake Barrels

We stayed at the Hotel Asia Center of Japan (yes that is the name) and it was pretty great. We were right off the subway line and it was super easy to jump around the city. It definitely takes a few hours to get comfortable with the subway in Japan but once you do, you feel invincible.

My dad, sister, myself and my mom at Robot Resturant.

Over two days we saw so much of the city but I still feel like I could go back and see more. Honestly, I could very easily live in Tokyo. The city is amazingly clean (although you cannot find a garbage can to save your life), the subway is a breeze and the food is awesome.

The best thing we did was wake up at 4am to go to the Tuskiji Fish Market. It reminded me a little of what the Meat Packing District used to be in like in NYC before it became cool. Not only do the restaurants and hotels all go to purchase their fish from this market, but so do individuals. You wander through this enormous warehouse filled with different stations and every seafood you can imagine, but the greatest sight is to see one of these butchers break down a giant tuna. The tuna is gorgeous and the break it down with such ease, it is mesmerizing to watch.

The giant tunas waiting to be butchered.

After wandering through the stalls (wear sneakers if you go, you won't be allowed in with open toe shoes), we settled in at this awesome little sushi bar for breakfast. Sushi at 6am may seem a little off putting but honestly, it was the greatest sushi I've ever eaten in my life and I wonder if I will ever have better. The fish was fresh, tender and delicious. They were actually butchering that morning's catch right there. We had a sampler of anything the chef wanted to throw at us, some of which included: smelt egg, squid, yellow fin, mackerel, and of course the head honcho the tuna.

We also were able to visit the Meiji Shrine, where we happened to witness a traditional Japanese wedding taking place; Harajuku Street, where we glanced one or tow Harajuku Girls; Harajuku Gyoza Lou, where we ate a feast of Gyoza (dumplings); Kitanomaru-koen, where the old imperial palace used to be located and where we were given a free tour by the nicest University students, who were working on improving their English; Senso-ji, a beautiful Buddhist temple; Robot Restaurant, which is so stereotypically Japanese; and a Yokahma Baystars game, which as huge baseball fans was such a treat to experience the Japanese style of play.

After Tokyo we headed off to Nara. More to come about Nara tomorrow!