2 week Japan Trip Report and Vlog! (Tokyo/Disney/Osaka/Kyoto)

Oh man, you're going to have an awesome trip!

Chris is a musician (plays bass, writes the music, and is the lead vocals in a nerd rock duo) so we find that we end up building relationships over music a lot.

I don't even remember what I said in the beginning of the report, but we actually have 4 kids (aged 11-19), so this was a big dealt go for 2 weeks without them and travel like we were young again. :lol: We took them to Mexico for Christmas, and here are a few pictures from that trip:

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Anyway, back to Japan...

We didn't get a super early start on Thursday, because we only had three things planned:

Tsukiji Outer Market
Pokemon Center DX to get a present for my son
Dinner at Tapas Molecular


Coffee became the bane of our existence in Tokyo. We generally got moving before most places opened, so we spent a lot of mornings on our way to the train station at the Starbucks overlooking Shibuya Scramble Crossing. It was much busier at night than during the day - but it was kind of a fun ritual over our stay to grab a cuppa joe and watch the pedestrians. This Starbucks is across the street from Shibuya station:

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Oregon is known for its recycling. When we have friends visit from the midwest or east coast they ALWAYS comment on how many different recycling receptacles there are, but it was nothing like Japan. This is what you see when you're ready to discard any remaining coffee or the cups:

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Because we got a bit of a late start, the train was BUSY.

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The tuna auction moved in 2019, but we didn't ind because we weren't planning on getting to the market early enough for the tuna auction anyway. We were there for the street food. We had a GREAT time here. It was busy, and huge, and I'm sure we only saw a fraction of it, I mean look at this map of all of the vendors:

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We had so much food here. So. Much. Food.

Tuna steak cooked with a blowtorch (delicious!):

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THOSE SCALLOPS. HOLY MACKERAL:

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EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEL:

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I want to eat Strawberry Daifuku every day. EVERY DAY.

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We met this super cool vendor who had us try a bunch of his stuff, and we purchased some glasses of this alcoholic HORNET WASP ginseng:

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The hornets in that thing were HUGE. We also had some beer and some black sesame ice cream:

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No eating while walking - and keep an eye out for those ding-dang birds:

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The bird looks so pleased with himself:

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When we had beyond full stomachs, we took a trek to the Pokemon Center on our way to The Mandarin Oriental. My son wanted a stuffed bulbasaur. It turns out that Pokemon Sword and Shield were coming out THE NEXT DAY. If we pre-ordered both games they came in an exclusive set like this with figures of the new characters and an art book.

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So we ordered that knowing we'd have to get back there before we left Tokyo - but we thought we'd be able to manage the next day without too much hassle. We didn't eat at the Pokemon Cafe, but we definitely would have if we had the kids with us.

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We poked around the area a little and then we had time to kill before our reservation at Tapas Molecular. We headed up near the Mandarin Oriental (where the restaurant is), and then we explored a brewpub, a shrine, and some other stores:

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There was a museum in the same building as the hotel/restaurant, so we went in search of that.
 
We had an awkward amount of time, so we went in the lobby of the building to look for the museum and instead discovered that I could make a Hanko Stamp which is something I really wanted so we took a few minutes to choose my kanji and then they needed about an hour to carve it, so we told them we'd pick it up after dinner. We headed toward the elevators in the small first floor hotel lobby. They had an umbrella locker which I just thought was kind of funny because no one locks their bike up anywhere, but there was a location to lock up your umbrella:

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Chris and I decidedly do not look like we can afford anything at the Mandarin Oriental, and I am still wondering if the elevator guy followed us everywhere because we looked like we didn't belong or because it was high service. When we got off the elevator, he walked us to the hostess stand to make sure we had reservations before leaving us on that floor.

We hung out by the insane windows and had a cocktail before dinner started.

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I wish I could put panoramic photos up because it's pretty spectacular. But there's a taste.

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While we were drinking The World's Most Expensive Moscow Mule (tm), Chef Ping was getting the chef's table ready. Tapas Molecular does two small seatings a night so you can really interact with the chef and the food. We opted for the early seating since it was pretty far from where we were staying and there were only 7 of us total eating that night. There was a group of 5 young Japanese adults (early-mid 20s) celebrating a birthday and then there was Chris and myself. Chef Ping is the Executive Chef (he's worked for the Mandarin Oriental all over the world, his stories are awesome) and he was our guide because he spoke English. The other chef was the chef for the group of 5 and they all spoke in Japanese.

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Tapas Molecular was a 14 course, Michelin starred Molecular Gastronomy Restaurant. It was actually my birthday present from months before and it was totally worth it. We did the wine pairing as well.

This was hot water that you poured on the little disc, and it grew into a hot towel. The bandana was our napkin for the night and it's wrapped around a tool box that had a variety of utensils to use.

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Here are our various utensils and the tape measure pulled out and had all of the courses written out on it - it served as our menu during the meal:

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I'll do my best to remember what we ate, but it's been almost two months now. He uses a seasonal menu - and they gave us a copy of the menu at the end of our meal. Oh! I just went and found the menu and it's written out quite nicely.

Ok, Course 1: Salmon Roe and Roe (This was three different types of salmon roe but one was ponzu juice that had been transformed in tapioca balls to appear as roe:

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Course two was Saag Paneer - This was awesome, we injected some sort of spinach and foie gras concoction into a crisp hollow egg-shaped rice puff and then you eat it in one bite. It was an explosion of amazing in my mouth:

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Dynamite Roll - Kuruma Ebi, Caviar, Chili:

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Blizzard - a Hakkaido Scallop with a vinaigrette that they froze in dry ice and then dropped on the scallop like a snowfall. This also had radish, sea grapes and micro tomatoes (they are fully grown at that size):

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This was Bendict - Brioche, Lobster, Hollandaise:

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The Mushroomed Egg - THIS IS NOT EVEN AN EGG. Molecular Gastronomy is amazing. It's Barley, Truffle, and Broth that has been molecularly gastronomized (I made that up, but it works) to appear and feel like an egg:

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For the next course - Fish Meuniere - we ground up our own seasoning thing:

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It was Amadai, butter, and lemon:

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Peking Duck - bean curd skin, cucumber, spring onion -

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Autumn Ranch - Lamb, hay, sprout:

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Look you guys, this is all way too much food for any one person to eat. After the scallop I had to start eating only half or less of each course because I was afraid I would never make it to the end of the meal. I did however drink all of the wine - I like to think it helped to wash down the food.

This is my husband's favorite thing he's ever eaten - Confused Wagyu with garlic miso and romaine lettuce. This is a cut of A4Wagyu that has been cooked Sous Vide to PERFECTION.

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Just when you thought you were going to explode - they move into dessert courses.

Mushroom - Chestnut, chocolate, truffle

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We poured a hot chocolate sauce until this and it was so delicious I could have died right then and there.

Very Berry Chai - Blueberry, Ginger, hot and cold

This was like a reverse lava cake. Instead of cooking it partially to make the outside solid and the inside liquid, they put it in dry ice and it froze the outside but left the inside runny:

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Pina Colada - Coconut and Pineapple:

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And finally - After 8, mint/cocao - again a play with liquid nitrogen. Let's hope this video works (related: I have a ton of video from this meal and I'm hoping Chris finds a way to make it into a longer video):

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After all of that food, we rolled back to the subway. I'm 99% sure we stopped at Akira's bar on the way home - but it's a little fuzzy from all of the wine. :)
 
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My stomach hurts just reading about it, but my mouth is watering too. That seems like one AMAZING meal, and I can only imagine that the wines they paired were perfectly chosen to complement each item. Wow... just wow!
 
It was a COMICAL amount of food. There was no possible way for me to eat it all, but trust, I tried. The first two courses I ate it all up and then I was like "Wait. There are TWELVE MORE COURSES COMING. I NEED A PLAN.":scared:
 


I want to personally thank you for NOT getting to the gastronomy portion of your report until I got back from Japan....I would have likely caved and gone. I will be putting it on the list for the next trip and my kids are already saving their money.
 
I want to personally thank you for NOT getting to the gastronomy portion of your report until I got back from Japan....I would have likely caved and gone. I will be putting it on the list for the next trip and my kids are already saving their money.


Haha! I don't even remember how I found the restaurant, but I suspect I looked for a molecular gastronomy restaurant in Tokyo because I knew Tokyo has some of the best chefs in the world and I've always been fascinated with Molecular Gastronomy. Once I found it I couldn't stop thinking about it.

It was easily the BEST meal I've ever had in my life, and I'll stand by the meal we had wine tasting the previous Sunday as a close second. It was SO GOOD, and Chef Ping was awesome as he guided us through the meal. I have some video footage of it (Chef Ping encouraged us to take photos and videos) so Chris might make a video of the footage I do have. I wish I had taken more, but I also wanted to be in the moment as soon as I could.
 
I wish I had taken more, but I also wanted to be in the moment as soon as I could.

Understood!

My kids eat like linebackers and are only 5'0"...hence why they are already saving. My daughter is insisting on an official Temple University Japan visit, so I have them on a 24 month budget. They LOVE food, all food, and are still talking about everything relative to the trip. I showed them your post, and they are so ready to go. I also bookmarked the sake places for next time. We got close to going this trip, but the striking Christmas displays wreaked havoc with our "relaxing" time. :o
 


The fish market looks really cool... and the Tuna Steak cooked with blow torch... so cool and looked amazing... I really like tuna, DH is just so so about it... I showed him the octopus on a stick... he was like okay.. you can try it first... LOL... In looking at the photo of the fresh seafood, it all looks so amazing... It looks like they will cook it for you right there? and the pricing was that each piece or for so many piece?... scallop's are my favorite...

What a wonderful Birthday gift... I showed DH last night and he was blown away by the all the course, and the presentation, and the fact that it is a small group, and that it is interactive... so cool... as well as the view really something to see... So this went to the top of our list... We do one really nice meal when we travel, to celebrate us.

Wow, really sums it up.... what a incredible experience... This is a moment in time that you both will never forget... and share forever... really special...

I do have a food allergy to coconut and some melons.. so I am wondering if we choose here... how to handle it, as the menu is planned way in advance... normally when dinning more on the upscale restaurants, the chef will come out and speak to me... here I feel that I would have to let them know in advance ... and I don't want to be a pain booty ... Thoughts on this? ...

On the wine pairing... We enjoy wine, me more than DH, he is more a beer guy, and loves Kirin, and Sapporo... We enjoy a couple of drinks... but are not big or heavy drinkers... Was wine more along the lines of a tasting size... or a half glass pour... full glass pour ?
I ask this as we were invited by friends for their anniversary several years ago, they treated four couple's to dinner at their country club ( super fancy , long dress and suit and tie fancy) and they offered chef's table in Atlanta... So 10 of us... Aperitif, wine pairing with each course, then dessert wines, and coffee's and Digestifs, it was over whelming... the pours were more half glass, to full glass pours each course...most of us stopped drinking about the 3rd of 4th course... I know that we ( DH and I were just sipping a tiny bit at each course)... and they did keep the water glasses full all night - Thankfully.. The thing is that it was so much that I could not even begin to imagine drinking all this at one sitting it was like 4+ hours from start to finish...and I felt bad as it was just wasteful, and I'm sure very expensive so another waste... So if we choose this as our big night out... I would like to do the wine pairing... but not if its going to be insane amount like with our previous experience...

Loving your trip report... can't wait for the rest...
 
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The fish market looks really cool... and the Tuna Steak cooked with blow torch... so cool and looked amazing... I really like tuna, DH is just so so about it... I showed him the octopus on a stick... he was like okay.. you can try it first... LOL... In looking at the photo of the fresh seafood, it all looks so amazing... It looks like they will cook it for you right there? and the pricing was that each piece or for so many piece?... scallop's are my favorite...

What a wonderful Birthday gift... I showed DH last night and he was blown away by the all the course, and the presentation, and the fact that it is a small group, and that it is interactive... so cool... as well as the view really something to see... So this went to the top of our list... We do one really nice meal when we travel, to celebrate us.

Wow, really sums it up.... what a incredible experience... This is a moment in time that you both will never forget... and share forever... really special...

I do have a food allergy to coconut and some melons.. so I am wondering if we choose here... how to handle it, as the menu is planned way in advance... normally when dinning more on the upscale restaurants, the chef will come out and speak to me... here I feel that I would have to let them know in advance ... and I don't want to be a pain booty ... Thoughts on this? ...

On the wine pairing... We enjoy wine, me more than DH, he is more a beer guy, and loves Kirin, and Sapporo... We enjoy a couple of drinks... but are not big or heavy drinkers... Was wine more along the lines of a tasting size... or a half glass pour... full glass pour ?
I ask this as we were invited by friends for their anniversary several years ago, they treated four couple's to dinner at their country club ( super fancy , long dress and suit and tie fancy) and they offered chef's table in Atlanta... So 10 of us... Aperitif, wine pairing with each course, then dessert wines, and coffee's and Digestifs, it was over whelming... the pours were more half glass, to full glass pours each course...most of us stopped drinking about the 3rd of 4th course... I know that we ( DH and I were just sipping a tiny bit at each course)... and they did keep the water glasses full all night - Thankfully.. The thing is that it was so much that I could not even begin to imagine drinking all this at one sitting it was like 4+ hours from start to finish...and I felt bad as it was just wasteful, and I'm sure very expensive so another waste... So if we choose this as our big night out... I would like to do the wine pairing... but not if its going to be insane amount like with our previous experience...

Loving your trip report... can't wait for the rest...


It was per piece and they do cook it right there to order which is super cool. It was a combination of cooking over open fire and using a blowtorch.

I had to fill out a form and give them a credit card to hold the reservation, and they ask if you have any food allergies. I have no doubt that they would accommodate you.

So, the wine pairing was 7 wines so there wasn't one for each course, but they chose wines that would work with multiple courses. They were full pours, but it's also like a 2 hour meal. It's a lot of wine either way. You could just choose to have a glass or two of wine - they have a great wine list and I'm sure they would do glasses of the wines from the pairing.
 
My mother in law is a super talented multi-media artist and she's taking all of our tickets, maps, brochures, some coins, etc. from our trip and making them into an art piece on canvas. We finally put it all together and gave them to her and I found the wine list from the restaurant so I thought I'd share for my fellow wine lovers.

There were two wine flights to choose from and we chose the less expensive one (which was still expensive hahaha).

1. Champange Rose
NV Deutz Brut Rose
Champange, France

2. White Wine
2014 Knoll, Emmerich
Grüner Veltliner Kreuzers Federspiel
Wachau, Austria

3. Orange Wine
2017 Donkey and Goat
"Romato" Pinot Gris
Berkely, United States

4. White Wine
2017 Azumino Winery
Chardonnay Barrel Aged
Nagano, Japan

5. Red Wine
2015 Taupenot-Merme
Gevrey Chambertin
Bourgogne, France

6. Red Wine
2000 Chateau Musar
Bekaa Valley, Lebanon

7. Sweet Wine
2009 Salvetta
Nosiola Vino Santo Trentino
Trentino, Italy



They refilled our glasses if they were ever empty before the matching courses ended. It was all delicious, I mean, by the 7th glass of wine who knew - but they tasted great to me.



Interestingly, they also have a mocktail pairing if you don't drink and that is on the other side of my menu, so I'll share it since some of you are thinking about going

1. Indian Ginger Ale
Juniper Berry Infused Apple Vinegar, Mango Juice, Ginger ale, coriander, star anise

2. Autumn Coffee
apple juice, lemon juice, espresso beans infused maple syrup, clove

3. Tree Side Car
Non-alcoholic white wine, lemon juice, kinome, herb salt

4. Mellow Shrub
non-alcoholic red wine, cranberry juice, house made strawberry shrub, rosemary, basil

5. Roasted Beans
Almond milk, chocolate syrup, hoji-cha creamy, nutmeg



I didn't have any of those, but they sound delicious.
 
Hi! I'm back! At this rate, I'll have my Japan trip report finished by the time I'm 80.

The next day was one of the most chill day of our trip (except for a day to come in the future whence we barely left our AirBNB).

We started our trip out to Odaiba for TeamLab Borderless and whatever other trouble we could find to get ourselves into.

I think we had to transfer twice, but I forget and really the train to Odaiba is different than other trains with the whole front end of the train being glass so you get a SUPER cool view of everything. I def recommend getting in the first or last train for the view. Here are some views from the train ride:

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Maybe this video works?
Video of train ride.



Our first stop was Borderless, and it was fantastic. We got there just after they opened and we waited about 10 minutes to get inside. One of the biggest complaints about this place is how crowded it is, and I understand that Planets is perhaps less crowded. I can totally see that, but I don't really feel like it took away from my experience. It was still pretty exceptional and I would say it's a must do (or Planets, alternatively. We didn't have time to do both and I learned about Planets after I had purchased tickets to Borderless on Klook).

I have two tips:

1. If you leave your bag and whatnot in the locker, make sure to bring money for the Tea House (you'll see why). I think it was about 500 yen pp, so 1000 yen for Chris and I and it was SO WORTH IT. We waited only about 5 mins to get a seat in the tea house but I think we got there right as they opened.

2. Go to the Lantern room first - we went last and we waited about 30 minutes to get into the lantern room because they limit the number of people in the room at a time. I think if we had gone earlier we wouldn't have had to wait as long.



Ok - so Borderless has no map and you just have to wander through the hallways to find the different rooms. I'm not even entirely sure that we saw every room available, but we wandered enough that I'm pretty sure we did. This are still photos, but you have to understand that everything is moving and evolving and there's music that makes it super immersive. We'll have a video of some of it in the next few weeks.

Here are some pics from Borderless:

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There is one room where you can draw and color an animal and then they scan it in and it comes to life and walks around the room. If you stand close to them then stop and freee, or you can surprise them and they'll run away, or you can step on them and they squish, and they all interact with each other too - it's pretty incredible. They also had a kids room that was more like a city where you could color buildings or vehicles (and even Santa's sled when we were there), then you could interact with them on the walls. Here's our drawing and our salamander guy. We are not artists:

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En Tea House was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. My husband HATES tea, but he agreed to it because I wanted to do it so badly, and not only did he actually like the tea - but he was amazed by the experience.

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Here's the menu:

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We each chose the Cold Green Tea with Yuzu. You pay at the counter and then they hand you one of these containers with the tea in it:

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Then they bring you into the tea room in groups and sit at a U-shaped table. The server stands inside the U (with the top of the U being a back room of sorts that they move in and out of so the tea house is a really clean space with black walls, black tables, and nothing else).


The server took our little container and then placed this bowl in front of us (or maybe it was there when we sat down, I kind of forget to be honest)

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As soon as she poured our tea into the bowl, digital flowers started blooming in it:

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And when you lifted your bowl to drink and sat it back down, the flower petals all started to float away and new flowers would start to bloom in their place. It was breathtaking.

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It was just so cool and magical. When you're done, you just stand up and leave so they can bring the next group in. The tea house is located to the left when you go upstairs to the athletic room (where the drawing section is located).

We both LOVED LOVED LOVED Borderless.

We were super hungry after that so we walked over to the mall and had lunch at some sort of pub style restaurant where I ate curry and it was fine but I had better curry on my trip. I'm the absent-minded person in our marriage and I have a history of leaving things places, or behind and yet I never did that once on the whole trip. Chris, however, left his phone in the back of the seat on a train once but luckily we only changed cars and didn't get off and when I went back after it 20 minutes later it was still there. This time, he left his phone at the restaurant and a staff member chased us ALL THE WAY ACROSS THE MALL to give it back. He didn't even realize he had left it behind yet. I love Japan.

The mall also had an old Japanese car museum which was free and it was set upto kind of look like parts of Japan during the different eras of car. Here are just a few that we saw:

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Look at how the section of museum looks like an old Tokyo streetscape:

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Ok - I'm going to start another post in case I hit my photo limit.
 
After that unexpected car museum stop, we went to the Toyota showroom. You actually have to walk through this to get to Borderless in the morning. I don't know if we would have made time for it otherwise but when we walked through it we thought "Oh, those are cool! Let's come back and look at them."

I hadn't left North America since I was a teenager, and I guess I just kind of forgot that cars are different all over the world even from the manufacturers that do business here. My husband loves boxy cars and compact cars (but we have huge cars because he's a musician and we have to lug equipment all over the ding-dang place). So we got a kick out of looking at all of the concept cars and asian market cars that we'll never get in North America:

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After that we hopped on the Ferris Wheel whence I was reminded that I hate heights. They had some cars that were GLASS BOTTOMED. I think I would have had a panic attack. The views were pretty awesome, though:

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You can see the all-glass one under the yellow car. Hard pass:

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Chris loved the Ferris Wheel. I vowed to never ride one again.

Next up was a walk to the other mall with the VR game center and the trick art museum. On our way, we passed this gachapon machine that was unfortunately empty and we never saw another one like it. We desperately wanted what we refer to as "Sexy Statue of Liberty" on the top right:

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We also passed a robotics showroom. It was small (one room) but still with a 5 minute peek:

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I thought this was cool and would be super helpful in Oregon (not that any of the pedestrians are following the rules, but whatever). It's a split pedestrian and bike path:

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I don't remember this at all and I have no idea what it says:

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We were going to go to the Sony game thing - but there was a discount if we waited an hour (they had a discount after 5pm I think) so we decided to have dinner and go to the trick art museum first. Now commences some of my very favorite vacation photos:

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And my very favorite picture which also serves as a testament of my bravery and sense of adventure, but also that I have no shame in making a fool of myself:

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After that we hopped in the Daiso to pick a few things up and then ate at a restaurant overlooking the water and we watched the various cruise boats go back and forth:

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By the time we were done with all of that we decided against the Sony game place and decided to walk to the Gundam for the 7:00pm transformation. While we were at the Gundam, we walked in the food court and share the best soft serve of my entire life, it was sea salt flavored and my husband is still talking about it to this day.

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the Gundam transformation was a lot of fun, it's only a few minutes long and it's pretty close to the train station, so I'd say it's worth a stop.

We headed back to the train after that and made a quick detour to pick up the Pokemon Sword and Shield set that we pre-ordered the day before. We somehow ended up in the basement of a department store as they were closing and could NOT FIGURE OUT HOW TO GET OUT. I thought we were going to spend the night there when a security guard found us and took great pity on us - helping us get out.

The next day will be our last day in Tokyo. Sad face.
 
So cool... I can not wait to experience this... this is at the top of our list's to see and do...

Love the Salamander by the way...
 
So cool... I can not wait to experience this... this is at the top of our list's to see and do...

Love the Salamander by the way...

We liked it so much that I wish we would have done Planets as well. By the time we did Borderless we only had one day left in Tokyo, but I think if we had done it earlier in the trip, we would have found a way to squeeze Planets in, too. I would have rather done Planets than Akihabara - and I'm super nerdy and geeky.
 
I ordered our tickets online at the Team Lab Borderless site, and there was an option to have a ticket plus Tea House ticket. Worked great. I agree the tea was very tasty and it really completed the entire experience! :flower1:
 
For our final day in Tokyo, our original plan was to go to the Studio Ghibli Museum, but it had been closed for the entirety of our time in Tokyo and so we didn't even try to get tickets for the first day it reopened. We love Studio Ghibli movies, but the museum reviews were kind of mixed in our research. I'm sure we would have liked it, but we also thought there was a lot of value in scheduling a "free day" so we could adapt our plans if we discovered something cool while we were in Tokyo or if we ended up missing something one of the days because we ran out of time. I ended up being super happy that we did this. We had talked about Enoshima Island, Snow Monkeys, etc. so we kind of had some ideas in mind.

We ended up going to Asakusa because we missed it earlier in the week and it was the perfect idea. We weren't rushed, we didn't have to travel far, and we kind of packed a ton of souvenir shopping into one day.

You get off the train right by Senso-ji Temple. We didn't get there particularly early and we were there during off season, but it was still PACKED.

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There are a lot of little stores on your way to the temple, but we found them to be higher priced than other areas and kind of tourist trappy. There was still some cool stuff to look at, and we tried some snacks in the food stalls, but we didn't purchase anything here.

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There were signs asking people to not take pictures inside the main temple building but no one was following the rules. It kind of enraged me because it may be a cultural site for tourists, but it's still a religious and sacred space still in use. It felt super disrespectful. Anyway, that's the long way of saying that we don't have any pictures inside the main temple.

We did each pay 100 yen to get our fortunes which was fun!

I expected the temple to be just buildings but they had some gorgeous gardens and grounds.

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I bought some Omamori (amulets) and a good luck charm bell that is still attached to a bag I use daily. It is surprisingly one of my favorite purchases because I smile every time it rings a little. I generally don't like bells, but it's subtle and quiet so it doesn't annoy me.

After that we headed to Kappabashi (Kitchen Street), so I could buy some kitchen items and see the restaurant supply stores. One of the things I really wanted was a statue of Tanuki. If you aren't familiar with Tanuki mythology, you can find here - it's a hoot:

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/the-tanuki-japan-s-trickster-god
We desperately wanted to find one big enough to be amazing but small enough to bring home. No one could really direct us where to find one, so we just had to hunt and cross our fingers. Along the walk we spotted a few things:

A bunch of giant Tanuki:

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The Kappa Monster (a sort of mascot for Kitchen Street):

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We popped into the Don Quijote to get a couple of small things and ate an amazing roasted sweet potato. We tried some throughout the trip from smaller vendors in various markets but the one from the Don Quixote was our favorite. Who knew?

One thing I loved in Japan is all of the food delivery vehicles. How can you not love this?

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Bike Storage at an office building:

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Once again, I loved loved loved metal shutter art before buildings opened:

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I LOVED shopping on Kitchen street. I mean, I love cooking so that's part of it, but I purchased a gorgeous Japanese vegetable knife, we bought some ramen bowls and spoons that I use all of the time now, a restaurant banner for Ramen, and we did in fact find a Tanuki!! Yay!

I would have bought more kitchen things but I didn't know how we would carry it all back to the train.

This is Chris (who is 5'10) on the second floor of an old restaurant supply building.

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On our way back to the train we stopped at the little food cart street next to the Don Quixote and had a Kobe beef skewer, and some cocktails:

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There was some sort of boy group with a huge line of people waiting to take a picture and get swag like posters. It was fun to watch while we ate and drank.

Oh! Here's a picture of our Tanuki that I love so so so so much. He's right by our front door and I get the biggest smile on my face every time I come home.

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I think he is my very favorite purchase from Japan. I just get so much joy out of seeing him when I get home.

Ok, then we headed back to our apartment to drop off all of our goods before we celebrated one last night in Tokyo. We hopped right back on the train toward Shinjuku. The train was SO PACKED at about 6:00 pm on a Saturday that you didn't really need to hold onto anything because it would have been physically impossible to fall or even move. It was the most packed train we were on the whole trip. Luckily, Shinjuku was only 3 stops from Shibuya.

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First stop? The Godzilla. It's SO CLOSE to Robot Restaurant, I don't know why we didn't just see it the same night but we had also been drinking wine all day and were carrying so much wine around with us that we didn't even consider staying in Shinjuku that previous night.

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After that we headed off to find some food. We did a super American thing and had McDonalds because the Japanese menu is so different than the American one and we were too curious. I had a shrimp burger and it was awesome, actually. Chris had some super hot pork burger but he can be sensitive to heat but he shared my food with me, and really liked what I ordered. The McDonald's we went to was like 4 or 5 stories and it was PACKED. People just kind of hang out there. Glad we tried it, never needed to go to an America fast food restaurant there again.

We headed off to Piss Alley, which you can learn about here:

https://theculturetrip.com/asia/japan/articles/a-guide-to-tokyos-piss-alley/

I am really happy we went here, but here are my tips:

1. Each place will require that you each purchase some food items so don't eat right before you go like we did. We didn't mind because they are small bars and if people don't buy food and drink I imagine they can't really survive.

2. We were kind of intimidated by how small the bars were and squeezing in past people or whatever to sit down. Finally I just went for it and I'm really glad we did. We had a great experience with the bar owners and other patrons, but I was nervous about just squeezing into a place.

We ordered chicken skin and pig anus. Yes, you read that right. I don't ever need to eat pig anus again, but hey - when else would I be a place with it on the menu? It felt like a once in a lifetime street food opportunity.

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We also had some fried tofu, sours, and high balls.

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This is the Izakaya that we were at:

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Here are some of the most amusing (and alarming?) signs we saw on our walk from there to Golden Gai:

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SEXUAL HARASSMENT SPA. I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS:

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We ended up just walking around Golden Gai (and even discovering a cool shrine that was closed. We considered stopping in but most of them were full and we were kind of tired still needing to pack and clean up in preparation for check-out the next day.

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Oh, here's a fun fact - when we got to Shinjuku station we went to the JR office to purchase our Shinkansen tickets for the next day. Half way through the evening I realized I purchased return tickets FOR THE WRONG DAY. I worried about it for a few minutes and then realized there was really nothing I could do at the moment so I just crossed my fingers that we could exchange them the next day without penalty but I wasn't sure how that was going to work out. The good news is that it was no big deal and there was no additional charge because the price was the same so it was an even exchange. Whew.
 
Oh wait, I forgot some things:

Here's another picture from Center Gai:

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We also popped into an arcade and played this crazy game that I most definitely did not understand:

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We also went into one of the photo booths and the pictures make me laugh so hard:

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It was super interesting that the signs said no groups of boys could go in the photo booths together. Only all girls or mixed groups. Does anyone know why that is?

Also, they had aisles of mirrors and counters for people to primp before the photos. The booths had two rooms - one where the pictures were taken and then another section where you edited the pictures. I think we look gorgeous. Hahahaha.

We stopped at Akira's bar one last time and everyone at the bar was super cool to us. Akira wanted to take pictures with us before we left and we followed each other on IG. He's so cool.

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