Last Day in Tokyo…and Onwards

Another gorgeous morning from up above Shinjuku…the weather is really cooperating for us!

We had a quick peek at the food hall that was in the mezzanine level of the building that housed or hotel. Looked like some interesting options.

A look at our Kabukicho Tower from the plaza below.

These sort of establishments were plentiful in this area…

I headed out to do a little more trainspotting. This building, the Tokyo International Forum (a convention centre), was supposed to have a great view down to the busy railway below. But much to my dismay, the public lounge aka viewing gallery was closed for renovations!

So the alternate destination was a shopping mall a few blocks away that had an outdoor garden a few floors up. It wasn’t bad, but as you can see the upper vantage point would have been much better.

Our next stop of the day was an early lunch – at the Sanrio Characters Garden Cafe.

I made a last minute reservation, so we couldn’t get any of the special couches as they were all booked, like this Cinnamoroll hangout.

But we got the private room in the back for only a few bucks more and it was a hit.

They definitely had it set up for photo ops, complete with ring lights lol.

There were all sorts of teas on offer.

The food was actually decent – not what I expected for a theme cafe.

And of course when you get to sit with a giant Hello Kitty, how could you not like it?

We couldn’t linger that long as we had another reservation for a boat cruise down the Sumida River from Asakusa to Odaiba, which is way down where we rode bikes the other day. The ceiling and walls were mostly glass but unfortunately was a bit dirty from rain and dust.

Next trip we’ll have to go up the Tokyo Skytree.

After we passed the last of the low bridges, some crew members went to the roof outdoor deck and started raising all the barriers around the edge. The view was much much better up here.

We made an intermediate stop at Hinode Pier where a few more passengers boarded while we were supervised by a flock of seagulls.

It sure was a nice fall day. We passed under the Rainbow Bridge towards our terminal stop.

This interesting building is the headquarters of the Fuji Broadcasting Company. The spherical room contains amongst other things an observation deck that is open to the public.

Here’s our boat, Hotaluna. As I said, it was interesting in appearance!

One of the numerous interesting things about Tokyo – the phone booths no longer contained phones, but free Wi-Fi access points!

We boarded the Yurikamome Line, an elevated guideway transit, back to the city. It was super cool because as an automated train, the entire front of the cabin was windows accessible to passengers.

We went up and across the bay on the Rainbow Bridge. Ellie made some super cool Timelapse videos from this ride.

It felt just like SimCity as we traversed amongst the buildings and other infrastructure.

The terminal station, Shimbashi, had this cool stained glass display that included Mount Fuji.

After walking around Shibuya a bit, we took the bus to our next stop.

The Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building aka City Hall. The upper level of each tower is a free public observation deck.

The walk from the bus stop was through a beautiful park and over this tree lined boulevard.

We were a bit later than I would have liked, and the line to get in took about 20 minutes of waiting. But we didn’t miss much. Still got to see the silhouette of Fuji-san as the sun set.

And the office towers of Shinjuku.

Here’s what the interior looked like. The center contained a souvenir shop and small cafe counter.

I got a cold sake at the cafe while we waited for it to get a bit darker.

The big green space in the middle is the Meiji Jingu Gyoen. Unfortunately we didn’t get a chance to visit it on this trip.

Also in the observation area was this piano that was setup for anyone to enjoy communicating with others via music.

The lights of Tokyo were great. Pretty good for a free venue!

After we had our fill of the views, we went downstairs and across the street to lay on this astroturf for the next 20 minutes.

You see, there was a light and music show – Tokyo Night and Light! It started off with a display of “Pacman Eats Tokyo” being projected on the building that we were just on top of!

The show lasted for 15 minutes and was well worth the stop as you’ll see from the numerous photos.

I’d promised Ellie when we were walking from the bus that we would go back to the park and visit the playground that she’d spotted. She really enjoyed it.

This girl sure did have energy. Did I mention that we were doing a minimum of 20,000 steps nearly every day? Even 16,000 steps the day with the 32 km bike ride!

As we walked back to the hotel, Shinjuku looked just as cool from down below.

We stopped in at a little hole in the wall ramen joint. Everything was ordered from an iPad so nothing could get lost in translation, and we shared a table with an older Japanese lady as it was busy.

Ellie approved! That’s it for today…

Next morning and another Starbucks breakfast… delivered by a cutie 🙂

This was the last time we’d sit in this spot with the view of Godzilla.

We took the super convenient (stopped right outside our hotel) bus to Haneda Airport. After traversing a few city blocks we entered this highway which was almost entirely underground until close to the airport.

And then arrived at… the JAL First Class check in area.

It’s just a domestic flight – today we’re going to Hiroshima – but this didn’t cost much more than the train and it was really cool to try it out!

After a quick check in and baggage drop we went through a private security lane.

That deposited us directly at the escalator to the lounge.

The lounge had an awesome view of the arrival runway and some taxiways.

Not to mention some good sake.

And old Japanese aviation memorabilia…

I had my second beer of the trip at one of the automated pouring machines and enjoyed it with a rice ball.

Here we are onboard an ancient JAL 767-300 in these cozy first class seats! There’s only one row of 5 seats in the front of the plane.

Take a look at the menu… for a flight that’s less than an hour in the air.

The flight attendants were so friendly and enthusiastic. They offered Ellie this model of a JAL A350-1000.

An ANA 767-300 was arriving as we got ready to take off and head up over Tokyo.

We were sitting on the wrong side to see Fuji, but the lighting was better on this side anyway.

My feast was delivered. Ellie just had a bottle of water.

It was an absolutely stunning day over Central Japan.

Cinnamoroll peeked around the divider at me.

I didn’t know that Hiroshima’s airport was basically on top of a mountain. But it made sense, as it was very rugged around here and there wasn’t much level ground that wasn’t urbanized.

One of the flight attendants filled out a postcard for us with all sorts of tips for our short stay in Hiroshima. So kind!!

Goodbye, JAL 767! It was a fun hour!

We took the bus from the airport to the central bus terminal which was actually inside a shopping mall. And then a taxi the rest of the way to our hotel.

Our hotel for the night was in a typical mixed use area of central Hiroshima. We couldn’t check in yet so just left our bags at the reception area. Of course, there’s not anything too much older than 70 years here…

Ellie was a bit confused about these cafes and why someone would go to them.

We walked over to one of the main shopping areas in the centre.

Ellie couldn’t help but stop at the Sanrio store.

The underground network in this part of the city was super cool. Check out this book store.

And what it looks like from up the escalator!

We passed the shopping centre that had the bus station buried somewhere inside on our way to Hiroshima Castle.

The walk up the tower contained numerous exhibits on each floor as one wound their way up.

The view from the top was well worth the hike and meagre price of admission – I think it was 500 yen, very cheap.

Back down on the ground we walked towards the Peace Memorial Park – passing over these tracks of Hiroshima’s extensive tram network.

The Peace Park was of course, very moving.

Right on the banks of a branch of the Ota River.

We had to visit the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. Again the price was extremely low and the exhibits very high quality. We rented the audio guides to listen along.

Ellie had so many questions after our visit to Hiroshima, and in particular after the museum.

After we spent over an hour in the museum, it was now dark and the river extremely peaceful. What an experience. I’m sure that we, and especially Ellie, will remember this forever.

We went back to the hotel and our room was ready. There were no keys. Just an individually assigned PIN for the duration of your stay.

The room was a combination of traditional and contemporary Japanese style.

After some rest for our legs – another 24,000 step day – we headed out for dinner to get some Okonomiyaki, the signature dish of Hiroshima.

I’d sought out this tiny hole in the wall restaurant – you see Ellie and the other guy through the door, well, that’s more than half of the seating visible.