Tokyo

Holy Moly there’s a lot of people in Tokyo. We stayed in Shibuya and when the lights are red and traffic stops completely then pedestrians surge into the intersection from all sides. It was crazy. We couchsurfed with a local, so we were in a really great location. Couchsurfing is supposed to be free, but this guy quit his job and opens his home to travelers. It was still cheaper than staying in a Hotel. There was a guy from Australia staying there and a girl from Germany, so it was fun talking with them and they gave us good tips on places to go.

The first day we went to Asakusa which is “technology land” This is an area dedicated to Nintendo, computers, MP3s, anything and everything techno. They were giving away free anime things. People were in line for it. So, I caved and bought a new ipod touch. It was pretty much the same price I would pay online, but I needed to replace my stolen one. Next we traveled to find a traditional Japanese park a friend suggested. Instead we found the Ueno zoo. We were mainly excited to see a Giant Panda. The advertisements were everywhere for it, but guess what, once we got inside, no Panda. We were really sad. But, we still enjoyed walking around with local Japanese families, sometimes we were looked at as if we were a caged animal. Oh well. We ended the day with some tasty street food.

The next day we went to Disneyland. It was fun comparing it to California. The park is basically the same except everything is in Japanese. When we rode Pirates of the Caribbean the Pirate at the end speaks in Japanese and so does the robot in Star Tours. So funny. It was really cold, it even snowed. So, one of the shops had all you can drink coffee, so we took about a 2 hour break. We used fastpasses and went on many rides. It was a fun day. Once we got back to Shibuya we went out for Sushi. We are not big sushi fans, but we were in Japan and had to try it. It was great. We saw the men make it right in front of us. We just grabbed a plate of whatever looked good. Each plate cost about $3 and had 2 pieces on it. We tried sake too. I was scared, but after a year of Korean soju the sake went down smooth.

After Tokyo we used the rest of our JR pass and spent a whole day traveling to back to Fukuoka. We saw Mt. Fuji on the way and it snowed for awhile. It was a nice train ride. In Fukuoka we finished up souvenir shopping and ate our last little bits of Japanese food. Fukuoka was a wonderful way to end our trip. Nice little city with great shopping. We also visited the biggest wooden Buddha.

We are so happy we traveled to Japan. It was a little expensive, but we had a great time!