Tokyo Trip Part 1

Tokyo! So exciting! I really didn't know much about the city before we went other than it is the largest city in the world. I felt like if I read about things to see and do I'd end up disappointed if I didn't see EVERYTHING. Better to try going with the flow? Well, after trying that I felt like we wasted some time deciding what to do...maybe better to at least do a little research before going somewhere like this. Lesson learned!

We signed up with the ITT office (Information, Tours & Tickets, I think) to go on this 4 day trip to Tokyo for a Sumo Tournament. 

Day 1 was traveling to Tokyo by bus, evening of free time.

Day 2 was morning of free time, afternoon Sumo, evening free time.

Day 3 was a free day.

Day 4 was traveling back to Misawa.

So day 1...

The bus ride took somewhere around 9 1/2 hours to get to the hotel. We stayed at the New Sanno which is a hotel for U.S. Military members at a very good location in Tokyo. 

Beautiful scenery during the drive.

This was on a vending machine. Kinda creepy...

Love that you can buy a pre-filled ice cream cone!

I had curry for lunch. Pork cutlet I think...

Keenan had ramen.

At another rest stop I bought what I thought was going
to be lemonade...not so much...it was lemon milk.
Like a super sweet milk with a lemon taste. It was ok.

Keenan loves cream puffs!

I got a lemon cream puff.

Our first evening we went to Roppongi which is a district in Tokyo known for its restaurants and nightlife. This area of the city is full of foreign embassies (I think I counted over 30 on the map) so there were people from all over the world. Very likely the most diverse place in Japan. Roppongi Hills is a newly developed area with a skyscraper, restaurants and high-end shopping. We spent a little while trying to figure out where to eat. Found a tempura restaurant on the map that sounded good, but when we got to the entrance and looked at the menu we saw that it was 10,000yen/person for dinner...that's $100/person...ummm, nope, not the place for us!

Mori Tower in Roppongi Hills

Ahhhhh!

Awwww!

Mori Tower after sunset.

Ended up getting burgers here.

Found this little place that had Happy Hour 300yen drinks.
Not going to pass that deal up!

After a couple beverages we went to Tokyo Sky View which was on the rooftop of Mori Tower in Roppongi Hills. The building is 54 stories.

Tokyo Tower is left center and
the blue line center right is the Rainbow Bridge.

The tower in the center (very distant) is Tokyo Sky Tree.

Day 2...

We had free time til after lunch so we did a little exploring and ate some Mexican food! There's one option for Mexican food in Misawa and after going there once, we don't plan on going back. It was good to find some that was decent!

Considered stopping at Subway and trying
one of these sandwiches unique to Japan...

Salad...and a FORK?!

Restaurant was on the 2nd floor.

This picture is just to show that English is pretty prevalent in Tokyo. Most of the street signs had English, the train stations have English and the announcements on the trains about the next stop are in English. Makes it so simple to get around, and by that I mean that it would be a million times harder if there was no English. I wouldn't say it was much more complicated than public transportation we've been on in the United States, just more people and more train lines to navigate. A phone with Google Maps is a wonderful help! Love being able to put in where I want to go and it tells me the nearest train station, how to get there, what train line I need to take, when the next train leaves, etc. 

Up next: Continuing Day 2...SUMO!