Tokyo, Japan

We’ve been talking about taking the boys to Asia for a while and decided this was the year to go! I lived in Tokyo for a couple years when I was around the boys age and couldn’t wait to experience it with them. February is a great month to get out of the rainy Pacific Northwest, so we took full advantage of the boys’ mid-winter break from school (plus a week for good measure). We started this epic journey with a 10-hour direct flight to our first stop in Tokyo, Japan.
 
Tokyo is 17 hours ahead of us so we arrived at 10pm Seattle time but it was 3pm the next day in Tokyo. Pretty fun explaining to kids how you can travel into the future. We headed over to Nikko Narita Hotel near the airport and checked into our room thinking we’d just want to crash. The room had four separate beds so we each get our own to spread out and get a good night sleep. Of course, the boys jumped on the beds and Wesley was the first to call the bed closest to the TV, lol. There were also two bathrooms which had bidets. Pretty nice for a layover hotel!
 
Even after the ~14 hour process of getting to Tokyo, we still had a little bit of juice left in us and were itching to go check out downtown Narita. The hotel had a free shuttle to downtown, so we hopped on to go peek in a few local shops. It was fun looking at all the various Japanese trinkets for sale. It wasn’t too long before we decided to stop in a small restaurant called Ramen Bayashi for some authentic ramen. It was definitely a popular stop for international travelers and had a lot of pictures of people from around the world on the walls. The spicy ramen was amazing and Marshall said the gyozas were the best he’d ever had! We were so exhausted by that point, we took a shuttle back to our hotel and zonked out around 7pm.

Of course, getting to bed so early meant the next morning we all woke up by 4am. Acclimating to the 17-hour time difference was definitely going to take a few days. Luckily the hotel opened its breakfast buffet at 5:30am for us jet leggers. They had a huge buffet with traditional Japanese foods like rice porridge, seaweed, soba noodles, etc. We found a table next to the windows and they had a massive light display we got to watch twinkle while we ate and talked about the day ahead of us. Mid conversation, I cracked what I thought was a hard-boiled egg and squeezed it open…. Only to learn it was a runny soft-boiled egg and it exploded all over me. The boys had a good laugh and I ran to the bathroom to clean myself up before we took off to explore Tokyo.
 
We had stayed at a hotel close to the airport that night and needed to get closer to downtown where all the action was, so we grabbed an Uber and headed to our next hotel in the city called Tokyo Bay Shiomi Prince Hotel.  We were about 7 hours too early to check in, so we dropped our bags at the front and walked down the street to the train station. The train system is amazing and can get you pretty much anywhere in Tokyo.
 
Even though I’d ridden on these a thousand times, It took us a minute to figure out how to get train tickets and put it through the machine. Wesley went through the ticket machine first and didn’t know he had to grab his ticket after the machine sucked it through and spit it at on the other side of the gate. The ticket quickly went back into the machine so we had to find an attendant to get our ticket out for us. Ooops, won’t make that mistake again!
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I remember taking 3 different trains with my sister to and from school every day when we lived there. The trains get so packed at peak times, there are attendants standing at the doors helping to cram people in like sardines. Luckily this train ride was pretty empty so the boys had enough space to do pull ups on the handles hanging from the ceiling, lol.
 
We took several trains to get the historic district of Asakusa. A short walk from the train station is Nakamise shopping street which is famous for it’s authentic Japanese street food and souvenir shops. We gave both kids 5000 Yen (about $35 USD) in spending money and spent the next few hours walking around the shops looking for the perfect souvenir to bring home. Tyson found a “Tokyo” sweatshirt and Wesley found a Son Goku blue toy, a character he likes in Fortnite. He also bought a new stuffy to add to his giant collection at home.

While strolling around, the boys noticed a pet café with dogs and cats inside, so they ran in to get a closer look. It took them about two minutes to come out with names of two puppies they HAD to bring home with them, Slider and George. But of course, we couldn’t take them home with us…we don’t speak Doganese!

Nakamise street leads to the ancient Buddhist temple, of Senso-ji. In front of the temple is a water well where you can pour the holy water over your hands. There is also a fortune station where you donate 100 Yen and pull out a stick from a container that has a number on it. You then look for a box with that number and open the drawer to pull out your fortune. Tyson opened his box first and pulled out a “bad fortune lack”. Say WHAT, how do those even exist?!! We had a good laugh reading it, then putting it on a special rack they had for ‘bad’ fortunes to refresh your fortune (I guess)…We let him pull another stick to get a better one which ended up being called the “best fortune”. Can’t get better than that! For Wesley’s turn, he pulled out “excellent fortune” and enjoyed reading all about the good fortune coming his way.

We checked out the temple for a bit before popping into a ramen restaurant down a little side street to grab lunch. I swear there’s a ramen street on every corner here just like there are Starbuck’s in Seattle. They all have different tasting broths but the ones we’ve tried so far have all been very tasty. We tried a little Sake too, but it wasn’t really my thang.

After a good lunch, we were on the search for a delicious treat. There were endless amounts of yummy choices around here. The boys scoped out all the options and both landed on a chocolate marshmallow waffle on a stick while Marshall and I tried little pastry puffs dipped in custard. Heavenly!

I’d reserved us a Ninja training class for a bit later in the day and we still had a couple more hours to kill, so we decided to check out the Samurai museum for a guided tour of the history of samurai’s. That ended up being a fun surprise. We got to see lots of swords and some fancy armor from over the centuries. We even got to put on some (pretend) samurai armor for a photo shoot!

A short walk away was the Ninja Cafe. The instructor handed us our black ninja outfits to put on over our clothes and we each got to select a special Ninja drink to have before our training began. The boys chose Ginger Ale and Marshall and I tried the Ninja cocktail, but they all came out pitch BLACK. I guess they added some black dye to them to make them extra…Ninja-y. Not my fav, but the boys enjoyed them as we started our training.
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The first thing we learned was the proper techniques for using samurai swords. She taught us how to properly hold the sword in our belt, pull it out safely, then do a few swipes to take down our opponent, wipe off the blood and get the sword back in the sheaf.
 
We then moved on to ninja star throwing at targets they set up on a wall about 15 feet away. The boys did great and were able to get several stars to stick on the target board. The last skill we learned was blow darts. That was the most fun of all! We started up close to the target board and eventually moved all the way back into their bathroom to blow darts from their golden toilet, lol.

By the time we were all Master Ninja Assassins, it was time to head to our dinner reservation at R Restaurant which is located at the top of a hotel with a great view of the Tokyo Sky Tower. It seems to be a rarity for restaurants to serve cocktails in Tokyo. Most places we encountered only served beer or sake, so it was nice to find a place that had tasty drinks to enjoy with my meal. The food was great and we enjoyed the cocktails as the sun went down over downtown Tokyo. 

The following morning we hopped on a train heading to Harijuku. We looked around us and realized Tyson, Wesley and Marshall were the only boys on the train. We felt like everyone was staring at us for the first few stops, then we noticed a sign (lots of them actually) saying that the cabin we were in was for women only. Oops, sorry ladies!
 
Near our stop, Harijuku station, is a long trail that leads to the Meiji Jingu temple. We decided to go on a stroll to see it before we went to a surprise that I had in store for the boys that opened in an hour or so. When we got to the temple, we noticed some people going up to an area and praying then clapping and bowing. We walked over there when nobody was there and noticed a sign that said to throw in a token into a box, bow, clap twice, then bow again. What the heck, we can use all the good fortune we can get! To the side of the temple, we saw a wishing tree where you write down a wish and put it in an envelope with an offering and then place inside a box. Tyson wished to have a fun day and Wesley just wrote down his name and put that in, lol.

About a mile walk from the temple is Harijuku street that is known for its vintage shops. Sandwiched between a couple shops was my cool surprise, Cafe Reissue that that does elaborate 2D and 3D coffee art! They mold the foam into the characters and then paint on the custom pictures onto the foam. We grabbed a table and ordered our custom drinks. Tyson ordered an iced chocolate milk and asked for it to have a dog he’d seen in one of the pet cafes. Wesley ordered hot chocolate with that Goku character he got as a figurine, Marshall ordered an iced mocha with Kirby (they couldn’t do King Kong in 3D) and I ordered an ice caramel latte with a panda bear. So cute and tasty!

We checked out dozens of vintage stores and I found myself a sheer jacket with pictures of various 90s models all over it. Super unique! Down the road is another shopping street called Takeshita that has trendy street fashion stores and sweets galore. Tyson got a giant rainbow cotton candy that was like 3 times the size of his head. He offered us each a small bite and then proceeded to eat the rest of it while we walked around. Meanwhile, Wesley found a crepe in a cone filled with bananas, strawberries, and a small slice of chocolate cake. They seriously have the best treats here! Don’t come to Japan to count calories!

Along Takeshita street there are also several pet cafes, some with the standard dogs or cats that you’d expect to see and some with more interesting creatures such as micro pigs or hedgehogs. The boys thought the hedgehogs would be the most fun to play with, so we stopped in to check it out. The hedgehogs were tiny and so cute. The boys got to hold them and feed them snacks. They also had hamsters and yellow lizards that the boys hold. Lots of fun!

We continued our stroll and eventually made our way to Shibuya and crossed the famous all-way intersection. I swear there were over a thousand people crossing the road at once at each light. We walked for a bit and got lost looking for Tsukada Nojo Shibuya Miyamasuzaka, the restaurant we had dinner reservations at. We eventually found this tiny place down a side alley. It had a great vibe with lots of lively young locals. I ordered the grilled chicken dish (surprise, surprise). When it came out, it looked suspiciously gray on the outside. Marshall offered to taste test it to make sure it was edible. After swallowing his bite, he looked in the middle of the chicken to see that it was completely raw inside and just barely seared on the outside. So GROSS! I’m pretty sure I just became a vegetarian (considering the only meat I eat is chicken)! 

After our “interesting” meal, we rode the train to Shinjuku. The people were packed in like sardines. This was exactly how I remembered the trains when I lived here as a kid. We went on a mission to go find the giant Godzilla head popping out of the top of a hotel. After zigzagging down several different streets, we finally found it. The boys were in awe of how huge it was…although you can barely spot it in the picture we took, lol. We stumbled upon an arcade and the boys played a dance game and a few claw games before we headed home to get some shut eye.

The following morning was our last day in Tokyo. Unfortunately, it was chilly and rainy so we modified our plans a bit. We heard the Tsukiji fish market was a must-do and headed straight there. They had all kinds of interesting fresh seafood including squid, eel and sea urchins. Wesley ordered a flat squid cracker that they cooked right in front of us. He said he liked the first few bites and then said it started to taste weird, lol. That’s ok, we also stumbled upon a sweets stand selling various flavors of mochi filled with strawberries and custard. So bomb!

It was time for fun and games at Joypolis, an indoor theme park. Tyson, Wesley and I went straight to the upside-down roller coaster that was also a game. Wesley whooped us! The boys went on a few more rides together while Marshall and I found a table in the café to chill at. Tyson really wanted to do an attraction called Murder Lodge before we headed out. Marshall decided to go with the boys in case it was super scary. They walked into a pitch-black room and heard creepy noises, Japanese people screaming at each other (saying who knows what!), and even gun shot sounds with air sprayed at them. They said it was terrifying but kinda cool at the same time! 

​We had so much fun in Tokyo but we’re excited for the next leg of our trip.

Next stop: El Nido, Philippines