Finally made it... week one

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Arrived in Tokyo at 8.30am and made our way via the train and underground to our hostel, which was about an hour away from the airport but quite central to Tokyo City center. The hostel was great and the people there seemed quite friendly. Our first day (Monday) consisted of checking out what was in the immediate vicinity and planning what else there was to do. After a good nights sleep we headed into the city center to explore. We checked out the Imperial Palace and gardens, which was very pretty. We visited the Diet Building (which is similar to the Houses of Parliament) and then walked through Ginza which is where all the designer shops, the bright lights and the advertisements on buildings are.
We also managed to visit Ueno Zoo which wasn't as good as I had expected but there were beautiful gardens there too.

On Wednesday we went to Kawaguchi-ko near Mount Fiji where we stayed in a ryokan for two nights (a traditional Japanese house). Most of the day was spent traveling there but we managed to get out at night to see the Lake.

The next day we went up Mount Tenjo by cable car which has great views of the area, unfortunately it was too cloudy to see Mount Fiji. We had a bit of a surprise to find the Japanese style of bath is communal but when in Rome (however Erica and I went at different times, too weird!).

On Friday we woke up to sunshine and for the first time we actually saw Mount Fiji, well for five minutes before it clouded over again. We had planned to go to Togendai and Lake Ashi but we were told it was a national holiday and as we hadn't booked any accommodation we would have trouble getting in anywhere. So the back up plan was to go to Yokohama, a city about thirty miles south of Tokyo for two nights at a hostel we managed to book into. Unfortunately this hostel wasn't as nice as the one we had previously stayed in and the best way to describe it was like a prison. They dictated when we showered, when we could come in, when we had to go out, etc. But after seeing the room we were glad to stay out as long as possible, beer was the only other thing that got us through. Yokohama it's self was good, we walked around the harbor and spent some time in the park.

The following day we had a picnic in Rinko Park at the harbor and went on the ferries wheel and a roller coaster at the local amusement park. We then decided to walk down the harbor and found a great market that was really busy. We got plenty of free samples: green tea, sake, dough balls (awful) and jelly rum or gin (not sure what he said). Erica and I bought a small bottle of sake too, which she managed to hit a Japanese lady over the head with later when we were in China Town (Don't ask..)

Sunday is our final day in Japan and we decided to head back to Tokyo as we fly out tomorrow morning. We spent the day doing as little as possible as we have had our backpacks with us all day (I knew I had packed too much!). We spent some time relaxing in Hibiya Park and then walked down Ginza to Hama-Rikyu Gardens which were absolutely beautiful. We left there around 5pm as it gets dark early here and in time to see Ginza in all its beauty on the way back by night. We then headed back to the airport for a night roughing it before our flight in the morning.



I found Japan to be a lovely, clean country and the people are really friendly. Wish we could have had longer than one week to explore what else this country has to other.

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