Firstly, that was an amazing flight! Thanks, Air New Zealand. You get all sorts of cool shit on premium economy. Yes, Michelle, I am glad I didn’t go business class. Otherwise, the rest of my trips would be crap ?. It was my first ever long haul flight. So glad I did. It is one of those things that if you are travelling for more than 8 hours, over 6ft tall and can get yourself an upgrade. Do it!

So I decided I would have a few days in Tokyo by myself before I joined my tour. As soon as I arrived, I was amazed to see how friendly everyone was, though I’m sure they all learned to drive in Auckland based on the trip to my hotel and the JAFFA type manoeuvring that was happening. Top tip: Do not bother with taxi or hotel collections from the airport if you don’t have to. It’s easier and cheaper to get there by train straight from Narita.

Once I got settled into the hotel, I went for a wonder to find a data sim so I could stay connected. It took a while but was worth the walk. You can get these at the airport but you can find better deals in the city. During my walk, I found one of the main reasons I came to Japan! Cherry blossoms! And they look amazing up close. Add in some Takoyaki (which are octopus balls with different sauces and toppings) I found and it’s a bloody great way to start an adventure.

The next day was a bit of a wet one. But what do you do on a wet day in Tokyo? That’s simple. Get your ass outside and go exploring of course. Do not ever let the weather dictate what you do when you travel. Though to be fair, I felt like I was home for a bit today. Had beautiful weather yesterday and then turned to crap today (Yeah, good old Hamilton). But a bit of rain wasn’t going to stop me going walkabout and finding some amazing places and things to do.

Before I did that, I needed to fuel up. It was easy enough to find a place, but another thing altogether to know how to ask for your breakfast. I managed to say “could I please have a coffee” then just pointed to the menu for the pancakes. I didn’t want to put them through the pain of me trying to say that as well… Sometimes it is easier to get the hotel breakfast to start your day.

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I was relatively free until the afternoon, so I decided I would wonder the streets and just see what’s out there. This is one of the best things to do when travelling. Go get lost and experience the world around you. Such as finding the local KFC and a vending machine selling beer! As well as some beautiful temples and more cherry blossoms. 

One thing I learned today as I was out was the cherry blossoms are only out in bloom for about two weeks and its dependent on weather so seems I came at just the right time. Though not all of them out in bloom they will be during the time I’m here. You’ll easily find beautiful temples throughout Tokyo just like the Yushima Tenmangu Shrine.

To wrap up the arvo (afternoon in kiwi slang) I joined a walking tour that took us around the old area around Kagurazaka and the Tokyo Daijingu Shinto Shrine.

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By the evening I was pretty hungry and so scouted for some nice hot food. When walking around the alleyways and food areas you see so much amazing food. Again you have that tiny problem of not sure what to get or how to ask and becomes a game of food roulette. This didn’t stop me. I found an awesome little stand and got brought in and give a little stool menu and pointed out what looked nice. And I got this.

It was amazing and one of the spiciest things I’ve ever consumed. But it did the job and fuelled me enough to get back before I crash for the night.

One of the awesome things I booked before I left Tokyo was to go on this Sumo Experience, where you could challenge a retired sumo wrestler as part of it. I’m thinking that this is an awesome thing to do right? Until my brain registers I might need to wear only a loin cloth. Well long story short. My dignity and your eyes are safe…. It was an amazing experience to learn about Sumo and what they eat and how they train and about the matches and to have a play match against one. Retired or not! These guys are tanks! I would not want to ever try and mess with either of these boys. I gave it a good solid effort and that was hard for me to even move him just a bit. 

Tokyo is a massive city well actually its a lot cities all joined together.  Well if you really want to appreciate the sheer size of this place go to the world trade tower and on the 40th floor, they have a 360-degree viewing platform and it’s just amazing. I was hoping to get a clear day and see Mount Fuji but alas I’ll just have to see it up close later on next week.

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From up there you can see how vast and chaotic it must seem but when you get to the street level you’ll also find lovely quiet places that just seem a world away and it’s fantastic to have such separation in a place like this.

After awesome view of that, I decided to get to Odaiba. Also known as Diver City

I was hoping to see the massive Gundam but was gutted to hear that they have removed it as they are building a new one which should be ready in a few months 🙁 but I perked up after I heard of the Gundam museum which shows all the Gundams and get to feel what it would be like to be inside one. So I got my inner geek on and had a look around and was awesome.

So how does one finish off a day like that? You go find a place in Shinjuku called Piss Alley. Yeah, that’s right. It’s full of small yakitori bars you can sit down and have freshly cooked meats and veggies (if you’re that way inclined) and wash it down with some sake.

It is a great place to just meet people. Met some nice groups of people from a couple of different places in America. I also meet the lovely old Japanese man and his date. We didn’t know how to speak verbally to each other but we worked out a simple method. We both bought sake and started to proceed to pour each other glasses and drink. Got to love the simplicity of life!

The last few days have been amazing and it was great to have a bit of solo time to get ready to get used to it all. Now I get to enjoy it with like-minded (I hope) people and get to see outside of Tokyo.

A massive thanks to Tamara for reminding me that I needed to do something while I was here. Ramen! ? I know you’ll hate me for reminding you. But it was so good.