Nine years after my last epic trip to Japan as part of an MCLA travel course with Professor Huang and the gang, I've returned to the Land of the Rising Sun. This time it's different: I'm completely on my own, it's not for school, and I'm slightly more familiar with the country and the language.
The first day of my trip technically consisted of two days and were mostly travel days so this post will be short. I left Adams around 6:30am on the 4th of April and arrived in Tokyo at around 2:00pm on Friday, the 5th, Japan Standard Time. The 15-hour flight was actually not all that bad; it wasn't until I got into Narita Airport that I started feeling travel exhaustion. My biggest concern was getting to the city and getting to my hotel, as I had to figure that out with what Japanese I can understand and trying to figure out the train system and city layout. I got to Tokyo proper around 3:45pm and quickly managed to get a taxi right near my hotel, which I found with a little wandering and a lot of relief.
At that point, it was after 4pm and I was totally beat and ready to just call it a day, but I decided to suck it up and go out for a little stroll. I wandered around the block a bit, immediately seeing a guy walking two tri-color shiba inus that looked like giants compared to Midna, but he disappeared into a subway before I could get a photo. The cherry blossoms were indeed out, but it was getting dark so my pictures didn't turn out great but I'm sure I'll get plenty good ones.
In one particular park, families had set up blankets and tarps under every cherry tree and were having elaborate picnics.
After that, I wandered more into the city looking for a place to eat and just sightseeing a bit. I finally settled on a little noodle shop on a side street, where I got some authentic kitsune udon, which was very good.
By then it was dark and I wanted to get back to the hotel, but not before stopping in a 7-11 and getting the legendary melon flavored Fanta that I particularly enjoyed last time...I'll have to bring a can or two home this time.
Now it's time to get some sleep and recover from being awake for over 24 hours...big day of sightseeing tomorrow!
In one particular park, families had set up blankets and tarps under every cherry tree and were having elaborate picnics.
After that, I wandered more into the city looking for a place to eat and just sightseeing a bit. I finally settled on a little noodle shop on a side street, where I got some authentic kitsune udon, which was very good.
By then it was dark and I wanted to get back to the hotel, but not before stopping in a 7-11 and getting the legendary melon flavored Fanta that I particularly enjoyed last time...I'll have to bring a can or two home this time.
Now it's time to get some sleep and recover from being awake for over 24 hours...big day of sightseeing tomorrow!
