Toyko

Tokyo

3rd to 5th October

We stayed at the Family Hotel Kamogawa in Asakusa, northern Tokyo for a total 4 nights at the beginning and end of our trip. The rate of Y12,800 for a traditional double room with bath included breakfast. The first room was tiny - our futons had a narrow gap to walk to the bathroom and the bags just fitted in at the doorway! But we did have a fridge and tv! Rooms are measured in the number of tatami mats and I think we had 4! The nice thing about the hotel was the ability to book the hot bath on the ground floor for your exclusive use.

Asakusa is a traditional neighbourhood and used to be the entertainment and commericial centre during the Edo period. The streets are narrow and there are many shops selling traditional crafts such as fans, wooden sandals, paper etc. The Nakamise arcade has loads of shops and at night the metal shutters display beautiful graphics. The arcade leads to the Senso-ji Temple which is the oldest Buddhist temple in Japan. The Kaminarimon gate is at the entrance to the arcade.

It was a 10 minute walk to the Sumida River where we caught the waterbus to the Hama Palace Gardens downtown. The journey was not very scenic but the gardens were quiet. Then it was on to Tokyo Station to book our trains for the 14 days. Tokyo Station is huge with lots of restaurants and shopping. I had planned all our train journeys so it was very easy to just hand over our spreadsheet and the girl made all the seat reservations.

We walked to the Imperial Palace, the home of the Emperor but you can only enter the gardens. The original Palace was built in 1888 but rebuilt after the war. Most of the massive moat and walls survived.

I had read that on Sundays you could get a free bike to cycle around the Palace area so we walked around till we saw a crowd! To get a bike, you filled in a form with your name and hotel and that was it! You weren't allowed to go outside the immediate area but since the roads were closed to traffic it was quite pleasant to just cycle and watch the other Japanese.

Our first journey was to Kyoto on Monday 5th October a distance of 514kms. The train departed at 10.33 and arrived at 1.15pm.