Our time in Tokyo continues…
Tuesday, December 2: After school, we took the bus and train to the famous Shibuya Crossing, the world’s busiest pedestrian crossing. We arrived around 2:15pm, so were a bit early for the rush hour traffic. So we decided to run an errand we had been meaning to do for a while–take Charlotte to the optometrist to get her eyes tested. It turns out one of her eyes needs some extra help so she now has glasses for distance. And a cool story to tell about where she got her first pair! It was cheap, easy and so fast (less than an hour). From there, we did some window shopping and then positioned ourselves in the Starbucks that overlooks the crossing. Steffen caught a photo of some of us crossing as we approached the Starbucks. You can see us in the black circle on the photo below. We enjoyed a great view and some treats. We then headed to the 11th floor of Shibuya Hikarie for a different view. And then it was time for our daily sushi dinner!
Wednesday, December 3: This was a much-anticipated day of our trip–a day at DisneySea! This is the second half of the girls’ Christmas present and they have been looking forward to it since our last trip to Disneyland Paris this past summer. And it did not disappoint! We had so much fun and stayed from open to close. We rode rides, ate churros, bought souvenirs, waited in endless lines, got scared and laughed and had so much fun together. If you like Disney and find yourself in Tokyo, we highly recommend it! DisneySea has a huge underwater-themed area which was a dream for our Ariel-loving girls and a new Frozen-themed area. It brought back all the wonderful memories from when the girls were small and princess-obsessed.
Thursday, December 4: After sleeping in and doing some schoolwork, we headed to a new district Thursday afternoon, Harajuku. But first, I snuck away to The Sumida Hokusai Museum which was a quick walk away from our hotel. I wanted to see the exhibits on the life & art of Katsushika Hokusai, and it was very interesting. Katsushika Hokusai is best known for his work “The Great Wave off Kanagawa”. He lived in the area hence the museum being so close to our hotel.
We had an appointment at 5:00pm to snuggle some Samoyed doggies and wanted to explore the area, so headed over via bus and train. The public transportation in Tokyo is clean, efficient, easy to navigate and always in-time. We also did some window shopping (very difficult to not succumb to buying!) and had dinner.
Friday, December 5: For our final day in Tokyo, we checked out the Imperial Palace (unfortunately it had closed so we couldn’t go in), walked over to the main train station and then into the Ginza shopping district. We wanted to go to Itoya, a huge and beautiful stationary store and then wandered the area, looking at all the high-end retailers. For the girls’ advent calendar that day, they were allowed to pick a pair of chopsticks. We came across a big department store and found some chopsticks that they would engrave. The girls were thrilled to pick out a pair of chopsticks and have their names in Japanese engraved on them. What a special souvenir! From there, we went to Kura sushi for our final sushi train experience in Japan. We ate so much wonderfully delicious food that month!
Saturday, December 6: Sadly, this was our last day in Japan. Luckily, Nikolaus visited overnight so we cheered up when we awoke to some treasures in our slippers (instead of boots because no shoes are allowed indoors in Japanese homes/hotels).
We had an afternoon flight so we had a some tie to kill before heading to the airport. I had heard about this diner that is behind a vending machine, and we thought maybe we could grab a treat. But it didn’t open until noon which was too late. We walked around that area a bit and marvelled at how different it was from all the other areas we had seen. Like I’ve said, we could easily have spent a month exploring Tokyo! Then we had one last meal at Luisa’s favorite restaurant. We had eaten there the first night, and she loved their pasta pomodoro, she begged us to go once more. So our first meal and our last meal in Tokyo were at the same Italian restaurant. There are compromises that must be made when traveling with children! LOL
We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Japan, and are so glad that we had a chance to explore so much of the country from small villages to huge cities, taking in temples and animal cafes and the crowded shopping streets, and experiencing the calm of the onsen and the thrill of roller coasters and everything in between. It really was a very special month for our family, and we will treasure the memories we made together forever. And I sure hope we’ll be back soon!
Gnegel Family Travels 
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