Here’s part 2 of my Tokyo trip!
March 28th: Our main planned thing to do of the day was TeamLab Planets, and other than that, just chill in Tsukiji in the morning, and Asakusa and Ueno in the afternoon/evening. Because I planned on getting a brunch at Tsukiji, I bought tickets for TeamLab for 1pm entry, which should have given us plenty of time.
It took us about 40 minutes to get to Tsukiji, and I really just wanted to look around and check out some places that I’ve bookmarked for a while. Now, Tsukiji is known for being the place of the former famous fish market and just seafood in general, but I’ve heard that some of the places can be a little overpriced, and probably very crowded. Also, my friend doesn’t really eat seafood, so what’s the point of going to Tsukiji you might ask? Well, I’ve always wanted to go visit and check it out, and plus there’s some non-seafood things there that look good too. It’s also pretty close to TeamLabs, which works out in our schedule.
When we arrived, I wanted to check out this famous onigiri shop called Marutoya, but as most stalls at Tsukiji go, it was pretty crowded and there was a big line in front of the shop. We decided not to wait in line. Oh well. After circling the area for a bit and my friend stopped for some souvenirs, we made our way to our first official food spot of the day, Totoya. Now this place isn’t about their seafod, but it’s a chicken bowl place. I honestly just found this place on Google Maps while browsing the area for something my friend’s diet-friendly, and this seemed like hidden gem in the area. I was pleasantly surprised that there was no line when we got there, and we were seated immediately. We each got the Service Don, which comes with three pieces of thigh, 2 meatballs, pickles, and a soup. Man, everything about the meal was perfect, from each individual item to the overall worth of the meal as a whole. The tea we got on the cold morning was amazing, the pickles were just right, the soup was light and refreshing, and the chicken was grilled perfectly over the bed of rice. Highly recommend Totoya for food at Tsukiji.
We walked around a bit to get some snacks, first stopping at the famous tea and seaweed store in the area. My friend bought some tea for her mom, and I ended up buying a matcha financier as a souvenir for a coworker. The place was also giving out free freshly brewed tea samples, but we entered and left at a weird time when the guy was still brewing the tea. Big sad, no free tea. After we left, we stopped by Ichigo Soratsuki for some ichigo daifuku, and we picked out the matcha and sakura flavor to try. The guy almost forgot to give me my second one after I paid for two…Those were also amazing, with the mochi being super soft and chewy, the strawberries super ripe and juicy, and the bean paste inside smooth and flavorful and accurate to both the matcha and sakura.
Our last stop in Tsukiji before leaving the area was this cool matcha shop that I saw whisks and pours your matcha fresh for you, Matcha Stand Maruni. My friend didn’t end up wanting one, and I gues they were sold out of their hot options for the day, so I ordered an unsweetened, single shot iced matcha latte. That was amazing and also refreshing, as it was purely matcha and milk without any extra sweetness. I was able to taste the pure high-quality matcha flavor on its own with the natural flavor of the milk, and that in itself was a new experience. They also had an option for straight matcha, but I preferred mine in latte form. Then, we got on a bus in the direction of TeamLab.
After getting off the bus, we spotted a Lawson, but not just any Lawson, a Natural Lawson. Naturally (haha…) I wanted to go, since I had never ben to one before. Very surprisingly, I found many new and interesting items in this one, including my favorite Taiwanese Apple Sidra! We ended up getting some drinks and more snacks, and then walked over to TeamLab. We did get there a bit early, and like the Ghibli Museum, they wouldn’t let us line up until our time slot was called to the line. In the meantime, we checked out the tiny souvenir shop, and chilled a bit. Then, the instant the changed over the sign, we lined up and waited to be let in!
I’ve been to a TeamLab exhibit before with my family, but that one has since closed down, and this is a different exhibit. Again, experiencing it with friends has different vibes, and this one was quite a different experience than the other one. The art pieces were completely different, and instead of a explore-yourself maze situation the last time, everything this time was one-way so it was guaranteed you’d see everything in one go. I liked the interactive bodily experience part of it, especially being able to take your shoes off and feel the textural change with your feet. They were all cool, but I think my favorite had to be the hanging lights one that was interactive with your phone (I forget the name, but I’ll look it up later if I’m not lazy).
We ended up spending a little over an hour in the place, which ended up being shorter than I thought, even though we took our time wandering around, and even going back to one that was on us that we missed. It ended up working out perfectly, since there was a shop in Asakusa that we wanted to visit that would close at 4, and it would take about an hour to get there. Immediately after getting off at Asakusa, I wanted to get the 3D Latte art which was suppsoed to be next to the station, but we ended up walking away from it and I told myself we could get it when we left Asakusa. We hurriedly made our way to Hatoya’s vegan fruit sandwiches, which was the earliest stand on my list would close, and my friend chose the kiwi one, which went for 700 yen. Although vegan, the bread was still super fluffy, the whipped cream was light, and the kiwis were perfectly sweet and juicy. I’m really happy to give my friend that experience, considering she can’t have normal fruit sandwiches here.
As we made our way to Sensoji, I picked up a fried sakura manju for 230 yen, which was hot, crispy on the outside, and soft and sakura on the inside. We walked around, took some pictures, took in the sights, and my friend even tried her luck at the fortune drawing. We chilled for a bit, and then made our way down the Nakamise shopping street. I stumbled upon the best melon pan I’ve ever had in my life for 250 yen, which was crispy and hot on the outside, but soft and fluffy on the inside, but when we arrived to this aesthetic dango shop I really wanted to go to, they had closed their business for the day, even though I thought they closed at 6 (apparently they closed at 5 that day?). But no matter, surely I can still get my Insta-worthy (I don’t have an Insta) 3D Latte Art right? We made our way to the shop, and it being 5:30 and clearly labled closed at 6, I was confused when the shop door said they were closed but there were customers inside. The door was open, so we went in, and I asked if they were still in business. Apparently, they do close at 6, but they already took their last order of the day before deciding to end business, and so we were turned away. Big sad. As we couldn’t get our lattes, we found a Yi Fang across the street, my friend suggested boba, and I’ll never say no to boba, so we ended up getting drinks there instead.
For our last advenures of the day and for evening eats, we headed for Ueno to go to Ueno park and check out Ameyoko street. It was nearing evening, so it was already pretty dark, and we walked into Ueno park and found a long pathway surrounded by sakura trees and lit up by small lanterns. It was a really pretty sight, and at some point the path opened up and we saw a bunch of people sitting on blankets at the park, alongside huge trash cans. There were also a few food trucks selling food and drinks, and we spotted one selling long fries, so we had to get some for the novelty. We picked up seaweed salt flavored ones for 600 yen.
After chilling for a bit and finishing our fries, we headed back to main Ueno to Ameyoko to check out the street food. Another reoccuring theme is that yes I have been before, but I love this street for good food, and I wanted to show it to my friend. Can I just say there’s so much authentic international food here? So many Taiwanese and Chinese stands that I was so tempted, but had to remind myself that I’m going to Taiwan in a month. We did stop at a Taiwanese stall though, and bought some QQ balls, fried sweet potato balls, for 480 yen. They were very hot, cruncy on the outside but chewy on the inside and were an amazing snack.
One place I wanted to check out was this Oskar Kebab stand selling rotissiere chicken, which I haven’t seen at all in Japan. I guess they also sell long fries, but at that point both of us were pretty full and would probably struggle to eat a bunch of chicken. We opted for a Korean stand across the street, and got a small cup of yangnyeom fried chiken and a honey hotteok. The chicken was amazing, and a tolerable spice level for me. The hotteok was pretty good, fresh, crispy, and chewy, with the added sweetness of the melted sugar inside, but as we kept eating we realized there were peanuts in the filling, which was definitely not advertised at all on the board. I don’t like and might be allergic to peanuts, but my friend is severely allergic, and so unfortunately, we stopped eating and threw the rest away.
After drinking some water and taking a pill, we watched for her condition, but also wanted some desserts and checked out Mihashi, and pretty famous traditional Japanese sweets restaurant in the area. We ended up ordering an oshiruko, mochi and red bean soup, and tokoroten, jelly noodles in ponzu sauce. The tokoroten interested both of us, and I wanted to order a traditional dessert but the anmitsu looked a bit much at the moment, so I went with the oshiruko. The tokoroten had an interesting texture, and it was very light and refreshing as a cold dish. The ponzu was good, a little strong for my tastes, but overall I wouldn’t mind having it again. The oshiruko was very comforting as a thick red bean soup, and the mochi was super stretchy and chewy.
Now we were relatively full at this point, but my friend was feeling better, and I wanted to try this duck ramen place around the corner, Ramen Kamo to Negi. We ended up waiting a bit in line anyway, and we both opted to try their tsukemen for 990 yen. Because this place literally only uses green onions, duck, and water, they also let us choose and additional type of green onion to top our ramen. I’m not the biggest green onion person, so I just went with whatever looked like would be the easiest to avoid. When the tsukemen came out, the noodles looked so beautiful, were a little flat, and super chewy when dipped into the soup. The broth itself was pretty oily, but when eaten with the noodles as a dip it worked out pretty well. I wish there were more duck pieces and less fatty bits, but the duck chunks that were there were very tender and flavorful. Fully stuffed by this point, we headed home.
March 29th: Because we’d be heading to Nagoya the next day, today was our chill and day around the Shibuya, Harajuku, and Shinjuku area, along with seeing any sakura spots along the way. Our first stop in the morning was to the Starbucks Reserve along the NakaMeguro river, which supposedly is super pretty and a good place to go sakura sightseeing. I wanted to get there early, and thought we left at a decent time, but when we got there around 9, there was a huge crowd of people already waiting outside, and when we got our number registered in the system (there was a separate building just to get a number!), there was a good 200 or so parties ahead of us. Kind of devastated, we thought that we would just have to come back later, and could not have imagined the amount of tourists and general people on a Wednesday morning.
We ended up just walking around, taking a few pictures, and then hung out in the Donqui hote next door for a bit. After periodically checking our place in line, we found that our number moved up a lot faster than we anticipated, and decided to just stick around and wait it out and move our morning plans to another day, though with an impending lunch reservation a bit away at 11:30. We finally managed to get in around 10:30, and I immediately went to order while my friend went to grab a seat. All the limited time Sakura drinks looked so good, and I was so tempted, that I ended up ordering a Sakura float for eat-in, and a Snow Blossom drink and a chocolate tart to-go.
As soon as my order buzzer rang, we grabbed our drinks, tried to enjoy them with the little amount of time we had, and rushed to get on the train that would take 20 minutes to our brunch spot, a Japanese-style vegan place I found in Omotesando. The place is called Brown Rice by Neal’s Remedies, which I think is a perfume/aroma brand, as their bathroom supplies and hand sanitizer were all using their brand.
I did rush a little, and my friend did end up not getting on the super full train I was on, but in the end, we both made it to the place a little past 11:30. We both got the 1 soup, 1 main, and 2 sides that was recommended by the menu, and my friend wanted to try their seasonal orange tart. Overall the meal was pretty good and interesting, but also a nice chance to get my veggies in for once on the trip. My favorite part was probably the small thing of boiled veggies, and I found the fermented sauce on the tofu quite interesting. The tart was amazing for being a vegan tart, and the slight sournes of the orange went really well with the smooth vanilla cream of the base. It was a little expensive in my head, but I guess you’re there for the vibes and the high quality vegan food too.
We then explored our way through Omotesando en route to Takeshita street, and popped into a few shops including Kiddy Land on our way there. We started at the southern end of Takeshita street, because I had hoped to make our way to see Meiji Jingu at the end (we ended up skipping it that day in favor of getting to Shinjuku park, and pushed it to another day). We stopped by a few shops, and my friend even bought a pair of shoes at Wego, a brand I really like! We also stopped by a dango shop, and bought a prepackaged sakura dango, as well as a a stick of mitarashi dango freshly dipped in sauce. We tried getting in line for the Long Longer Longest giant potato swirl line, but the line itself was long (go figure), and we didn’t want to wait in it. I also wanted to get boba from Xing Fu Tang since I found it in the area, and after that, we went to go get the famous giant cotton candy at Totti Candy Factory for 1000 yen. We did find another branch of the Longest line down the street, but at that point, we wanted to get to Shinjuku Gyoen National Park before they closed and while there was still daylight out.
The entry to the park was 500 yen, and we just spent the hour or so we were there walking around and looking at he variety of flowers that were in bloom. Lots of pretty flowers, but honestly a little less overwhelmingly pink than I thought it would be. At that point, my boyfriend messaged me that they were in the area, and we decided to meet up at an izakaya at 5:30 because I told him I was interested in going to a Fruit Parlor in Shinjuku that was going to close at 8. We chatted and caught up, ordered a bunch of izakaya things, and then tried to go to Takano Fruits Parlor around 7:20.
Unfortunately when we arrived at the Fruits Parlor, they were going to close at 8, but apparently the call for the last order was going to be at 7:30, and they were unsure if we were going to be seated in time considering evreyone was still eating and all the seats were full. I was bummed out, but we left without any other real plans for the night. Since we had a bit of time though, and it was early in the evening, my friend and I decided to head to Tokyo station to pick up our shinkansen tickets for the text day, so we wouldn’t have to worry about being close on time or stressing out about it the next morning. My boyfriend and his friends accompanied us since they didn’t have anything else to do, and other than picking up some sweets at Tokyo station, we ended the night there and separated.
March 30th: We started off the latter half of our trip waking up bright and early to catch our 8:00 shinkansen to Nagoya to visit the Ghibli Park! We brought most of the snacks that we had bought and stocked up with us for the train ride there, and that’s also where I ate my Starbucks Reserve chocolate tart. It was rich and decadent, and paired perfectly with the strawberries we picked and also brought.
Our Ghibli Park Reservation was at 2, so with the time we had after getting off the shinkansen, we headed to Nagoya Castle to do some sightseeing. It was pretty cool-looking on a hot day, and after we picked up and ate some dumpling-looking sakura mochi, we entered the castle grounds and looked around. We walked around, waited in line and walked in the guest house, and did some souvenir shopping.
Some things Nagoya is famous for is kishimen, which is like a flat and think udon noodle, and miso, so we stopped by a miso udon place nearby. My friend ordered the tempura zaru kishimen, and I got the duck miso udon. The miso was amazing, and had such a deep fermented flavor unlike anything else I’ve ever had. It was also quite interesting that the udon in the miso udon was purposely cooked very al dente, and almost undercooked in the middle, to give it an extremely chewy and almost hard texture. The cold kishimen was also amazing, very slurpable and refreshing, and different than a traditional udon.
Now, we had to wait a bit in line to be let into the restaurant, and it would take an hour to get to the Ghibli park from where we were, and we basically finished eating around 1:30. We ended up arriving at the park a little before 3, and the park was scheduled to close at 5, which meant we had around 2 hours to get to see and explore everything there. I think we made good time, and the Aichi Expo Park that the Ghibli Park is a part of itself is huge, grand and vast, and if we had more time, I would have liked to explore more of it and walk around.
As for the Ghibli Park, our tickets were only for the Grand Warehouse, and those were the only ones available, but it would be the majority of the current Ghibli portion anyway. We had an amazing time, as all the props and construction work was so well done to create such an immersive experience. They transferred a few things over from the museum, like the food exhibit but expanded, and also some of the short films. Luckily, we were able to watch a different one than a few days earlier, and also a different one than the one I saw 6 years ago. One of the coolest things was there was a Coke vending machine for glass bottles, and it came with a bottle-cap removing function, and after you finish drinking, you return the glass bottle to a crate next to the vending machine. There was a similar system with the milk being sold at a milk stand on the third floor too. The thing we saved for last was the Narikiri/Play Pretend exhibit where you can renact famous movie scenes and take pictures that had a super long line when we first entered the Warehouse. We actually thought it was the line for the theater, but the actual theater had no real line when we went to go enter it. The line was considerably shorter around 4:30 when we entered it, and I can tell why there was such a line. The first thing in the exhibit was the train booth with No Face from Spirited Away, which seemed to be super popular. The other scenes in the exhibit all had varying lines, but considerably shorter than the one leading in. We took a bunch of pictures, had a lot of fun, and headed to the gift shop with techinically 10 minutes left of park time (the exit was connected to the gift shop). Darn, my friend told me to use their bathroom, but I forgot about it up until we left, and then I was too late.
Because we left the Aichi Park a little past 5, we unfortunately didn’t have time to check out the Osu Shopping Street that I wanted to look at, since most of their shops were going to close at 6. We wanted to go check-in to our Airbnb first to drop off our bit of baggage for our night stay, wich definitely meant we wouldn’t have time to go. A bit unfortunate, but perhaps sometime in the future!
Apparently, another thing Nagoya is known for is chicken wings specifically, so I made a reservation at a famous local izakaya chain that supposedly also has good wings (I just looked it up, and apparently there’s a branch in Saporo, wild). We obviously got their wings, along with another sauced version, and a few other izakaya goods. The star of the night was the miso cucumbers, and actually the “secret” wings, which came 2 an order. They were crispier, and the sauce tasted better than the purely peppered og wings.
Japan Excursions 
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