Our last bullet train journey to Tokyo, but we are here now and still lots to do. At our hotel which is more like a hostel where we have a lovely room but share the bathroom. The Kinuya Honkan Hotel was easy to find in the center of Ueno district in between the station and the park.
Bags in the room and we're off again to the Ginza shopping area where I wanted to see the Sony building and play with the new gadgets on the market, well recommended. From here we headed to the Shinjuka Station which happens to be the busiest in the world and if you want to see how many people can fit into a train carriage ride a train from this station. Walking around the Shinjuka area you realise it has the most sky scrapers in any one area and the metro government building has a viewing floor free of charge where I'm told you can see Mt.Fuji from. We were there at night so didn't.
Still wanting to get the most out of our JR Pass we headed for Nikko which was about 90 minutes from Ueno. It was a very cold day and kind of dead place with nothing open apart from all the shrines which all seemed very expensive to visit. There was even a charge to cross Shinkyo Bridge so we walked around to avoid paying. Once walking around the park area, which was quite nice we were cold and hungry so decided to leave and hopefully try and find a coffee shop. Found a great little cafe that did bottomless coffee refills and chips to die for. Once back in Ueno to the heavy rain we headed for some dinner and decided to splash out at TGI's, very nice.
We woke to a lovely sunny day and decided the park and zoo would be a good choice. Ueno Zoo is the oldest in Japan and some of the enclosures looked original. I don't like zoo's much as the animals are in such small cages and when you have seen them in the wild it's sad to see them locked up. It has a save the panda campaign going but not sure it's working as they only had two. The saddest animals there were the rhinos, hippos, elephants and polar bear all in pens far too small for their large size. That night we eat in a street market cafe and had chicken on a stick washed down with some beer. Very lively place and got chatting to some locals who couldn't speak any English.
Our last day in Japan was at the shops buying last minute gifts and items for ourselves, decided a new iPad was needed and with a £100 cheaper than the UK my mind was made up.
Now on the night train for the airport as we are booked into Nine Hours Capsule Hotel for the night ready for our flight home tomorrow.
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| 9hrs capsule bed |
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