Ikebukuro, Shinjuku, Ochanomizu

DAY 5

Japanese roll cake…breakfast of champions! Well not really, but this was my breakfast. I had bought it at Family Mart the night before for dessert and finished it up for breakfast this morning. I have to say, for convenience store roll cake, this was very good – super soft and moist!

Day 5 was a little different in that this was our first day on our own in Tokyo. Our biggest apprehensions were finding our way in the train stations and finding our way back to train stations. But we brought our map (and even a little compass!) and were determined to do our best.

First up was the Toyota Amlux showroom located inside Sunshine City in Ikebukuro. It’s free admission and about 4 or 5 stories high.

There were all kinds of interesting cars to check out…

But the most fun part was getting into these test cars and taking a virtual test drive. The whole thing moves up and down and side to side so it’s pretty fun!

If you are in the Sunshine City area, drop in. You can’t beat free!

After Toyota we went to one of the department stores at Ikebukuro station. It was either Seibu or Tobu, I can’t remember which one but boy is it hard to walk by all the food in their basement and resist the temptation!

After checking out the desserts we went back out into the main station area to make our way to Shinjuku.

In Shinjuku, the first thing we wanted to do was go to another free attraction – the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building. There were many signs in Shinjuku station so it was easy to find the correct station exit.

Then using our map we just continued on down the main street. Once we got near the building there were more signs around with arrows pointing you in the direction of the Observatory (our destination) so we just followed the arrows.

It was pretty slow when we got there which was good, no line for the elevator. We quickly went straight up to the 45th floor to take a look around. It was a little cloudy that day so there was no view of Mt. Fuji. However, this is what we did see…

While we were up at the observatory we decided to have lunch at the cafe there. They had 3 different lunch specials. We were both going to get the tomato pasta…

but when I saw the special called “Loco Moco Hamburg Style Plate”, I had to give this Tokyo loco moco a try!

The gravy was a little different, more of a demi-glace sauce with mushrooms. But I liked the idea of the poached egg. That was different compared to Hawaii’s standard over easy or sunny side up fried egg.

After lunch we headed to Takashimaya Times Square to do some shopping. I spent a bunch of time in my new favorite store, Kinokuniya. I

After Shinjuku we headed to Ochanomizu to check out the music instrument district. There were tons of guitars in this area near Akihabara.

There were also many other string, woodwind, and brass instruments. We spent a lot of time in a big store called Shimokura.

Walking around the area, we saw many girls in kimonos. The reason is because we were there during graduation time. These girls were just coming out from their graduation ceremony.

To end this day we caught the subway back toward the Yamanote line and headed to a department store to have some soba for dinner. When I saw the unagi soba combo I couldn’t resist!

My hubby was good and had the tempura and soba combo. They were very nice about making it all vegetable tempura for us.

Coming up in the next post? Tsukiji, Okonomiyaki, Monja, and more!

DAY 1 & 2: Meiji Jingu, Harajuku, Omotesando, Shibuya, Ikebukuro
DAY 3: Mount Asama, Shiraito Waterfall, and Karuizawa
DAY 4: Ghibli Museum, Odaiba, Asakusa
DAY 5: Ikebukuro, Shinjuku, Ochanomizu
DAY 6: Tsukiji, Ginza, Akihabara
DAY 6 (Part 2): Kappabashi, Asakusa, Okonomiyaki, Monjayaki
DAY 7: Japanese Baseball at the Tokyo Dome
DAY 8: Ueno Park, Yanaka Ginza, Sengakuji Temple, Beer Museum Yebisu
DAY 9: Nikko Day Trip – Toshogu Shrine and Yuba
DAY 10: Fishing in Tokyo
DAY 11: Kanamachi and Shibamata