Tag: Japan
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Tokyo Part II
Taking the train back to Tokyo on a Friday afternoon was a great feeling; while it was certainly pleasant to spend some time in the countryside, there’s nothing quite like traveling to a major cultural city (especially Tokyo) for the weekend. Being Golden Week in Japan, cheaper lodging in the city’s more popular areas was difficult to come by, so we had to suck it up and splurge a little bit for our last weekend. As we cleaned ourselves up and enjoyed some 7-11 happy hour beers in the room before heading out for the night, we absolutely soaked up…
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Hakone
While Andrew and I had very much enjoyed our time in Kyoto and Tokyo, we wanted to get out of the cities a bit, experience some more relaxed Japanese culture, and maybe even catch a glimpse of Mt. Fuji. We decided to spend two days and two nights in Hakone, a rural area to the west of Tokyo popular with Japanese tourists. After searching online through a large selection of accommodations including hotels, resorts, Airbnb, and Buddhist temples, we settled on a reasonably priced ryokan, a traditional Japanese inn. Our ryokan also had an onsen onsite, which was practically a…
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Tokyo Part I
Armed with a bit more boots-on-the-ground knowledge of Japan, Tokyo got off to a much smoother start than Kyoto. After exiting from the shinkansen, we switched to one of the local rail systems (there are several in Tokyo) and rode to Shinjuku station, the world’s busiest train station; I can attest that it is overwhelming and quasi-chaotic. After checking into our hotel, we walked around Shinjuku – a central ward of Tokyo and essentially a microcosm of the city at large – for a few hours to get the lay of the land. After an adequate (but unfortunately not California-level)…
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Kyoto
Our first day in Japan wasn’t under the most ideal circumstances: out late in Hong Kong until about 2:30, then up at 6:00 to pack and catch the train to the airport. I don’t think I have to tell you that packing while tired and hungover is a terrible, terrible time. Nevertheless, we made it to our flight on time, thanks in part to multiple attributes of Asian airports that I’ve noticed over the last eight months: they’re never that crowded, check-in is quick, and the security line is almost non-existent. In East Asia, I think this is due to…
