Tokyo Day 2 - Imperial Palace, Botanics and Atomic Bomb Boat

Delicious Family Mart Snacks                 Half Height Subway Barriers                         Woman Only Sign

Got up super early, grabbed a snack from the Family Mart (yup, they have cheap tasty boiling food) and rode the subway downtown, was surprised by how busy it was. Similar to Kuala Lumpur there is a car reserved during rush hour for women only. Japan is also the reason phones bought in Korea can't turn off the camera sound - apparently there were too many pervs taking photos up ladies skirts on the subway. Maybe I've been in Korea too long but maybe if their skirts covered their ladyparts.. Although the ladies I saw were a lot more conservatively dressed so I'm sure it's not that. 


The Imperial Palace became so way back during 1868 when the Emperor moved up from Kyoto. The Edo castle on the grounds was originally built in 1457 and subsequently destroyed in a few fires and of course World War II. It's right in the centre of the town so you walk into it from streets covered in skyscrapers.  We wandered around, some parts like the walls and moat haven't changed in a few hundred years - such a huge change from Korea where almost the entire country was destroyed during the Korea War.

Attractions to see: A side building with pictures of the Japanese Royal Family, guard towers, moat, gardens etc. When we were wandering around too we saw an old horse-drawn carriage. Not sure why that was there!

Afterwards we wandered past protesters and marathon runners (see photos on the right) to the Sakuradaemon station - I was very pleased with myself that I could read the kanja for door/gate in 
桜田門. Next stop was the botanics to meet some couch surfers to take photos of the flowers.

Getting from Shinkiba station to the botanics involves walking under a huge elevated road (where they store construction vehicles and buses).  It's 

Tokyo Day 1 - Asakusa and Skytree

I flew outta Gimhae first thing Sat morning - saw Laura at the airport but we were on different flights ;-(  With hind-sight I can tell you that heading home to pack at 2am slightly drunk is not the best of ideas.  Upshot is I slept through most of the plane ride.

Once I got into Narita I got 3 days worth of subway tickets (note, they are only for the Tokyo metro lines, not TOEI) and grabbed a slow train that ran as a metro service through Asakusa station - every metro line except the smaller guage K and M lines (the first two subway lines built in the city) have through running with suburban services.

Dropped luggage at our hotel and wandered around Senso-ji Temple.  It was Lunar New Year so there was a market and a lot of people there.  Saw some monks lighting incense for good luck for the next year. There was also a strange wooden block thing that the Japanese people would pay to pick at random - I couldn't read the writing on it.

Afterwards walked to the Sky Tree (it was 2 subway stops away but a TOIC line, also the riverside walk was refreshing).  If you can find out how to book online for the Sky Tree I suggest you do it - we had to queue for a time period to come back to buy a ticket!  Highly efficient but wish I'd stopped off there first!

Got some delicious marinated beef and rice for dinner and headed back to the Sky Tree.  A bit of background info - it's 634meters tall and the tallest tower in the world (second tallest structure about 190m smaller than the Burj Khalifa).  It's a lot better than Namsan Tower, we got there as the sun was setting so got the full experience.  Spent a while wandering round and taking photos and enjoying the interactive screens in addition to the amazing views.

Finally it was time for a quick snack and some beer and sake at the hotel.  Perfect end to a long day :-)