Kitty Day Care

On Friday we slept in a little bit.  We didn’t wake up until 4:30 AM.  Not bad for our second day here.  In another couple of days we should be sleeping normally.  Once again we really could not do much at that time of day so we worked on the previous day’s blog, checked e-mail, etc.  Since we were up so early we took advantage of our awesome east-facing room and the high floor, to take some good pictures of the sunrise.  Usually we get the sunset pictures, not the sun rising.

 

 

We left our hotel at about 9 AM because we were in no hurry plus we did not have a big day planned.  We knew at some point or another on this trip we would have to visit the Hard Rock Cafes in Tokyo to pick up our magnets (if you have been to our bar you know what this means) so we decided we would do just that.  There are two HRC’s in Tokyo but that would not take an entire day so we checked a Tokyo City guide Trip Advisor app that Chris had downloaded to see what else there was to do that we hadn’t done on our last trip.  We settled on a walking tour of a particular neighborhood, Ikebukuro because we hadn’t been there yet and the walking tour on the app was short (our feet still hurt from Thursday) and it was kind of near the two cafes. 

Since breakfast was not included in our hotel price we were on our own.  Since the hotel connects to the subway station through a mall our choices were somewhat limited.  We immediately spotted a pastry shop in the mall so we stopped in.  In Japan when you enter a pastry shop you grab a tray and tongs and you pick up the pastries that you like.  When you pay they bag them for you.  Jackie had a muffin and donut with coffee while Chris had some kind of pastry with a cheesy/eggy/ham spread and some kind of biscuit type thing that had raisins in it along with some orange juice.  You can probably tell who the more adventurous eater is. 

We got on the subway after eating.  We went straight to the front car because you can look out the front of the train in Japan.  That seems more interesting than just staring at the advertisements on the walls or looking at the floor for 40 minutes.  You can also watch the engineer drive the train which in Japan is quite the production.  They constantly point to the signals along the tracks, they point to their schedules, look at their pocket watches and they seem to talk to themselves as they drive the train.

 

We got to the Ikebukuro station and walked to the first stop on the tour.  The Ikebukuro neighborhood is home to some large department stores and at least one unique “only in Japan” experience that we took advantage of.  Our first stop was the Sunshine City building which is really just a bunch of stores from high end to 100 yen stores (100 yen stores are Japan’s answer to $1 stores except right now 100 yen gets you about $1.15).  We saw a Burger King, the first time we had seen a Burger King outside of the US.  While we did not go inside we did take a look at the menu to see if there was anything unusual on it.  We know that McDonalds restaurants often have one or two regional items on the menu whether it be in a different part of the US or elsewhere in the world.  The Burger King had something a little unusual.  Since in Burger King you can “have it your way” by adding extra patties or bacon to your sandwich for a small price, in Japan you can add an egg to your burger for only 100 yen. Not a bad deal at all! They also had an avocado Whopper which may or may not be that unusual since we don’t go to Burger King all that often.  Besides walking through, we did not spend much time in Sunshine City because to us it was really just a mall.

Our next stop was within the same building, the Sunshine 60 building.  Sunshine 60 was the tallest building in Asia at 60 stories until 1985.  Up on top is an observation deck and given the amazing weather we had, the views were amazing.  The ride up was pretty cool too.  As soon as you enter the elevator the lights go dim and it turns into something that looks like a disco.  The ceiling lights up with stars and purple, blue and shiny lights start flashing in the elevator.  The speed of the elevator is also displayed as it climbs to the top.  We topped out at 600 meters/minute, or about 22 mph.  Besides having a 360 degree view of Tokyo we had a good view of Mt. Fuji, about 100km away (that’s 60 miles for the Americans reading this).  The observation deck also had a couple of windows built in a way so you could stand right up against the glass which is kind of scary as you look down on the city right below your feet.  

 

 

The next stop was the Tokyu Hands Department store.  Tokyu Hands claims to have everything you need.  They have about 20 stores scattered about Japan and they really do have everything.  They started as a DIY store so they have hand tools, etc. but they also have some really quirky stuff as well as household items and just about everything else. All of this is usually spread over about 8 floors of store.  We took pictures of some of the more interesting things that we saw there.    

No comment needed

Our next stop was just plain weird.  We visited Nekobukuro.  The bukuro part is probably named for the town we were in?   So we visited the cat section of town.  Nekobukuro is located on the 8^th floor of Tokyu Hands.  According to our app, “since so many residents of Tokyo work long hours and can’t take on the responsibility of a pet, Nekobukuro is there to fill in much needed kitty time.  ‘Neko’ means cat in Japanese, and ‘bukuro’ is tacked on as wordplay on the neighborhood, Ikebukuro.  For 1000 yen per couple you can spend one hour admiring and petting the resident cats.  The house is built with many high, out-of-reach ramps for those cats who tire of human contact and need to escape.”   Yeah, it was weird.  We paid our 1000 yen and interacted with the feline species for about a half hour.  At one point when we were about to pet a particularly mean looking cat one of the workers told us in broken English that the long haired ones are mean and scratch.  So we left him alone.  This was probably our most unusual experience on any of our trips so far but it certainly was memorable.

The mean one

 

Rules and regulations

The cats on the wall are the ones who are currently roaming around.

After the cats we started walking back towards the subwayones are mean and scratch.  So we left him alone.  This was probably our most unusual experience on any of our trips so far but it certainly was memorable.

After the cats we started walking back towards the subway but first stopped at a conveyor belt sushi place.  They have these in the US but if you have never been to one basically you sit at a counter and plates of sushi come around on a conveyor belt.  Dishes are on different colored small plates and the different colors mean different prices.  At the end they count your plates and you pay for your meal.  We ate about a dozen plates between the two of us and lunch cost us about 2000 yen.  We left feeling full and quite satisfied and we then headed for the Hard Rocks. 

 

After completing the Tokyo Hard Rock Café tour we headed back towards Yokohama.  When we arrived at the hotel on Thursday we saw a really big ferris wheel a few blocks away and thought it would be pretty cool to take a ride if it were open.  We didn’t think it was open being that this is January in the northern hemisphere which means winter.  But we were surprised to see it was open.  The Cosmo Clock 21 not only is a ferris wheel but is supposedly also the world’s largest clock.  When it first opened it was the world’s largest ferris wheel at a height of 107.5 meters (that’s 353 feet to you Americans) tall.  The interesting thing about this, and being that this is Japan, land of the vending machine, is that the tickets were sold in a vending machine.  We later found out that you could buy your ticket from a person as well but we saw the vending machine first so we got our ticket there.  For 700 yen per person it was a bargain for a 15 minute ride in the sky.  We were fortunate to be there just after sunset.  We also took a few pictures of the surrounding area and of our hotel lit up at night.

At first glance it appears they want you to drink on the ride.

 

Our hotel from the ferris wheel

 

When we got off of the ferris wheel we were hurting once again so we made our way back to the hotel and fell asleep before 9.