Hotels & Trave

Family Friendly Tokyo and Kyoto Tour of Japan Japan

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Japan Jun 2008 Trip Log

Day 1: Arrival into Tokyo

After arrival, we’re amazed at the efficiency and organization of the Japanese. The Airport bus is arranged neatly outside the baggage claim with each bus organized by route. Each bus serves a cluster of hotels located within minutes of each other to maximize efficiency. We stayed at the Prince Sakura hotel in Shinagawa which is a bit off the beaten path but is located right at the JR line train station. From the airport, it took us about 90 minutes door to door.

Since Tokyo’s train system is arranged in a circle with stops at virtually all the tourist stops, it’s a perfect place to stay. It’s quieter with larger rooms but with very convenient access to any stop. Further, it is the train station where you depart from Tokyo to Kyoto and other major cities which is another major advantage when you have to lug baggage. As an aside, the Japanese with Disabilities Act was clearly never passed because if you have luggage or are stuck with an infant/stroller, you’ll be lugging it illegally on the escalator or literally carrying it up the stairs. So, pack lightly when you come to Japan!

Day 2: Tokyo On our first day, we went to a number of great sites. First stop: the Meiji shrine in Harajuka. Harajuka is a neat little area for a few reasons. First, the people are the “punks” of America without the hard edge. Here, teenage girls and boys dress bizarrely in anime or doll-like costumes with goth makeup. It’s called Cosplay and the kids walk around the area preening for gawking tourists and reveling in the attention. Apparently, these kids are the outcasts of their local schools but are in their element in this area. From here, it’s a brief 5 minute walk around the back of the station to the Meijin shrine which is a gorgeous shrine ensconsed in a city park. There are over 170K trees in the park and its another testatment to the gardening skills of the Japanese where everything seems to be just in its precise place. The highlights here are the iris garden which blooms in the summer (starting in mid-June) and the weddings that take place on Sundays (or at least it did for us!). You can leave wishes on pieces of wood that are later read by the priests but, frankly, I doubt they ever get to it. But, it’s a neat little way to get tourists to shell out extra cash. Budget about 1.5 hours for the walk through this park and shrine.

After this stop, we went to tour the streets of Harajuku where you’ll find more of those crazy Cosplay teens and a bunch of great food stores more oriented toward Western palates—ie greasy hamburgers and sweets. We had to stop by to get sweet crepes with ice cream, strawberries and custard.

In the afternoon, we went to Shinjuku after we realized that our camera died during the barrage of photo taking. Shinjuku is the Times Square of Tokyo and is filled with everything from shops, bars, seamy strip clubs, and restaurants. It’s also packed to the hilt with Japanese. We went to one of the big camera/computer stores where we found out the other part of Japan that is so appealing—the people themselves. Japanese are literally the friendliest and most helpful people in the world. It’s like a genetic trait that they want to help you out, no matter if you are a complete stranger. We ended up buying a camera here but the sales rep was so helpful that he even pulled out a spare battery of a camera for us when we noted that we had no camera to use for the day (and no time to charge the new one). I mean, when does that happen in the US?

Now exhausted, we found a little massage place that offered 1 hour massages for $60. This store happened to be owned by a Chinese family from Fujian province and who were much friendlier and helpful than the average Chinese person in China (perhaps Japanese helpfulness is environmental). Here, we got some of the best massages of all time, albeit in rather unattractive surroundings. If you’re looking for it, it’s right around the corner from the camera store Yodabashi.

After this refreshing stop, we decided to walk by the Golden Gai which is home to Tokyo’s bar scene (and is a few blocks from the red light district). As it was 5 PM on a Sunday, it wasn’t exactly a happening scene and with a kid in tow, we obviously didn’t stop anywhere. So, while I’m sure it’s fun for most young tourists in a drinking mood, this is a skippable area for families.

Day 3: Tokyo

This AM we started off with a bang, waking up at 4 AM to head off to Tsukiji fish market. This is the market where tons of seafood are offloaded, auctioned, and then transported out into Tokyo and greater Japan. When you see the volume of seafood here, it’s both awe inspiring and frightening at once. Industrialized eating at its height is a testament to human ingenuity as well as the unsustainability of human existence in the modern world. It’s a wonder there is anything left in the sea when you see this operation.

For the tourist, there are few signs and little direction in terms of where to go. You literally wander around the market, dodging these little transport cars and motorbikes (like Frogger), until you find the warehouse that houses the Tuna auction. Here, hundreds of frozen tuna are laid out with their tails cut off and a small patch of scales exposed. Inspectors walk around with a small pick which they use to break small pieces of tuna free from the tail. Since it is frozen, they work the tuna piece in their hand to defrost it and to assess the texture. Occasionally, I saw the inspectors actually eat the sashimi but most of the time, they just tossed the fish away which I always found a bit depressing! One last tip for tourists—dress warmly as the auction house is refrigerated.

After the auction which really gets going around 5:30 AM or so, we went off in search for our 6 AM sashimi breakfast. This is found in a row of shops a few hundred yards away from the tuna auction. The most important thing is to arrive here at 6 AM sharp—otherwise, be prepared to wait at least 30 minutes for a seat. There are three restaurants open at 6 AM and two of them, for unknown reasons, get all the business. Here, get the set sushi menu which will get you about 10-12 pieces of sushi and miso soup for the not that reasonable price of $35 USD or 3500 yen. But, it will be the best sushi you’ll ever have in my opinion. The tuna will literally melt in your mouth but the stars for me are the sushi that are normally bland in the US—like squid or tamako. Here, the squid is almost creamy in texture and the egg actually has a distinctive flavor. Don’t get me wrong, toro will always win but this was the first time I really appreciated the other types of sushi as well.

After the fish auction, we headed off at the late hour of 7:45 AM to head off on the bullet train for Kyoto. Here you take the JR line from Shinagawa station to Kyoto on the bullet train which takes about 3 hours for the full trip. It’s an easy and comfortable ride and I recommend getting a bento box for the road which is a quintessential Japanese experience. Don’t eat much—the food is much better in restaurants but it’s still a fun experience.

On arrival in Kyoto, we stayed in a Ryokan and spent the afternoon relaxing and enjoying the surroundings. A ryokan is a traditional Japanese “bed and breakfast” but on another level. They typically include an onsen, or hot spring bath, either in a public setting or private one in your room. Further, they provide a kansei style dinner and breakfast which is Japanese high end cuisine. The meals are notable for the incredible presentation with each small plates showcasing an unusual ingredient or small dish. The tastes are wonderfully varied and, for most tourists, these will be tastes you’ve never experienced in your average Japanese restaurant at home. What makes it even more interesting, is that at many ryokans, this dining experience happens in your own room where an attendant serves the multi-course meal in your own bedroom. How does that work? In a ryokan, there is basically no furniture and the main area is simply a big tatami area. Here, there is a single table and seats where the attendant serves dinner. After dinner, the attendant clears the tables and places quilts for sleeping.

One note for tourists—you’ll be charged for your drinks so don’t go and order the sake without knowing how much it will cost! We learned that lesson the hard way!

A couple notes on selecting a ryokan. We much preferred those that served dinner in your room as some will serve it in a restaurant. While the restaurant setting allows more complexity in the food (ie grills, etc), it’s just more interesting to have a high end meal in your bedroom! We also preferred ryokans with real onsen—meaning the hot spring water is constantly flowing into the tub. There’s nothing like having a hot tub that’s always fresh and ready to go. There is a website that allows English speaking tourists to pick Ryokans and we found it quite useful—though your selections are pricier. We went off the beaten path for a second ryokan and while it was very Japanese—the lack of English skills makes the experience a bit less enjoyable.

Day 4: Kyoto

From our Ryokan in Kyoto, set in a neighborhood called Gion, we were only a 20 minute walk from Kiyomizu Dera. This is an ancient temple set on a pretty steep hill that is nestled in a mountain forest. To be honest, we’ve had lots of experience seeing temples so for us, “a temple’s a temple”. But the streets leading up to the temple were an absolute must see. Along these cobblestone type streets are these wonderfully quaint traditional Japanese houses, stores and restaurants. Here, you’ll find the complete range of Kyoto sweets—mochi with various bean fillings, cakes, candies, and shaved ice. You can sample virtually everything here and so if you try them all, you won’t need much of a meal. Our favorite is the shaved ice with green tea syrup, mocha balls, and clear jelly. To top it off, green tea ice cream makes it a real winner. At the end of the street leading into the temple, you’ll find a man renting out audio guides with the interesting pricing model of: first 45 minutes FREE, up to 2 hours 300 yen. At first, I’m thinking—“why is this man offering something like this for free?” Of course, you have to use it once you see it’s free and then 30 minutes into your tour, you realize that it’s impossible to tour the temple in under an hour. On my return at 1 hour and 15 minutes later, I paid him my 600 yen for 2 audio sets and congratulated him on his brilliant pricing model.

I should note that on the way to Kiyomizu Dera, you can stop at Kodai-Ji, another temple that looked pretty and less crazed than Kiyomizu. From there, we decided to take a taxi to Nanzen-Ji, the first stop in a Southern Higashiyama walking tour. Our taxi driver started talking to us in stilted Japanese and soon we were on a guided tour of Gion’s major sites before we headed off to Nanzen-Ji. This included stops at:

- Chion-In a major temple in the area with Japan’s largest bell (worth a 5 minute stop over)

- Shirakawa Minami –Dori which is a beautiful, historic street in Kyoto (drive there or through via taxi and save yourself the time to do the walk)

- Shinmonzen- Dori with has old traditional houses (same as above).

By the time we made it to Nanzen-Ji, our fare was $20 USD but we completed all the major sights in Gion.

Nanzen-Ji itself is a nice temple with a couple of neat side trips. We followed the Lonely Planet guide which sends you toward an aqueduct that lines a pretty mountain side. Do NOT, however, take the instructions literally as you will end up walking along the aqueduct to nowhere. Instead, when you go up towards the aqueduct, turn left toward another temple like structure directly up the mountain where you’ll see a number of gates leading the way.

From there, just before the exit gate, turn right along the street and you can head toward the path of Philosophy which shows up in every tour book as a must see walk for tourists. To be honest, we found it quite skippable but it’s a reasonably pleasant way to get to Ginkaku-Ji which is yet another well known temple. This temple has one of the more interesting gardens in that it has a number of really neat stone patterns. Otherwise, as they say, it’s just another temple.

That evening, we switched hotels to the Hotel Granvia in Kyoto station. Unlike your average US train station, Kyoto station is part train station and part mega-mall. You’ll find innumerable restaurants, department stores, and even foreign brands like Café du Monde from New Orleans. We ate many a meal here and one of the great dessert favorites is a place called Berry Café (by the Hachijo exit). It’s pricey at nearly $900 yen per slice but it’s worth every bite. As a side warning, there is a branch of Berry Café in Ginza which comes with a lot of attitude. We wouldn’t recommend going there just for that (they refused to let us take out an unfinished slice).

Day 5: Kyoto

Today we hit Arashiyama which tour books note as one of the highlights of the city. For us, it was a bit underwhelming. Tenryu-Ji is the area’s most well known temple. It’s primarily distinctive for its wonderful bamboo grove which is reminiscent of Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, but otherwise, it’s not a particularly unusual temple. Although the tour guides recommend going to the monkey park in Arashiyama, we skipped it with the baby.

From here, we went to Nijo-Jo in Northwest Kyoto. This was an ancient castle built in the 1600’s and is interesting for a number of reasons. First, it’s a castle with a moat which is always a nice touch. Secondly, the inner palace has beautiful screen paintings and other neat design quirks. Our favorite were the Nightingale floors which are built to squeak loudly with every step. This was intentional to allow people to detect intruders (or it was spin on bad carpentry). The gardens themselves are quite beautiful as well. We recommend taking the audio tour which helps quite a bit in appreciating the inner palace. Also, if you can avoid it, after you peek into the main garden and palace, there’s no reason to do the entire loop—it just takes an extra 45 minutes and tires you out.

From here, we went to the Nishiki market which is a market in Kyoto. This was one of our favorite stops because it showcased all the wonderful snacks and foods of the city. You could easily spend a day here because the shops literally go on forever. The shops for other clothes cover all the bases from imported goods to area trinket makers.

Day 6: Kyoto to Izu Hanto

After a sleepy checkout of the hotel, we are on our way by bullet train to Izu Hanto. Our ryokan is based in Izo-Nagaoka, a small town just before Shuzen-ji, the well known spa town of the peninsula. We selected our ryokan based on trip reviews but, in retrospect, it was a poor choice. First, it is quite out of the way and it required an extra 50 USD or so in cab fares and subway fares to get there. Second, there isn’t much else in these smaller towns except the ryokans. So, Izo-Nagaoka is quaint, but in our book, eminently skippable. Our ryokan was solid but a bit disappointing in the end. The primary pros of the facility were that each room has its own private onsen. A real onsen has hot spring water constantly flowing such that the tub is basically constantly full. That’s a tempting plus every time you walk by the bathroom! It also had a number of private and public baths with long hours which is nice for flexibility purposes. The meals themselves were had in the restaurant, however, and though this allowed a pretty impressive presentation of food, it lacked the same kind of experience of in room dining. The food was also disappointing relative to Kyoto but perhaps that bar is too high!

One small highlight is worth discussing, however. Since our ryokan catered almost exclusively to Japanese guests, the innkeepers had no English proficiency. So, we headed off by taxi to the nearest “beach” from the town. $20 USD later we end up at the Sea Palace, Japan’s version of Sea World. The Sea Palace is a dismal aquarium with borderline unethically sized tanks for some large aquatic animals. But, the general manager was extremely sweet. After sighting the two of us pitifully trying to navigate a bus back to our Ryokan, he showed us a map of the area and then graciously offered us free admission as a gift to us. So, though the aquarium itself is rather terrible, I almost feel like giving the place a thumbs up just to support the manager.

The area also had a small house owned by a family called Egawa. It has a number of old historical relics from a prominent local family that had significant interactions with the West. The owner was interested in Western gunnery and so the house has all sorts of neat artifacts from the 1800’s. It’s about a 20 minute walk from the station and is worth a trip if you happen to be in Iza Nagaoka.

Overall, my recommendation is that the Izu Peninsula is an interesting stopping point between Tokyo and Kyoto (it’s near Tokyo off the JR rail line) but it’s not a must see area. There are nice views of Mt. Fuji and seeing rural Japan that is off the tourist beaten path is nice, but, the complete lack of English fluency in the area makes even basic travel a bit inconvenient.

Day 7: Return to Tokyo.

Back along the JR line, we arrive at Shinagawa station where we check back into the Prince Sakura hotel. In the afternoon, we head toward Akihabara, the discount electronics area of Tokyo. A few days earlier, a madman had killed 7 people on a stabbing rampage so we thought it might be worth coming to the area to see if it had any impact. From what we could tell, it was largely business as usual though there was a high police presence in the station. From there, we headed onward to Ueno which has discount shops and cheap eats. We loved the ramen here and there are a number of unusual stores there that are worth a visit. You can also find most of the major museums in this area so Ueno would be a great place to see a museum and grab a quick lunch.

After Ueno, we continue along the JR line loop to Ikebukuro which is the home to the major department stores in Tokyo. For any person of Taiwanese descent, you’ll know what it’s like going to Japanese department stores with the incredible food courts. The department stores here are variants of that model with massive areas selling food but in a more grocery store like setting. Nonetheless, if you want great food at reasonable prices, this would be a great place to stop for a cheap, simple dinner.

For dinner, we return to Shinagawa station and exit on the Konen side. Here we find an interesting izakaya, a drinking restaurant that serves largely Japanese bar food. But, Japanese bar food is delectable and in some places, rather distinctive. We found a place using an English website that reviews Tokyo restaurants and it’s just off the Konen side exit at Shinagawa station. I’d give you directions but they’d be useless since I can’t write Japanese and you won’t find an English name. But, it is distinctive for the fact that they specialize in all forms of tofu. The drinks ain’t bad either and they have semi-private rooms which are great for a couple or small group of friends.

Day 8 Tokyo.

It’s our last full day in the city and we take advantage of the time to go back to our old favorite—Tsukiji fish market. This time, its 10 AM and we head right to the restaurants which are ridiculously packed. You’ll find that the lines are up to 2 hours long for 2 of the restaurants along the short row and virtually non existent for the other shops. Having been to both the popular and “unpopular” shops, it’s hard for me to understand why one would wait 2 hours to have basically the same raw fish. So, my special tip to you is—if the line is short, try the famous ones if only because their presentation is slightly superior. But, if all you want is fresh, great sushi, just go to the unpopular next door neighbors and skip the 2 hour wait!

In the afternoon, we do a flyby of Ginza before heading off to Odaiba. Ginza is the high end shopping district of Tokyo and, for that reason, has nothing distinctive about it. Personally, I’d rank it as one of the least interesting areas in the city unless you like overpriced shopping. Odaiba, on the other hand, is this crazy otherworld where you’ll see the strangest things that make Japanese culture so unique.

To get there, take the monorail from the Shinbasa station and get off at Odaiba. The first thing worth visiting is the marine park which is a man made artificial beach. It’s my personal custom to jump in virtually any body of water I see but when I noticed that not a single person was swimming, I decided that there must be a reason for it and just dipped the feet in. One reason is that the water is quite cold and given our location near a shipping port, it probably wasn’t the freshest water to swim in.

After a quick visit here, we went along the major shopping malls of the area which have cheaper and hipper stores. Then, we jumped back on the monorail to find the local onsen in Odaiba. This was one of the highlights of our entire Japanese experience. The onsen is at the telecom stop of the monorail and is basically a theme park, onsen, spa, and food court mixed into one. For the not so cheap price of $57 USD, you get admission for two people into the facility. But, that is just the beginning. After the men and women pick a yukata (Japanese kimono like pajamas), they meet in a central waiting area with arcade games, amusement park like games, and a big food court. Kabuki entertainers for kids perform goofy skits to the delight of a hundred young children. Meanwhile, visitors are welcome to visit the single gender baths or schedule massages, aesthetic treatments, or hot sand treatments. It’s a crazy place that is hard to describe but it’s such a fun experience, we recommend it highly. One note for tourists—you should be comfortable with nudity because the baths all ban clothing. It’s kid friendly as well so you shouldn’t be bothered having a 7 year old in your onsen next to you!

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