After waking up in a strange McDonalds in Ueno and finding it much busier than when we had decided to nap quietly in the corner, we headed to Asakusa to drop our bags off at the hotel. Cathy had found us a series of great hotels over the next 5 nights in all the best spots in the City. It was a decision, in part, due to the fact that most hotels were almost fully booked, and we could only find one availability here and there, but it also meant we got to see many different parts of the city and stay in a handful of funky 2-foot by 3-foot hotel rooms. Waking up and dropping off our bags at the next hotel before check-in was a common occurance across our stay in Tokyo.

Over the course of our 5 days in Tokyo, we stayed for one night in Asakusa, two nights in Nishi-Azabu, one night in Shinjuku and one night in Nihonbashi. We pushed & shoved through Harajuku and Shibuya, rode Japan’s biggest ferris wheel in Odaiba, ate and drank in Roppongi and strolled through Ueno & Yoyogi parks. All without a flake of snow!

By great coincidence ( & by relentless encouragement) many of our friends from around Takikawa ended up in Tokyo over new years as well. We each had our various places to go and friends to see, but on a few occaisions we all got together at an Izakaya for food, drinks and and some “Hey, we’re in Tokyo!”

On new years eve, after a big dinner gathering in Shinjuku, we found ourselves at Zojoji temple, at the foot of the Tokyo Tower. We were accompanied by our new photographer-friend Michael, who we had met for the first time earlier that day. We were introduced to Michael, a former Takikawa resident turned tokyoite, over flickr and the three of us had a great time in Tokyo walking around and taking pictures (even though he’s a Nikon guy…)

We were joined by thousands of people in the temple’s immense courtyard- and at the stroke of midnight, 3,000 “eco-friendly” balloons were launched into the air & the temple’s joya-no kane (new years bell) rang out as the Tokyo Tower lit up with its spectacular new blue colour for 2008. Attached to each balloon was a special new years wish, or prayer. It was a spectacular sight to behold, and in one single event justified our epic 48 hour, 16 transfer train ride down to Tokyo. Following that, we took the subway back to Shinjuku and drank in the new year until the wee hours of the morning.

The first of January, accompanied again by Michael, we visited Kanda Myojin, a modest shrine near Akihabara. Far from the tourists and foreigners, we got a very fascinating, real glimpse into the very old Shinto tradition of visiting the shrine on the first day of the new year, called Saitansai. We ate new years aman, and drank sweet sake, before heading into the heart of Akihabara, the electronics center of Tokyo to play with camera equipment like little kids on Christmas.

That night, we had a farewell Tokyo dinner with our foreigner-friends and woke up the next morning to catch our 9:00am Shinkansen back home. We laughed at our 2 day trip down to Tokyo, as we sped at 284km/h back towards Hokkaido. Within 11 hours, we were back at home to confirm that yes- our fish were still alive and yes… it’s still snowing in Takikawa, just as we remembered.

Tokyo was our first big trip within Japan, and a huge success by any account. It was nice to escape the snow for a week, though Tokyo wasn’t exactly t-shirt weather. We made good friends, took over 3,000 pictures beetween the two of us and ate some delicious monja. Our next trip will be to Taiwan, for Chinese New Year, and then to Kyoto for cherry blossoms in March.

In the mean time, we’ll enjoy the Hokkaido winter from our humble home in Takikawa.

More pictures:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jaako/sets/72157603624801739/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cathycracks/sets/72157603618267855/

-Goodfishies