So, my trip went really well, I followed some recommendations from the allies like skipping Shibuya
I arrived on the 24th and basically just hung out and Akihabara for the first night, hit up the arcades, grabbed some street food.
Day 2
We went to Akihabara. Basically, just walked around there. went to the Evangelion Store and a really cool store with a whole level of it devoted to Gundam model kits. After that we hit up Shinjuku. relaxed at a park there, saw the Tokyo Metropolitan building and it was a very nice day. this was when weather started getting really nice mid 70s (cherry blossoms just started blooming so there were a lot of people just taking pics of the beautiful trees). for the night we headed back to Akihabara for some more nightlife arcade experience. Ate at the Gundam Cafe
Day 3
My party of 3 went to Kyoto. took a 3-hour ride on a bullet train, arrived in Kyoto then went to Fushimi Inari Shrine. Huge doesn't even begin to describe it. the shrine consists of a bunch of smaller shrines all over this mountain that takes hours to climb (lots of stairways). Great experience, beautiful scenery. after that we had some sushi for dinner and went back to our hotel.
Day 4
We decided to start with the Bamboo forest and some shrines surrounding it. lots of tourists at these shrines and they are all there to soak up this beautiful spring weather. got done with the forest pretty early so we decided to go to Togetsukyo Bridge. Before we even got to the bridge though we happened upon a great strip of shops. we meddled around there for a while and got to the bridge. The bridge did not disappoint. the views were great. the atmosphere was just so relaxing. this was when i realized that Kyoto was probably my favorite part of the trip so far and saddened at the realization that we are leaving it tomorrow to go back to Tokyo. Day wasn't over through. got a cab to the Gion district had a lot of fun just walking around but really couldn't find a place i really wanted to eat finally came across a cool ramen shop. was really good ramen
Day 5
This day contained one of my biggest reasons i went to tokyo now. I wanted to check out the Life Sized Gundam Unicorn. headed on over to diver city where it was located. had a nice mall, but malls aren't that different from what i got in the States. Got to see the unicorn in the daytime, got to see it transform, and stayed around till nightfall and saw it all lit up.
Day 6
I went to Disney Sea. great park western friendly. way more affordable than Anaheim or Orlando Disney parks. Disney sea is more oriented for adults and was really packed for a Thursday. i think this great weather really attracted a lot of guests to the park.
Day 7
Went to Roppongi Hills. there was this cool art museum that had a 90s Shonen Jump exhibit going on. also had a cafe themed around shonen jump, ate there, was very tasty. Went near the top of the building and got a great view of the city there. seemed to stretch endlessly and you can really see how 25 million people live in this big city. they had another art exhibit going on with a lot of installation pieces.
After that we went to Harujuku. as a Male i was really out of place there mainly because all the shops were aimed at the female demographic. lots of bad English shirts here. one just said "shave mee"(was on a little girl)
did happen upon a monster hunter cyber cafe where everyone was just playing a ton of monster hunter worlds.
A few tips i have is make sure you have a cell phone plan that works in japan, get unlimited data. get suica card for using the subway. if you are going to Kyoto get a JR national pass (worth the cost for the bullet train alone)
don't worry about navigating. most signs are also available in English. learning a little Japanese phrases does help. navigation with your cellphone is great for subways but can be bad when you are trying to go to a specific hotel. Even if you have the exact address. The way their address system works is that instead of having the number tied to the street its tied to the block, and all the numbers aren't going to be in a row either.
Lots of places have English menus, but for ones that don't pictures help a lot. also google has a translation app that you can just take a picture of something and you can get the jist of what it's saying.
I might post some pics from my trip later. sorry for some of the bad grammar i wasn't really looking much at what i was typing XD .
