My partner and I are visiting Japan for the next three weeks. On our last trip, I wrote down most of the places we ate and what we experienced. I hope to be able to do the same here. I hope you enjoy it, too.
✨ Click on any day in the Table of Contents to jump to that part of the trip.
- Day 1—Thursday, Oct 24, 2024—Flying to Sapporo
- Day 2—Friday, Oct 25, 2024—Sapporo
- Day 3—Saturday, Oct 26, 2024—Otaru, Sapporo
- Day 4—Sunday, Oct 27, 2024—Sapporo
- Day 5—Monday, Oct 28, 2024—travelling to Nikko
- Day 6—Tuesday, Oct 29, 2024—Nikko
- Day 7—Wednesday, Oct 30, 2024—Nikko
- Day 8—Thursday, Oct 31, 2024—Travelling to Kyoto
- Day 9—Friday, Nov 1, 2024—Kyoto
- Day 10—Saturday, Nov 2, 2024—Kyoto
- Day 11—Sunday, Nov 3, 2024—Nara
- Day 12—Monday, Nov 4, 2024—Osaka
- Day 13—Tuesday, Nov 5, 2024—Osaka
- Day 14—Wednesday, Nov 6, 2024—Osaka
- Day 15—Thursday, Nov 7, 2024—Travelling to Tokyo
- Day 16—Friday, Nov 8, 2024—Tokyo
- Day 17—Saturday, Nov 9, 2024—Tokyo
- Day 18—Sunday, Nov 10, 2024—Tokyo
- Day 19—Monday, Nov 11, 2024—Tokyo
- Day 20—Tuesday, Nov 12, 2024—Tokyo
- Day 21—Wednesday, Nov 13, 2024—Tokyo
Day 1—Thursday, Oct 24, 2024—Flying to Sapporo
Woke up at 3am Wednesday, October 23. Caught a 4am Uber to Pearson. Got through customs by 5:20. Now, just waiting until boarding at 7:20. Landed at 9:10 in Montreal.
Boarding at 12:00 to Tokyo. Leave at 12:50. Getting premium economy seats became such a good investment for a trip this long. Our legs weren’t dead, and our bones didn’t hurt.
We landed at 2:10am EST, which is 3:10pm the next day in Japan.
We got Éisee a Suica card.
I tried to add money to my phones Suica card, but my bank flagged it for fraud. So I called them, and got it sorted, but it was a stressful few minutes. Maybe that feature where they “know” when you’re travelling isn’t fully baked yet.
Eisee’s Airalo didn’t seem to be working. So we bought a 21 day SIM card for her, for $64. That’s still decent. There seems to be a pretty big difference between how it works for iOS and android. At least we still can just pop SIMs in and out.
Ultimately, I wish I’d done the same. Airalo worked fine on my phone, but I still turned my SIM all the way off to save on any call/text/data charges that might happen. It really seemed to be just a sim swap without needing a tiny pin to pop a piece of plastic in and out.
Got dinner at Narita airport. Kyoto Gyoza. Fried chicken and beer. Decent.
Got on the plane to Hokkaido at 8:45. Landed 10:30. Met our driver and he took us to the Cross Hotel an hour later. Long travel day, but we had a huge advantage of being rested in the morning. No jetlag right away, yes!
Day 2—Friday, Oct 25, 2024—Sapporo
Our hotel in Sapporo has a theme song, and it’s great.
After breakfast at the hotel, we hit up the Mega Don Quijote shopping. Éisee picked up some cold medication here she suggests everyone try, and might bring home as souvenirs. We checked out the Sapporo TV tower (cute!), Odori park (pretty!), and Hokkaido Shrine Tong. Small shrines like this were all over the place, offering a calm space even in between enormous spaces.
Our first lunch happened at Sushidokoro Rin. We enjoyed a ten-course Omakase. Loved the roe hand rolls. Fatty tuna was incredible. Nice sake as well.
Then, our first tour: Sapporo Museum. It was cool! Lots of graphic design history. It’s a beautiful distillery building. The highlight was seeing a room full of vintage ads.
We enjoyed a ropeway tour to the top of Mount Moiwa. I had a feeling the views from this ropeway funicular and observation platform would be amazing. The view revealed Sapporo’s size and beauty. A real stunner.
We walked to the corner in Sapporo that’s filled with classic billboard ads and shot some pictures.
I was not exactly looking forward to our dinner at Matsuo Jingisukan. I’m not a big mutton fan, but this was seasoned well, and the pieces were thin enough to cook quickly. I’ve never been proven wrong so quickly.
Day 3—Saturday, Oct 26, 2024—Otaru, Sapporo
We took a lovely drive through the country on our way to Otaru. The fall colours were coming out exactly as we hoped.
Our first stop was Tanaka Sake. Listen. Start your day with a sake tasting. They had a good number of sake that were only available in the area. We’ve caught the LCBO slacking, obviously.
We walked past the Otaru Canal. This was the historical focus point of the town. Lots of tourists, but it was serene.
Our tour guide showed us though this observation deck. Even though it was just a couple floors up it really showed off the area.
The place had lots of images of this character, I want to look it up more later to figure out his deal.
We had lunch at Sankaku Sea Market. It was a row of fish markets with connecting small restaurants. We ate at Otaru Ebisusakura. Éisee had whelk for the first time in decades. The seafood quality and abundance was not in question.
In their afternoon, we walked through a tourist street in Otaru full of glassware, Snoopy merch, and coffee shops. One highlight was Kaitaichi Hall, a coffee shop inside a large wooden hall lit with oil lamps.
There were so many glassware shops with hand blown, decorative pieces. It felt a bit like we were back in Venice. Some of them were genuinely beautiful displays, while others were obvious tourist traps. It felt like an hour or so but apparently we blew three and a half hours looking through these shops.
We returned to the hotel the chill for a while. I enjoyed the public baths (no photos obviously but the view from the roof was incredible).
For dinner, we had a reservation at Sushi Fuji, a small 8-seat restaurant. It was okay, but a bit on the disappointing side compared to omakase we’ve had in Toronto. Afterwards, we finished the night with a highball at Nikka Bar in the nightclub district. It was a cultural difference to see a few streets full of happily drunk folks leaving bars at 10pm. That would be 2am most places in Toronto.
Day 4—Sunday, Oct 27, 2024—Sapporo
Two quick thoughts:
- I forgot to turn off cellular data for iCloud Photos, and within three days of being here I burned nearly 2 gigs of data just from my photos syncing in the background. iPhone tip: Settings > cellular > turn off every app you don’t want using that precious, more expensive vacation data.
- I bought a buckwheat pillow a few years ago to try them out. It was fine, but I found it uncomfortable at least half the nights I used it. The hotel here provided a pillow that was half buckwheat, half foam, and that seems like a much better idea. It keeps me from shifting, but I also wake up without neck pain.
Last day in Sapporo!
Hokkaidō Botanical Garden was a perfect start to a lazy Sunday. Gorgeous park with a rose garden, indigenous museum, and Canadian rocks.
A quick stop at Marumi Coffee for a very good coffee before spending the afternoon in Tanukikoji Shopping Street. It’s one very long open mall full of restaurants, shops, and bars that goes forever. We picked up our first set of business chocolate and found an excellent winter clothing store in TNOC. As a treat for me, I found a Sony store and got to pet an Aibo dog, so that’s a childhood bucket list item knocked off.
We enjoyed an afternoon beer at Kotan and an afternoon parfait at Snow Parlor. As a massive victory, my wife said that if ice cream tasted like this everywhere, she’d like the stuff. But it only tastes this good here.
For dinner, we found a local Izakaya that served fried meat that you dipped into cheese curry, with beef covered in enough wasabi to eliminate all illness. Hell yeah. They called their deep fryer “Dr Fryer” and claimed it was good for your health. I love this town.
Our first choice for a wine bar to send off the night was closed, because it was Sunday. I then did the obvious tourist play of google maps searching for “wine bar” in the area. One came up, but it appeared to not exist. We hung out in the lounge for a bit, which, if I haven’t yet mentioned, offered free beer and wine to anyone staying at the hotel at a certain price tier. So as I tried a Sapporo “classic” “”vintage”” “””2024 only available in Hokkaido”””, Éisee looked one foot over to where there were a set of maps showing off restaurants and bars in the area. Not one block over was Barcom, a very nice wine bar that served not only local Hokkaido white wine, but a nice selection of Spanish reds. I’m so proud of her. She’s only been playing Zelda for a bit and she’s already finding maps.
Sapporo was good to us!
Day 5—Monday, Oct 28, 2024—travelling to Nikko
Not much to say about this day. We got on a flight to Hineda airport and drove to Nikko. Driving past Tokyo was a nice teaser for the end of the trip.
Instead, I’ll tell you a story from a few days ago. I forgot my coat in the hotel lounge the second night. The staff held it, luckily, so it was fine. But as I was embarrassingly telling Éisee about this, I was reminded of a cultural custom that’s different in Japan. People will leave their phones, coats, bags, etc on chairs and tables and walk away. They haven’t forgotten them; the item holds their spot. Theft is apparently rare enough here that people feel safe leaving personal items unattended for a while like this. So maybe it wasn’t so much that I forgot my coat on a chair, so much as I’m getting accustomed to the local way of doing things.
Day 6—Tuesday, Oct 29, 2024—Nikko
We had a full-day tour with a knowledgeable and gracious guide who took us to see a few historical sites around the countryside of Nikko.
Kegon Waterfall is a near-100 metre waterfall and one of the country’s most beautiful. It was misty today, so we sadly couldn’t see much of it, but the observation deck still gave us a great view of the forest and river below.
Chūzen-ji Temple is a historic temple founded in 784. Dedicated to Kannon, the goddess of mercy, the temple is known for its wooden statue of Kannon, carved directly into the trunk of a sacred tree, which is over a thousand years old.
We had lunch at Myogetsubo, a high-quality steak restaurant sitting very close to a Shinkyo bridge in Nikko. What a find. We enjoyed Rice-fed beef and a good Malbec.
In the last leg of the tour, we saw the Nikko Toshugo Shrine. Here’s a great description of it from our guide:
Located in the lushly forested hills, the shrine is the mausoleum of Tokugawa Ieyasu, founder of the Tokugawa Shogunate which ruled Japan from 1603 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. Featuring ingenious design and intricate details, it is also an architectural masterpiece. The entrance to the main shrine buildings, Yomeimon Gate, boasts over 500 detailed carvings, making it one of the most lavishly decorated gates in the country. Besides the beautiful gates, halls and pagodas, you can also walk up a flight of stairs through the woods to see Tokugawa Ieyasu’s mausoleum.
The scope of these shrines and gardens were incredible. We had no idea this was here, and loved the tour. Climbing the stairs of my apartment building paid off here, those stairs are no joke.
We finished the tour at Futarasan jinja Haiden shrine. One of the shrine’s deities, Okuninushi-no-Mikoto, is considered a god of good relationships and matchmaking, so lots of people come here to pray for blessings in marriage ❤️
Plus, cute rabbit!
Day 7—Wednesday, Oct 30, 2024—Nikko
Spa day. 🛀
Day 8—Thursday, Oct 31, 2024—Travelling to Kyoto
Shinkansen day! After driving back from Nikko, we found our way through Tokyo station and boarded the Shinkansen bullet train to Kyoto. I’ve only used it twice before, ten years ago, during our honeymoon. One trip, however, is enough to put all other trains to shame.
Tokyo to Kyoto is about the same distance as Toronto to Montreal, but it takes less than half the time. When Toronto trains are going slower than ever due to increased maintenance and a lack of funding, this thing just smokes.
We decided to have dinner at Kyoto station, as it was so close to our beautiful hotel. I’d found a tonkatsu restaurant online that reviewers said has the best in japan. The problem was, Kyoto Station is a labyrinth with way more floors than we’d realized. We finally found this joint on the 11th floor, and after looking for nearly half an hour, faced another half hour in line. But I’m glad we stuck with it.
There’s a good amount of hyperbole happening in google reviews, and looking up restaurants leads to “best in” fatigue. But Katsukura might just be the best tonkatsu I’ve ever had now, too. The problem with the reviews isn’t the hyperbole. The problem is they’re right.
As we exited the restaurant, we found ourselves descending thirteen escalators flights down the Great Staircase. Last time we were here, we somehow missed Kyoto Station entirely. This time, we discovered its massive, famous staircase by accident.
Speaking of last time we were here, our first real stop in Kyoto was Hello Dolly, a jazz listening bar we stumbled on ten years ago on our honeymoon. Happily, it was still there and even busier than we remembered. The bartenders made excellent martinis in between changing out records. The vibe was romantic and chill.
Happy ten years, us.
Day 9—Friday, Nov 1, 2024—Kyoto
Kyoto is calling for rain the whole time we’re here, but it hadn’t yet begun. We began the day in an area full of shrines and gardens before it started to pour on us. This area was so beautiful and it took a lot of really stunning photos of some historical houses, shrines, and gardens. Our original plan was to see about seven, but by the time we’ve gone through three, it was almost noon already. This is a footnote to remind myself to spend at least 7 to 9 years in Kyoto, next time I come to Japan.
Lunch was a delightful bowl of udon at kawahigashi. It was a small restaurant with only eight seats. The server was curious but also gave us great advice on spots in the area.
The Kyoto imperial palace was our main tourist attraction of the day. It was a nice walk through historical government buildings, but the space around the palace was so large, we felt lost amongst huge swaths of gravelled road. Eventually we got where we were going.
After the imperial palace, we went to one of the spots our server at lunch recommended. We were confused at first. A florist? It was a pretty shop and all, but why a florist? In the back, there was seating at a counter for just a few seats, and a menu with just a few items. The main event? Orchid ice cream. Look at this:
The ice cream tasted like flowers, sweet and bitter and very creamy. I’ve never had ice cream like this.
Day 10—Saturday, Nov 2, 2024—Kyoto
We found a delicious French bakery to start the morning. We walked a bit of the river as it rained. Kyoto’s atmosphere came through here. This walk reminded me why it’s one of my favourite places on earth.
We shopped at the Nintendo store in Kyoto. So busy and charming! Below it, we found souvenirs in a special section of Tsutaya Books.
The rest of the morning/afternoon was spent shopping in and around Teramachi Shopping Street. Graniph and the unisex Not Conventional were some of our favourite shops in there.
We were running just on time for a dinner reservation, which means late around here. We got into a taxi, and this man barreled us through tight-knit alleys. He was a race car driver by any measure.
At dinner, we were seated next to a younger Canadian couple, and learned it was their honeymoon. Their Japan trip mirrored ours, too. Gion Karyo served us ten memorable courses. At lunch yesterday, the chef mentioned that rice was his favourite food. I kept that in mind here when rice (cooked with chestnuts) was served here as the main.
One last stop: Bar Indigo. We left Kyoto as we began it ten years ago, at a bar with no menu.
Kyoto felt like a blur. It’s such a gorgeous city. We we were in a taxi on the way back to the hotel, we saw a cafe/record shop combo. It looked cozy. I wanted to spend a weekend just in there. There were endless places like that.
Day 11—Sunday, Nov 3, 2024—Nara
We spent the majority of our time today in two parks.
The first, on our way to Osaka, we spent the morning and early afternoon in Nara Park. It has two prominent features: one of Japans largest Buddhist statues, and a park full of deer that you can feed.
I know by this point you probably need a break from hyperlinks to restaurants and stores. I hope these photos of deer provide a respite.
See? Don’t you feel better?
Arriving in Osaka, we taxi’d to our one activity tonight: Teamlab’s botanical garden show. It was a modern art show with lights and music in the near-dark of night. Moody, artsy, cool. Good start, Osaka.
Day 12—Monday, Nov 4, 2024—Osaka
Today was the things that were all a little too much.
We found a trendy pastry shop called Grenier Umeda. They make a flakey custard pastry the size of your head. It tastes incredible, but I couldn’t finish mine! For those that know me and my sweet tooth, you know how rare this is.
Éisee went for a spa, and I went off to check out a vintage arcade. Finally, a use for the 10 yen coins we’ve been collecting as change! Elemeka Laboratory was very cool. Arcade games from a century ago were functional and playable. I spent a little time here.
The main activity for me today was a live New Japan Pro Wrestling show. Coming to Japan to see this show live was a fans dream come true. Excellent, technical wrestling with a delightfully polite crowd was a memory I’ll cherish forever. But, at 4.5 hours with no intermission or concessions was too long for any event. The length was a blemish on an otherwise excellent live show that rivalled any major wrestling event in my life.
We enjoyed a fantastic dinner at Matsusakagyu Yakiniku M Hanare Branch. They served us choice cuts of beef that we grilled at the table. The beef was delicious enough to make me mad at the premier of Alberta.
The server asked if we were celebrating anything. After we told her about our 10th anniversary, she mentioned that the chef wanted to draw something special for us. Later, our dessert came with this metal as hell drawing, and shots with the chef! He was so happy for us. What a good time!
Too close out the night, we walked a little along Dotonbori. The lights were beautiful, but the vibes were off. It was only 10pm, but it felt like the Toronto club district at 3am. All a bit much! Sometimes I have to remember we’re not college kids anymore.
Still, pretty lights.
Day 13—Tuesday, Nov 5, 2024—Osaka
We shopped today, first in Denden town town for retro games and figures. We found an excellent merch store for some of our more obscure anime favourites. We combed through aisles looking for a few specific pieces, and got rewarded with a cute pair of figures that reminded us of our cats. I shopped for retro video games as well, but found the prices to be pretty crazy. The vibe of these streets were great, though. Few cars on the roads, fun vending machines, and lots of open space between the 10-floor shops.
In the afternoon, we hit up Hep Five mall, which had a Ferris wheel on its roof. Why don’t more malls have ferries wheels on its roof? We rode it just at sunset.
For dinner we found a nearby very nice teppanyaki place that has some innovative dishes, such as a delicious puff pastry lasagna and hamburg steak. It was the surprise meal of the trip, I think, remaining in conversation as one of the most delicious places in our time.
Day 14—Wednesday, Nov 6, 2024—Osaka
Osaka Castle was a nice surprise. It’s much more of a fortress than other places we’ve been. It let us see the city from another high vantage point. But its nicest feature was its display of classic kabuki art (no photos allowed, sadly).
Kaiyodo figure museum was showing off an exhibit inside the castle grounds, so we got to see some excellent little (and life size) showcases.
For dinner, we went on a walking/dinner tour. The guide showed us through Shin Sekai “New World” where we enjoyed more awesome kushikatsu at Daikichi Shinsekai. I’m glad a tour guide took us through this area. We might have skipped the neighbourhood otherwise! Then, we travelled back to dotonburi to enjoy okonimiyaki and the sights. It was still too much, but the tour guide made us feel at home.
We finished our last night with drinks we made ourselves Osaka at Automata, a self-serve bar in our hotel. We had the room to ourselves. What a view.
Day 15—Thursday, Nov 7, 2024—Travelling to Tokyo
We took the Shinkansen one more time to Tokyo. Mount Fuji was cloudy but apparently today saw its first bit of snow of the winter.
We didn’t do too much on our first day in Tokyo except have a nice dinner in the Ginza district and checked out two bars. One was an old fancy bar in a far too old and far too fancy hotel, and the other was a small whiskey jazz bar with a good amount of charm. I wish we had those in Toronto.
Day 16—Friday, Nov 8, 2024—Tokyo
Walked around some of the sleepier malls. We saw the 3D cat billboard and Godzilla head. They were fun but only took a moment.
Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden. This park made me realize the reason every character in every anime lies on the grass and falls asleep. They had really lovely views and a chrysanthemum display.
Lunch at kappo nakajima. We had sardine sashimi. So good! In the afternoon we shopped a bit more at Kitamura Camera, record stores, car shops, and Beams. Then we found a very good idea: a cafe with jacuzzis under the table for your feet, and emotional support robots.
We were supposed to meet a food tour group at 6 outside a Uniqlo. The fun part of this is that we were in a neighbourhood with four Uniqlos. But we figured it out, only to find multiple people holding the sign for the tour 😂
The guide took us to an Edo sushi joint (think sushi but large), a good wagyu beef bbq, and finally, a candy bar. I had no idea such a place could exist on this planet, but we got drinks and a variety of nostalgic Japanese confectioneries to close off the night. And now I have a sugar headache 🫣
Day 17—Saturday, Nov 9, 2024—Tokyo
Shopping day in Omotesando and Harajuku! First, we had to take the big tourist photo in Shibuya on the way.
It took us a while to remember where Cat St was. Eventually, we had good luck finding some items at places like Johnbull Private Labo, White Giraffe, niko and …, and A.P.C. We put our names on the list at tonkatsu.jp Omotesando, and 90 minutes later, tasted some of the best tonkatsu of the trip.
We walked through Harajuku, only mildly shopping, mostly walked through the mobs of people. We found ourselves above it all in Tokyu Plaza Omotesando, with a crazy good view.
To finish out our evening, we found an Izakaya in Mayashita Park, a very cool mall back in Shibuya. Miyashita Naru had a cool vibe. I wish I had more energy to enjoy it. This day took it out of me.
Day 18—Sunday, Nov 10, 2024—Tokyo
Ginza is a pretty ritzy place to shop. After a quick morning walk through Hibiya park, we spent the day poking through 12-floor stationary shops like Itoya nice ones like Hands, and shops we’ve seen before like Beams. But it turns out every Beams sells entirely different stuff, and I found a sweater I like.
I treated myself to a headspa massage like Éisee did in Osaka. It’s part massage, part hair treatment. It was very relaxing.
After that, we bought some chocolate and made our way through the main stretch of Ginza. Christmas decorations were out, and some were impressive in scale. We took the elevator up to the rooftop of Ginza 6 to take in some views.
Finally, after 18 days in Japan, we settled down for some ramen. It was delicious, and definitely the least expensive dinner we’d had all trip. Not bad for a sleepy Sunday.
Day 19—Monday, Nov 11, 2024—Tokyo
Our tour of Tokyo neighbourhoods via shopping continued today through Asakusa and Akihabara.
In Asakusa, we found some cute kimonos for our friends at Konjyaku Kimono Tatsumi, fans for our family at 扇専門店 万葉, and knives for Éisee at Cutlery Tsubaya.
At Yusha Kobo Keyboard Specialty Shop, we fell in love with two keyboards and decided they were coming home with us.
We were warned that we’d have to wait in line for lunch a great deal. We’ve mostly been able to avoid that, but today we waited an hour for excellent tonkatsu beef at Gyukatsu Ichi Ni San. Absolutely worth the wait on the very small and not at all up to code staircase.
Akihabara is a nerve centre of culture in the world. I know nowhere else that this level of concentrated celebration and obsession of media and fandom can be found. Visiting dendentown in Osaka may have dulled the excitement a little. There just gets to be a lot of repeat items, and you can only see so many stickers, pins, and standees of anime characters before it gets to be a bit much. But Akiba is still very magical. I’m so glad I got to enjoy it properly this time.
Visiting Super Potato again, this time in Akihabara, it’s become clear to me that we don’t know what to do with video games as an art form. Super Potato is a shop that sells games from all consoles, going back well into the 80s. There was a pong arcade machine on the 5th floor. Seeing the whole history of a medium in one place is awe-inspiring, but its setup is that of a junk shop. They at least know how to price it: so much of it was eye-wateringly expensive, so much more than original cost at the time in the past. All for hardware that yellows, and software that might not work in a few years.
We got beers at Hitachino Brewing lab across the river and loved watching the trains and light as the sun went down.
Back in Ginza, we found an izakaya that served us chicken skewers with beer and great music. It’s amazing that this far into the trip, we were still finding new styles of restaurant. The quality was top notch just about everywhere, but something I’ll take from this trip is the sheer variety of foods on offer.
Afterwards, we walked a pretty street with restaurants before enjoying the terrace of our hotel. It was seventeen degrees and clear, the only sounds from the traffic below. The Shinkansen flew past us just a few kilometres away. We could see it.
Day 20—Tuesday, Nov 12, 2024—Tokyo
We’d been in and out of a few Don Quixote’s here, but hadn’t spent real time, so we corrected that this morning. This is a Toronto reference, but Don Qui’s are like if Honest Ed’s was a successful franchise and you could find one every 12 blocks.
For our last full day in Tokyo we decided to return to Shibuya. The area was so large, we only got through a third of it the other day. We shopped at Onitsuka Tiger Shibuya, Mimi 33 for cool ear cuffs, and HMV for records, because its the 90s.
We found hamburg steaks for lunch at Hikiniku no Toriko Steak Restaurant and then I…ran out of gas. I fell straight asleep on the subway back to our hotel. 20 days of vacation, and six days of walking around Tokyo, I finally found my limit. But it was lovely. If you’re going to nap on a subway, have it be the Ginza line.
Later on, after a rest, we got dressed up nice for our last night in Tokyo. First stop, Bar Lupin, a 96-year old bar that’s famous for being a writers den for Dazai and others. Recently, an anime named Bungo Stray Dogs used it as a setting and it’s had a resurgence as a tourist spot for literary dorks like us. But it’s hardly a tourist trap, unless you count the classic Tokyo basement staircase as a death trap, but that’s just become such a part of the trip I barely noticed it. The cocktails were strong, as if the recipes hadn’t changed at all since 1928.
Our last dinner in Japan was an omakase we’d booked with the hotel, and it didn’t disappoint. Ginza Kyūbey Honten served us a dozen courses of life-affirming sushi, and a wonderful sendoff of Japanese dining.
Last stop: Mori Bar. Now, I wish we’d gone here earlier. Maybe instead of the too-stuffy Imperial Bar. But it’s sometimes tough to see the difference between fancy cocktail bars halfway around the world. Mori was cool. A classic, award-winning cocktail place that had its own published book of proud recipes. I might look into getting that one.
Day 21—Wednesday, Nov 13, 2024—Tokyo
We flew home on this day, but we had some time to wander around Ginza a bit more before the flight. We took in an aquarium art exhibit inside a mall.
This is a tough trip to sum up. Three weeks of tourism, amazing food, atmospheric bars, and so many photos. We learned so much about Japan, and ended only wondering how quickly we could return. We filled our suitcases and shopped a ton. Last time we were in Japan for a week, and it wasn’t enough. Three weeks wasn’t, either.
Sapporo felt like an idyllic version of the home I grew up in. Nikko felt beautiful and haunted. Kyoto felt like the place I want to write a novel and learn to cook. Osaka felt like a more welcoming Las Vegas. And Tokyo felt like it contained everything, and could be whatever you needed. I loved it all.
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