After our cultural tour around Japan, we tried to feed our inner nerd today by visiting some gaming temples! Well.. Kind of.. :-)
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| Nope, I didn't dare the squid (yet?) |
Ueno Park
Was our first stop. With Sakura season starting, we had to stop here and see the groups of people lining up in order to see their beloved trees getting in bloom. We didn't have much success yet in finding blooming trees, since the season here has just started, but that'll improve once we travel south. Ueno did offer some nice relaxing walking paths, if you don't mind the peddling monks..
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| Sakura really are beautiful |
Ikebukoro
This was one of the places I picked out. Since about a year this shopping town houses a shop that contains but one brand. Pokémon! As a big fan, I just had to visit. I got myself a great new vaporeon and was surprised to find out the brand still is so strongly alive around here. Ikebukoro also contains some big gaming halls that really can't be matched by anything European. Certainly go through some when you're here. But we wanted to reach our next destination before noon.
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| Kodama I choose you! |
Shinjuku
Shinjuku has the Square Enix showcase museum 'Artia' very close to the station, and that was our destination. Unfortunately it kinda disappointed us, and we ate at a café around there before moving to our next destination!
Akihabara
Is known as a shopping area, and with good rights, games all around! Be it new systems or old, you're sure to find stuff around here. Complete shops with statues, or even an Gundam cafe can be found here. We even found the rare boardgame store "yellow submarine" with a decent amount of games. Especially cardgames seem to be popular around here.
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| Cat and chocolate, a game we'll discover at home |
To finish our visit in Akihabara we had to stop at a maid bar. @ home gave us the experience of the maids, though they weren't used handling English speaking people which made our visit much harder.
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| Dessert was as sweet as the maids! |
Asakusa
Housing a beautiful temple, Asakusa is well known. An entire street of packed shops leads you to the temple where you can pray for a better world. While you are there, be sure to take a stroll by the water. This is even more romantic by nightfall!
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| Crowds were growing |
Finishing our final night we went to Jonathan's. An American style restaurant right across the street of our hotel. All in all, we're happy about our stay here in Tokyo, though 2 days really is way too short. We look forward to tomorrow when we'll take on Takayama!
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| Mighty warrior in Asuka |
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