Started the day off with some free breakfast at the hotel. I was too hungry after our first night on arrival and got full off our 7-11 haul at 4am, which lead to completely forgetting that the hotel provided breakfast. Really liked the offering, at least to me, it seemed close to Japanese home cooking. Today we had cream of mushroom soup with 3 kinds of mushrooms, miso soup, rice with vegetables, sausage, Japanese scrambled egg (tamagoyaki), miso sardines, light cabbage salad, stewed veggies, and pickles.
Joanna and I both belong to Anytime Fitness at home. If you’re looking to join a gym, I highly recommend it, especially the West Bloomington location as it’s the best gym in town. ATF is actually headquartered in the Twin Cities and they have locations all over the world. I did all my hotel bookings a few months ago but then realized that we could work out while on vacation. It was a total coincidence that there was a gym about 7 min from our hotel here in Tokyo and several of our other cities have one nearby as well.
I needed to the gym to burn off the 20k calories of food that I’ve ingested the last 2.5 days. It was a nice workout, but I wasn’t able to push as hard because jet lag is still an issue and I only got about 4 hours of sleep the night before.
We are checking out of Tokyo and heading south to catch our overnight ferry about 1.5 hours south in Yokosuka. Hotel checkout time was at 10am so we needed something to fill 12 hours until boarding time at 11pm. I’ve never been to Yokohama before so I suggested we dump our bags in a coin locker at Yokohama Station and wander around to see what we could find.
These lockers were such a blessing for $6.75. I seemed to have overpacked my bag (again) and not having to carry it around town the whole day saved my back and shoulders.
I checked out a few camera stores to get a replacement backpack camera clip somehow broke as I was getting off the train, Joanna did some shoe shopping, and we did our traditional vacation inauguration ceremony by going to Din Tai Fung which we do not have in MN.
We walked past Chinatown with intentions of going back to wander the shops but didn’t make it back in time (Peking duck sounded good though). Checked out the boardwalk and found a red brick warehouse looking building that had a lot of kitschy hand made artsy home décor, jewelry, leather accessories shops.
I was getting tired and hungry again so we made our way to a mall nearby which is known to have a giant selection of gachapon machines.
It took at least an hour to walk through the 30 or so aisles of machines to decide where we wanted to spend our coins. “Thankfully” I had just gone to the ATM so Joanna’s need for cash was met. I think by the end of it, she spent close to $40 on some random coasters and cat figures. Here’s a few machines that stood out to me and the 2 cats are just a sample of the things we got from the machines.
From where we were in Yokohama, we needed at least an hour and a half of time to make our way to the ferry terminal to board by 11pm. It started raining and I didn’t feel like walking in the rain. Lucky for us, there was a public gondola that could take us to a nearby subway station for $10 a person. How random, fun, and convenient!
We made our way on the very full commuter train to Yokosuka and caught a cab to the ferry terminal. I was not expecting this ship to be so big! We arrived with plenty of time so I watched these semi trucks load the back of the ferry. I think it’s mainly a shipping vessel they built part of into a people…mover (my brain is still fried I can’t words). I noticed maybe 30 people in the pre-boarding area so the ship should be pretty vacant.
Joanna gets seasick/airsick easily and I booked a room with an included balcony where it might make it easier for her if she wasn’t feeling well during the trip or she has the option to puke over the balcony. I showed the boarding attendant my ticket and he said oh 6th floor. But I looked closer and could not figure out where it said 6th floor. It became apparent that I the room i had booked was only one of two state rooms which is apparently the highest class on the ship. I’m always budget conscious when I travel but the fanciness was justified this time lol
Does anyone else do this thing where you walk into your hotel room and the first thing you say is “This is niceeee” as you check out the space? We got unpacked, Joanna took a Dramamine and went to bed. I wandered around and got a midnight snack at the restaurant. Tuna sashimi and pork curry with rice, and a huge beer for $12
They opened the public baths too and I got a nice hot soak after 3 days of walking 24k steps. For those that haven’t done long trips like these before, it’s really important to pace yourself and not feel like you need to take advantage of every moment during the trip to see everything otherwise you get burned out.
I love Tokyo, I could spend a month here and not run out of things to do but it’s so easy to get overstimulated from the lights, sounds, and sheer population density. I get really excited for this part of my trips because it’s off to the unknown to seek out a small taste of adventure. We have a day at sea tomorrow so I plan to just take it easy.
