Travel: Japan 2015 Day 1 // Tokyo // Walk: Tokyo Tower & One Piece Tower

19/12/2015

Do I ever get sick of Japan? I don't think so. Here I am again in the land of the rising sun, but opting to visit Tokyo as part of our trip, for a few reasons: I have not been to Tokyo since 2007 :D and this time I am bringing a couple of friends with me who have not been to Japan at all. So why not do the obligatory visit to the capital city.

This time we flew Singapore Airlines (still my favourite airline to date).

Inflight meal: Braised Chicken with Rice & Stewed Beef with Mash Potatoes

Because Christmas & New Year period is considered high season, it was very hard for me to book for flight that would take us straight to Tokyo. So I took whatever I could get, and booked for flights into Nagoya, where we had to take Shinkansen to Tokyo.

As with the Singaporean flagged airline, transit was in Singapore and we had enough time to rendezvous with our favourite singaporean dishes (although just the airport versions which are more expensive). I had a bakuteh as well, but completely devoured it before remembering to take picture.

Carrot Cake (small SG$4.50); Durian Roti (SG$5); Chocolate Banana Roti (SG$5)

Christmas decorations were in full swing at Changi airport and I have to admit they do it so much better than Sydney airport. The airport is massive (and  they always seem to have new stuffs/gardens/shops...) and spending hours in layover there didn't feel tedious at all.

*le sigh*... . I wish I can have 1 in my bedroom 

Our flight to Nagoya was about 2 hours after midnight (our eyes were as puffy as raccoons' I can tell you that)

Inflight breakfast: Scrambed Eggs with Bacon & Hash Brown (soggy); Grilled Teriyaki Fish with Rice

We touched down at Nagoya Centrair Chubu Airport around 9 in the morning (flight was about 1 hour later than intended schedule due to some delay on departure :()

:( glass was a bit dirty and I couldn't be bothered to clean the photo raws... .

After getting my rental wi-fi like usual (still from Global Advanced Communications - this time I rented the superfast 187.5mbps one), we boarded the train to Nagoya station (Fare JPY870 pp on Meitetsu line).

As this time we will be travelling on shinkansens quite a lot, I bought Japan Rail Vouchers for the 4 of us from JTB Australia back in Sydney. We had to exchange for the actual passes at JR Nagoya station (only across from the Meitetsu Nagoya station).


























And what to do for starving people boarding the shinkansen? Bought some ekibens :)

Hitsumabushi (JPY1300), How cute is the food container.

Miso Katsu (JPY 980)

For our stay in Tokyo, I booked for rental apartment through AirBNB. 6 nights in total costed us A$1902 at this place. The photos on the listings are pretty accurate (so do check out as I didn't take too much pics for that reason) and the place is very clean and quite spacious for 4 adults. It has one bedroom and the living room has a small tatami area where 3 futons can be laid down to sleep.
The closest station would be Hacchobori (Hatchobori) which is around 8 minutes walk.

After winding down and had a hot shower that felt sooooo good, we took a taxi to Tokyo Tower (taxi fare costed JPY2030 from this place, which is very fair considering we have 4 people and worked out quite cheap as we saved a lot of time compared to taking the subway. The journey took around 15  minutes).

Beautiful Christmas decorations. I just love the Japanese' sense of aesthestics.





























We came here not only to see the majestic icon, but also to visit One Piece Tower, an indoor small theme park dedicated to the anime, which one person of our group is a fan of. Needless to say, he was in heaven. And we all got dragged along with him. I have to say, it is pretty awesome :)

We bought the combo tickets for the theme park & main observatory (JPY 3900 p.p).T he special observatory (250m high) was closed due to strong wind)




































































































There are also quite some interactive panels & games indoors.



























































































































We got to see the live show (very very recommended). These people really define cosplay. Haha. And Robin, holy crap you sexy vixen!!
 (I do apologize for the pictures quality here. The room was dark and I had to make do using my phone's camera :P)











We had dinner at Cafe Mugiwara, where they served One Piece themed food & drinks. I had Omurice (JPY 900) and 12heart had Bone Burger (JPY 880)

This cute ghost chocolate bao with vanilla ice cream is JPY800

After having our fill of the theme park and visit the observatory as well, we headed back to the apartment and turn in for the night. Stay tune for day 2 :)