TOKYO
Our Finnair flight was unremarkable which is a good rating – no problems were encountered. So my first picture is our plane. We allowed ourselves two days in Tokyo to ensure we arrived in time to catch our ship. I think we made good use of our time there and we only saw what was immediately around our hotel, Hotel Villa Fontaine Tokyo – Hamamatsucho and what we saw on a trip into the centre of Tokyo. Our arrival was marred by our cab driver not having a clue where our hotel was located. Unknowingly his GPS took us to the rear staff entrance to the hotel which confused him and us but fortunately some locals on the street showed us the lane way to the front of the hotel. The second photo is the front of the hotel, and the following pictures show how close we were to the 3 levels of railway rushing around us. We noticed that several businesses had their own shrine for staff and passersby, and the first one below was immediately across the road from the hotel and alongside the Japanese version of a café – a drink dispenser. Note they also dispense Kirin Beer.
We obtained a tourist map from our hotel. We were checking the location of the dock for our departure on our cruise and became worried that the instructions as to the location of the dock for boarding our ship were somewhat vague – “Yokohama Dep. 4.00 pm”. Believing the dock was nearby, we took a walk to the waterfront. There was a considerable amount of renewal happening/being constructed underneath rail overpasses and vehicle expressways and in between the enormous city towers around us along the path to the waterfront. The photos below show the way in which the Japanese used all space available.
We made it to the dock but there was no sign of any ship terminal. Tugs and ferries but no cruise ships. We continued our search passing through wharf industries harbour side units and canals but no cruise ship terminal. Push bikes were popular even with the public transport available. As we returned to our hotel we were surprised by the architecture of one building: a domed area under an office tower. It proved to be a shopping centre at the base of an office block, but it seemed to be “dead” with no people activity inside the building. It seemed to be a cross between a plant hot house and a shopping centre. Not sure how successful it has been.
On returning to the hotel, we decided we would call our travel consultant and get the complete street address and directions for the dock. A very helpful consultant gave us an address (we were rather suspicious that the address said nothing of a terminal or dock number), but we felt assured that the instructions for the taxi would get us to our ship. Our concerns eased we took a ride by train into the city.
Tokyo has a rail ring road making it easy to get to the centre of town. We were looking for Tokyo’s highest building to get to the roof top for a grand view of the city and beyond – as the tourist literature promised. Getting to where we wanted to go was trouble free. Finding our destination from the train station not so easy. Passage ways, footpaths and aerial walk ways had us confused but we got there in the end. We found that building but to get to the roof top was ticket only access and all tickets for today were sold out. So, we took in the sites from ground level. That’s it 1st picture left to right.
When walking to our station to catch the train we walked past an open garage containing go-carts. No idea what that was about and there was no signage in English to inform us. So we were very surprised when we encountered go – carts full of jubilant tourists came rolling past us in the centre of the city. I have provided a photo below then follows a photo of the world’s busiest pedestrian crossing. As well as street level pedestrians there are pedestrians aloft – yes 3 storeys above ground and connecting everything. It is hard to find anything old world Japanese, but we found it in a restaurant with shrines in its front yard – what must that land be worth!
We had a burger in Hungry Jacks (very Japanese) and decided to explore further passing over a canal with houseboats and a new stretch of pedestrian and bike pathway and gardens on our way back to the hotel. The following day – “sailing day” – Kerry had spotted a large garden space on our map within walking distance and we thought we had time to explore a bit more.
The pictures below start with a different form of shrine to the one across the road from our hotel – an upright tablet with two temple urns beside it – then surprisingly our first cherry blossom tree in full flower. The park seemed closed at every entrance, so we traveled to the walkway 3 levels above ground for the view of the park. More than a park it is a religious sanctuary set out in traditional Japanese style. As the park seemed closed, we went in the opposite direction towards the harbour. The pictures show you the grand scale of these walkways. We passed a high school and its sporting fields and ended up on the harbour boardwalk with ferry terminals spaced along it and ferries plying the harbour and trains passing by. The buildings around us towered above and I have taken some photos of some of the more impressive. I was even able to grab a picture of the look-a-like Eiffel tower – the last photo but its a long way off.
We turned around and went back to where we had come form. I cannot recall what made us walk to the opposite end of the walkway, but I am glad we did so as we found the entrance to the park – there is a fee to enter and that explains the closure of all the other entrances. The photos below show you around the gardens. We were now pressed for time so we did not get to every point but we saw the cherry blossom grove in full flower with a traditional bride walking through and an Australian lass enjoying the sunshine.
We made our way back to the hotel and collected our suitcases. The receptionist called the cab driver and handed to him our piece of paper with the address for the cruise terminal – we thought – but our concerns were well founded. The address was the HQ of Holland America lines in Tokyo and the cabbie had no English-speaking ability and was completely oblivious as to where the Tokyo International Cruise Terminal might be. We have not had the need for using our phone for translation so we were left to go to charades to tell the cabbie what to do. He wanted to put us and our luggage on the street, but we insisted that he find out where to go and to his credit he did that by questioning every parking centre and hotel security he could find and struck it lucky.
Meanwhile I was on the phone abusing (politely) the HAL staff to find out where the dock was. My efforts seemed to be languishing but then the cabbie turned a corner, and the vessel MS Noordam was at anchor at the Tokyo International Cruise Terminal. The cabbie thought that we would leave him alone if he dropped us off but we were still a kilometer from the ship so he endured found the road to the reception of the terminal gladly took my Yen 7,000 (should have been Yen 500 for a 15 minute trip but it was HAL fault for the misleading information – my complaint to HAL resulted in an apology and refund of the cab fare.)
Relieved we boarded the ship with a good story to remember this trip. However, we were soon to learn many other people had the same misfortune. We settled down and then we were shown to our stateroom, whilst we awaited our luggage there was some noisy bumping coming from the hall and I stuck my head out. The bloke in the adjoining cabin was bumping in with their luggage so I asked if he needed a hand, and an Aussie accent answered that he was right. This was Barry and his wife Sandi from Indooroopilly just arrived in their taxi from Yokohama – they had also been given a bum steer by HAL. From there and occasions where we shared a dinner table, we became acquainted and did quite a few things together. We still keep in touch with them – our next adventure was to be to Nudgee Beach but for reasons forgotten we ended up at Indooroopilly.
So the next and last leg of our adventure was about to commence. Read on as we relax on the high seas south of Japan to Taiwan and back again in my blog “THE RETIREES GO AROUND THE WORLD – “TOKYO TO ABURATASU, PORT NARE AND PORT NAHA OKINAWA”.
glendon1954 