A Marathon of Cherry Blossom

Tokyo has always been atop my list of places in Asia that intrigued me. Maybe its the fashion, or the food, or just the fact that it constantly gets mentioned in the same breath as London, Paris and New York. I might be proud to be an up and coming Oregonian, but I will always be a New Yorker at heart. We originally planned on visiting Tokyo last weekend, but lucky for us we just got back a few days ago and got to experience the height of the Cherry Blossom bloom.

We found (relatively) cheap flights that left late Friday night from Shanghai. We had been warned that taxis in Tokyo were expensive but upon landing the taxi cost us about $100 US to go about 6 miles to our hotel. We got to the hotel around two in the morning but I was starving. I stepped outside and suddenly felt a little bit at home, because I pulled out my iPhone and used Google Maps. Google Maps doesn't work in China, and even with a VPN there isn't the same quality of data as there is in the United States or Japan. I had bought a data-only SimCard  that was only 3G but worked significantly better than anything I have used in China - plus Google! I felt like I had suddenly stepped from the 20th to 21st century. Anyway I walked less than a mile to an Irish-style bar, conversed with the owner via broken English and my Baidu-translator app, had a few beers and got given a free taste of Japanese whiskey, which is always delicious if you haven't tried it.

Saturday morning we set off from our tiny hotel room to start checking out a string of parks that were adjacent to a central neighborhood. First we picked up burritos - making me feel even more at home - and started out walking tour of Cherry Blossoms Central. We started at Edo Castle, walked through the Eastern Gardens, around the huge walls and moat of Akasaka-Mitsuke Gate, Around the fortified walls of the Asasuka Palace (which unfortunately was closed to the public this weekend), through the Meiji Jingu Gaien located in a large public park, through the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden which was exceptionally gorgeous, crowded and totally worth that $2 entrance fee; and finally through Yoyogi Park, ending around sunset walking through the quiet peaceful forest that surrounds the tomb of Emperor Meiji. It had only been 5 hours and over ten miles, but we were tired and famished.

Somehow - and I do mean somehow-  we kept walking and started our eating and drinking phase of Tokyo exploration. Before I continue, I must thank Amanda Lurie tremendously for her awesome recommendations of dining out in Tokyo. We ended up taking a half dozen of her recommendation and every single one was a little treasure I doubt we would have stumbled upon ourselves. I guess we could have Yelped our way through Tokyo, but it was great to have personalized recommendations.

We ended up walking a bit more, through Shibuya, then through what appeared to be the busiest intersection in the world (I remembered it from Lost in Translation), found a quiet but hip vegan restaurant for Katy, ate some falafel paired with more traditional Japanese cusine. We then proceeded to hike some more, stopped for a quick cocktail at a not so large bar with about 12 stools and some standing room, then made it to another restaurant where we were unfortunately told we could not sit inside because we had not made a reservation. As we were dejectedly putting our shoes back on to leave, the friendly waiter told us we could sit at one of the window seats if we liked. Of course! That looked something like this, with me sitting on beer crates on the street, and Katy sitting at the window ledge that doubled as extra table space. The meal was the best I have had on this adventure so far, including beef neck, bacon wrapped noodles, lots of cabbage and perhaps the most delicious pork belly I have ever tasted - and I have tasted my fair share of pork belly.

The next morning we were a little tired from our sixteen miles of walking but ready for more adventures. Unfortunately it was raining, so we decided to skew our adventure to eating and drinking our way through the city. Starting at the Tsukiji fish market, we grabbed snacks and suds to start our day after stumbling into a gorgeous Buddhist temple. While it was pouring rain, the fish market was still crowded with local and tourists alike, but didn't smell like fish. The entire time in Tokyo I was impressed with the city's cleanliness, but a fish market not smelling fishy was all the evidence I needed. Cherry blossom icons kept popping up on our Google Maps, so despite the rain, we kept exploring.

We pushed on through the rain to Ueno park for more cherry blossoms, a beautiful pond and traditional Japanese style gardens. Then sufficiently wet, we headed over to Ebisu neighborhood and another recommendation from Amanda for a noodle spot. This international micro-chain was exceptional, and even though we didn't order any noodles, we dried off, used their super-fancy toilet, had a beer, dumplings and did some research. It turns out that Ebisu the neighborhood is named for the Yebisu Brewery that was started in the 19th century. The Ebisu train station was originally used just for freight (mostly to transport beer) and the Yebisu Brewery Museum was only ten minutes away. Interesting history and artifacts in the museum, Yebisu was part of the first Japanese brewing conglomerate (with Sapporo). The beer and food was German in style, but as a brewery connoisseur, I can say that the atmosphere was truly unique for any brewery I have ever been in.

No longer thirsty, but hungry again, we set off to see what micro-bars in Tokyo might be like. We landed at Albatross, a tiny bar which was featured in an Anthony Bourdian episode. With a maximum capacity of 12, the bar sported 6 stools and 2 tiny tables with bench seating against the wall. I sat under the stairs and was one of the few in the bar who had the luxury of separating my knees. There was a cover charge - an act of patronage I will never be crazy about - but we had a pretty good authentic Japanese bar experience. A little tipsy we wandered a bit more before heading to the airport.

We had walked over 26 miles in under 36 hours, donning backpacks for most of our travel. It was a marathon and a sprint, and by the time we got to the International Terminal we could not be happier to overpay for a few pizzas and glasses of wine in an Italian place (did I mention Tokyo is expensive?). There are no great take-aways, but my small take-aways were: 1. were Japan is cool, 2. Tokyo is huge, 3. Japanese fashion is crazy and awesome, 4. everywhere we went in Tokyo was expensive and also tiny, 5. it's the cleanest and most polite city I have ever been to, 6. I hope I get to go back again sometime soon.