The Log Dog Blog: Land of the Rising Sun: Day 2

Saturday, April 8, 2017

Land of the Rising Sun: Day 2

Saturday, April 8

We woke up extremely early, because a 13-hour time difference really takes some getting used to, so we were ready for breakfast at the hotel as soon as the restaurant opened at 6:30 am. The breakfast buffet was fantastic! Over the years, we have grown pretty impressed with the restaurants at Hilton hotels we've stayed at, and we typically choose to eat breakfast at the hotel each day, especially when we are traveling internationally. Being in Japan, this buffet had some unique offerings, and I decided to try some of the fried rice. I'm pretty sure it was the first time I've ever eaten fried rice for breakfast, and I've got to say that it was the most delicious fried rice I have ever had. No joke. I've been a vegetarian for over 20 years and half of my family is Chinese, so believe me when I say that I've eaten my fair share of fried rice! I am already looking forward to breakfast tomorrow - that's how good this fried rice was!

As for the rest of the day, we spent it exploring Tokyo. We took the train to the downtown area and played tourist, wandering around, looking in shops, and visiting some neat places. The highlights were the Meiji Jingu Shrine and the Hachiko statue. If you do not know the story of Hachiko, you should research it. More proof that humans just don't deserve dogs. His statue is definitely one of things I was most looking forward to seeing in Tokyo.

I happily admit that I have a love affair with stationery. Pens, pencils, notebooks...you get the idea. While I had certainly suspected that I would kind cute stationery in Japan, I had no idea the level of restrain that would be required for me to not buy every single adorable thing I saw today. And so much of it was Disney! Things I have never seen in the States! I had to keep reminding myself about our luggage limitations and that I still had Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea ahead of me. Seriously so much fabulous stationery!

Speaking of Disney, we went to the Disney Store, and again, there were so many cute things! It's interesting to see which characters and movies are popular here...two unexpected finds were The Three Caballeros and The Rescuers. Tons of merchandise for these two movies, which are rarely even mentioned in America!

We went back to the hotel to rest for a while, and then did some more wandering around at night. We found a replica of the Statue of Liberty right near our hotel, and we also wandered past a little shop that had the most surprising window display. Orange Bird! If you've read any of my WDW posts, you know I love Orange Bird. I've loved him since the first time I visited WDW in 1981, and was thrilled when he was brought back a few years ago. Why this particular window display featured so many Orange Bird figurines, I'll never know, since the shop had nothing to do with Disney as far as I could tell. But it made my night! So cute!

We're looking forward to another day of sightseeing tomorrow...who knows what we'll stumble across in our adventures!