Tokyo–March 18, 2016

The flight from San Jose arrived in Tokyo an hour early. Clearing customs took about a half hour; there were a lot of people arriving at about the same time as our flight. There was no problem with customs, and I made my way to the Keisei Skyliner, a train that goes from Narita airport to the Ueno district of Tokyo in about 43 minutes. It costs about US$25, but it’s worth it. I could have gotten a train that made more stops for US$12, but it would have taken about twice as long, and after a 10-hour flight I wasn’t up for that. Here is a picture of the train interior and a few pictures from the train window. The last picture shows what I think is Tokyo Tower. As usual, click any picture to see it at a larger size.

Once I got to Ueno, I went in search of the hotel. By happenstance, I found three people wearing orange vests; they were volunteer guides. One spoke French, another Spanish, and the third spoke English. The Spanish-speaking lady approached e first, so I carried out the conversation mostly in Spanish. They were headed in the same general direction as the hotel, and they showed me which staircase to take, and said “It’s near the Taito Ward office; the big building with the blue letters.” I had printed a map, and I figured it would be easy from there. Boy, was I wrong. I got sidetracked and wandered around for about an hour before finding the hotel. I asked several people and showed them the map, but none of them even knew which street we were on, much less where it was on the map.

The hotel is nice, but the room is incredibly small. There is no place to store the suitcase, and very little place to put clothes, so it looks like I’m living out of the suitcase for this trip. (Will try to get some pictures of the room later.)

I went out again in search of dinner; it was night by then. Here are a few pictures from my walk; the first picture is from inside Ueno station where they have a display for cherry blossom time. There are lots of little side streets near the Ueno train station, filled with restaurants and shops. I ended up at a place that specializes in soba (buckwheat noodles) and had some vegetable tempura and noodles. The tempura was excellent; the noodles were OK but not something I would actively seek out again. The price was right, too; about US$6.00.

Today’s Signage

One misspelling (hey, at least their English is better than my Japanese), and one clever sign: