4/10 – Goodbye HAL, hello Gate 1

Off the ship – boo hoo. We totally loved it – and are completely sold on HAL. The staff are just so wonderful – and not just because of the suite thing. Everyone is. The bar server who serves mimosas in the morning (ok so that is in the suite dining – but we see him all over the ship and talk and goof with him everywhere) gave us an adorable little motorcycle or bike figurine made out of champagne corks this morning. I mean really. So, it was just lovely.

Our pre-booked a car for this morning arrived as ordered, actually 15 minutes early. Although it took us a while to find him because he kept texting in Japanese…. but…hey…Google translate is the bomb! Apparently he isn’t allowed up here at the entrance to the pier where we are waiting. We finally figure out that he is down the street in his “white business car!” Which actually is this huge white Suburban type thing with these great comfy bucket seats. And good thing they are comfy – because the ride into town took over an hour. Mostly because the driver was avoiding tolls and taking the city streets. But we don’t really care, it is still so early, we know we won’t be able to check in anytime soon – so longer is better.

Arriving at our hotel, the Prince Tokyo, it is still only 10 am, and as anticipated, we can’t check in. Checking our big bags with the concierge, we’re off for our day in Tokyo. First stop, the Tokyo tower which is right behind our hotel. This is a sort of Eiffel tower-ish structure with 2 viewing decks – and made out of metal melted from US war tanks left here in Japan. That’s an interesting little tidbit! Originally the radio and satellite tower here in Tokyo (that service now being fulfilled by the sky tower which 300 meters taller), it is now simply a tourist attraction with viewing platforms and a small mall type area on 2 lower floors. After looking at the pricing, we choose to only go up to the middle viewing deck – it was almost double to go up to the top – and really, after Harukas 300, we didn’t see the value. The middle deck was enough – and totally fun. Giving us an excellent view all over the city – and wow – what a city it is! Skyscrapers everywhere – the sprawl! It is a clear day and we can see all the way out to Mt. Fuji. Perfect. And the best? A cut out view down the support structures – which is really great, if not a little dizzying looking down.

After a quick cappuccino on the 2^nd level, we head downstairs in search of lunch. There is a food court with burgers and pizza as well as Japanese offerings, but nothing much appeals. In the corner though, we find a great little noodle bar where – once again – we order from a vending machine! (Don’t know if the vending machine thing is a COVID thing or a normal thing – we’re going with normal since they have vending machines everywhere!!). This is fun! Ordering salt shrimp wonton noodles for me and soba noodles with pork for Ed, we are shown to our little 2 person section of the bar where we get our water and wait for our meals, which are both excellent. There are tons of wontons and noodles – enough for a second serving for Ed! And the pork noodles are in an excellent miso broth. Fab.

On the way out, we watched people pose for pictures with the spires – but the best were the 2 women who were posing their dogs for glamour shots! Oh yeah. Their dogs!

It is still too early to think about checking in, so we walk through the Jojo-ji shrine that is next to our hotel. It is a lovely old temple, founded in 1393 as the first Nembutsu dojo in the area. It became the family temple of the Tokugawa shoguns and at its peak held more than 120 buildings with over 3,000 priests. Most of the buildings were burned in WWII bombings, but eventually rebuilt and restored as it is seen today.

The buildings are typical Buddhist and in one of the halls, while we were visiting, there was a blessing ceremony going on with one of the priests.

But probably one of the most interesting features is the Sentai Kosodate Jizo, the unborn children garden. Hundreds and hundreds of statues of children are located here and expecting parents and grandparents come here, select a statue and place a knitted cap upon its head to protect and keep the head warm and to wish for good health for the baby.

Besides just wonderful photos of the temples and the Buddhist statuary, there are also excellent views of the Tokyo Tower. Of which we take full advantage, and a sweet guy (who was there posing his girlfriend forever!) offers to take a picture of the 2 of us together. Very nice.

Figuring we might be able to check in by now, we walk back to the hotel, but no, our room is still not ready. Oh well – more exploration time. With the assistance of the very helpful lady at the check in desk, we found the closest subway station and headed off to the Imperial Palace – which is closed on Monday – as is every museum – but we thought we could walk around the park gardens. Nope. Closed means closed. We were actually aiming for this one area on the other side of the palace gardens that we had read had great cherry blossoms – hoping they’d still be there – but no go. It was a really long walk in the opposite direction of the metro, and we still wanted to be back at the hotel reasonably early to check in and get organized. We circled around the exterior of the Imperial Palace park, snapping pictures of the palace buildings peeking through the trees, and a couple of great bridges across the canal/moat. Heading south toward our hotel, we found a small little park, Hibiya, that the hotel lady mentioned had flowers. And it did! At least a few cherry blossoms were left there, and it was a lovely little park with lots of green space and a fountain and large bandstand area.

Plus there was a metro station there, perfect. Of course getting to our train in the station was a 1KM walk! These stations are amazing – there is a whole entire world of underground tunnels in Tokyo! You can walk forever underground to get places – even if you don’t get on a train. Great way to stay out of the weather!

Subway accomplished, we are back at the hotel again a little after 2, where we still couldn’t check in. Turns out that we don’t check in at the registration desk anyway – we register in this room called the Group Lounge (which isn’t a lounge but a large storage space with tons of luggage and a fold up table) and it won’t be open until 3. Sigh. Ok -we’re going for a drink, managing to find the outdoor cafe at the hotel (it is a maze in this place on 3 separate levels) with a lovely deck overlooking the Tokyo tower. The café was closing at 2:30 but we cajoled them into letting us just have a drink – no food. They reluctantly gave us a seat outside. Ha! Probably shouldn’t have – 2 beers were $24 USD! Great view, but not worth that price. Oh, and they were little beers to boot! Okie dokie, we will not be eating and drinking in this hotel, that is for sure!

Finally able to check in, we arrive at the lounge to find a lovely lady who has just arrived to set up. She gets all our information, checks our Vax cards and then gives us our room keys and a packet of information about the hotel – and earthquake preparedness. That’s a first! Check in complete, we arrive at a very spacious room on the 9th floor, though sadly not overlooking the tower. Oh well. Can’t have everything. After settling in, we went out for a walk – our evening exercise as this place has no gym (we’re figuring a COVID casualty) and found a lovely park next to the Jojo-ji shrine with lots of walking paths, beautiful flowers and great natural stairs up to the top of a large keyhole burial mound! I’d read about these, giant hills (or mounds) in the shape of a keyhole (you can only see it from above) used for burial tombs in the past, this one dating back to the 5^th century. Up top there is a marble carving of Japan along with some sort of inscription that Google translate couldn’t get.

At the bottom of the mound is a shrine with the foxes guarding it – and then further along the path, back down by the entrance to the park are more great views of the Tower. Nice little walk to stretch out our legs.

Back at the hotel – btw there is BEER vending machine on our floor next to the elevators!!! If we are ever in a pinch and Lawson’s is closed – they’ve got you covered! Amazing – we freshen up and head downstairs to meet our guide and group.

What ensues next is just, well I guess the best way to explain it is typical group behavior? Or bad group behavior? Don’t know. Our guide, Osamu, has literally just arrived from his last tour, so he’s a little flustered – understandably. And the group, which supposedly knows they need to be here at 7, meanders in little by little. They are still coming around 7:30. I mean, come on! We all got that information when we checked in – so where have you been?

At any rate, Osamu starts his presentation, has issues with a bad microphone and just sort of shouts out in the information. Of course, there is a whole lot of chattering going on in the back of the room – so you know nobody is listening. Let the fun begin!

Finished with the presentation, we all head off to the Japanese restaurant for dinner, were we have assigned seats – which works rather well – and an excellent dinner. True Japanese – which is totally surprising as we are expected a “dumbed down” version of food as per usual Gate 1 dinners. But, no. This meal is truly traditional with Sashimi, salmon teriyaki, beef steak, Japanese omelet, miso soup, salad, an egg custard thing and dessert. Just great.