Shinjuku | Travels, Adventures, and Leisure

We started off the day by checking out the Starbucks at the Gino District, where you can drink / eat Japanese style (ie sitting down on the floor). Here are the details :

http://food.johnmatienzo.com/2022/11/25/starbucks-gion-district/

We the taxied it back to Kyoto Station, where again I did get some McDonalds, and then caught the Shinkansen train to Tokyo (Shinagawa station). The train was 2.5 hours. I felt a bit nauseous at first, but got used to the high speed.

After getting to Shinagawa station, took one of the JR trains to Shibuya station. Our hotel is actually connected to the station (as the name, JR East Mets Shibuya, would suggest).

After getting settled in, we went to a close by conveyor belt sushi place in Shibuya (which was very close to the Shibuya scramble, which was super busy, as pictured below).

http://food.johnmatienzo.com/2022/11/26/katsumidori-seibu-shibuya/

After, we headed towards Shinjuku for some nightlife fun. First stopped by Golden Gai (so I could compare it to the burning man experience). Lol, the bars there are super tiny, but really fun. We went to one where the owner made a really good music video about Shinjuku.

Then we checked out Shinjuku Nichome. Basically you go to the local convenient stores (7 eleven, Lawson, etc), drink some seltzer or hard liquor, and then bar hop. We went Arty Farty, Dragon Men, and King.

Ended the night taxiing it back to the hotel.

Arrived at Tokyo yesterday at 2:35 PM. Clearing customs was super fast and easy. Figuring out the train to Sugamo was also not bad, but had a bit of difficult at first since Google maps didn’t recognize my hotels address (apparently because it’s super new). But after loading my Suica card with 1000 yen (which had a previous balance of 500 yen), I was ready to go!

I met up with Ben at Sugamo station, and we headed to my hotel. We were planning to go to the on-sen at my hotel, but they didn’t open till 5pm, so we check out his place.

After chilling for a bit, we went back to my hotel, and check out the on-sen. For the most part, it was similar to the Korean Spa we tried in New York, but slightly better.