Today it was time to move on from Kyoto and head to Tokyo. The best way to do that? By bullet train (Shinkansen) of course! You actually get 2 tickets which you need, so don’t lose either!
After breakfast I checked out and headed to the station. The Shinkansen entrance was on the same (southern) side as my hotel so it wasn’t hard to find. I placed both of my tickets into the machine together, the gates opened and I was through. It is important to insert both tickets at all gates.
Here are some links that I found helpful when it came to mastering the Shinkansen process:
http://gojapan.about.com/library/howto/htbullettrain.htm
http://mickwest.com/2007/04/02/skinkansen-tokyo-kyoto-and-back/
http://chrisatwaseda.wordpress.com/2009/11/05/shinkansen-to-kyoto/
http://hubpages.com/hub/How-to-ride-the-Shinkansen
Here’s another video someone else made:
That will give you a better idea of the experience.
I was now waiting on the platform for my train to arrive.
With each preceding train I was able to work out which half of the carriage was closest to my seat and that I would be sitting next to the windows (yeah!).
When my train arrived I jumped aboard and took my seat for the 3.5 hour trip to Kyoto.
You don’t get to see to much as they country side whizzes by and apparently on a clear day you can also see Mt Fuji, but not for me today.
We were soon at Tokyo and my next task was to find a subway station for the ride to my hotel near Shinjuku. Interestingly I had to pass through 2 sets of barriers before getting ‘outside’ the regional station. This is obviously why you have two tickets, one must be for the Shinkasen and the second must be for other regional trains. Anyway, to get of the regional station and get to the Tokyo subway you need both tickets.
Now the trick with the Tokyo subway is to find an entrance to the platform and not far away will be the ticket machines. I found a Pasmo machine, keyed in my details and gave it some credit and it spat a card back at me that I can use on the subway and recharge as needed. These are really the best way to use the subway I have found as all you need to do is simply swipe the card at the entry and exit barrier and the cost of travel is automatically deduced from the card.
I swiped past the barrier and headed down to the platform to hop on the subway. Luckily, Skinjuku is on the same line as Tokyo so all I had to do was wait a few stations.
Skinjuku is a HUGE station and last time I was here I could never get the right place to exit. This time I took my time and read all the maps and found the exit I wanted. It was very refreshing to start seeing things I remembered from my last visit. I was in the right place.
I waited in the location where the shuttle bus to my location was due to arrive. Here’s a few shots I took from that location at the lower level of the station entrance.
After about 40 minutes I began to realize that it wasn’t running at this time. This was confirmed by a friends bus conductor who had been watching me for a while and came over to tell me the bus to my hotel didn’t start till 4.30pm. Oh well, a little more walking wouldn’t hurt.
After about 10 minutes I finally arrived at my hotel, New City Hotel and checked in.
The view wasn’t as good as last time I was here as my room now just looks out onto more buildings and not onto the front road like last time.
What I like about this hotel is that it is really close to Shinjuku station (which is a major hub) and it is near the Shinjuku shopping area amongst other things that are still active after dark. The hotel is pretty basic but it is cheap, especially for a single room that suite me fine.
After a short breather I still had part of an afternoon left so I decided to use it and head out to the Salt and Tobacco museum near Shibuya station.
After changing trains I arrived in the locale and hit the streets. Typically I headed the wrong way. This is one place in Tokyo I have never been so it took a while to get my bearings.
Ends up the region is well know for its shopping and pokey side streets which doesn’t help when you are trying to find somewhere specific. I once again had to resort to Google maps as the map in my guide book was not detailed enough.
At last I arrived at my destination the Salt and Tobacco museum. A bit of a different museum. It is only really 3 floors with 1 floor dedicated to salt and 2 dedicated to tobacco. All the exhibits and explanations are in Japanese but it is still easy enough to work out what is going on.
I snapped these two shots on the salt floor before I realized that perhaps photography was frowned upon.
If are in the area and want to see a very different museum then I’d recommend that you stop by. You get a much better idea of the impact that tobacco (and salt to a lesser extent) has made over the years.
Time to head back to the hotel but the more I walked around the more I realized that this a pretty trendy area. Given that I haven’t been here before I’d like to try and make some time tomorrow to return if I get a chance.
Back on the subway. Where are all the people I hear you ask?
Here they are! Transiting like me between lines.
Finally back at my hotel ready for something to eat.
The hotel has a coin operated internet cafe at the ground level which I thought was the only internet access they had. Wrong! Turns out if you ask at the desk they will give you a modem that you can plug into your cable TV in your room and allow you internet access on your laptop in your room. Yet another reason to recommend the place in my books.
