Continued from Tokyo Day 1 Part 2.

Japanese breakfast this morning. Fried chicken karage and some dim sum offered free at the hotel breakfast bar. Yum.

We are going to have a slow start today. Not gonna leave until it’s time to head out for lunch. Kids, enjoy your ipad time.

Alright, time to head out for lunch. It’s sunny, it’s hot, but at least it’s not raining like it’s supposed to during this time of the year.

Down in the subway we go.

Busy train.

Looks a little like the dancing house in Prague.

Lunch spot, Maisen Tonkatsu.

There’s a small line already.

They offered fans for the people waiting. Yeah, it’s hot, but at least we have shade and it should open soon.

Really looking forward to this.

But the kids are a lot. They can’t sit still and be calm.

This place hasn’t changed. It’s mostly older crowd, I guess it’s not hip. Good, it’s also not stupid crowded and I just want my super delicious tonkatsu.

Yes please!!!!! So good!!!!

Kids are tonkatsu fans too. Of course they are, it’s fucking delicious.

Meal done, let’s do our only planned thing for the day, walk around harajuku and check out the stores. It’s hot, and more than other places, we see a lot of people here holding parasols.

Not much cloud cover, it’s hot.

This is the fancy part that we won’t be shopping at. Also, always need to make a comment about how this church is still here tucked between Burberry and LV. That building must cost a fortune.

We found a Y-3 store here. Y-3 is the design house that designed Little KL’s Japanese National Team soccer jersey, so we are going to see if they’ve got other soccer related items here.

Nope, as it turns out they don’t have any kids items here.

I did want to visit the Onitsuka Tiger shoe store though. I’ve been wearing Ultimate 81s for years and years, then they started phasing them out. I wonder if they have any here…nope. And it was super super super crowded, so I guess I’m not gonna buy any shoes for myself.

They also had a separate store that sold only Japanese made shoes. Kinda cool, but again, I didn’t feel like waiting for someone to help me.

Then there’s the kids shoe store with short lines.

Gonna get Little KL some new kicks.

The line was short, but it still took a while and he can’t contain himself so he’s gotta go wait in the corner. Crazy kid.

Got some shoes, and they gave us a coupon for a free drink at their drinks cart outside. Well, it’s great until we realized that it’s Japan and there are pretty much zero public trashcans anywhere. So we ended up holding an empty container for a long time. Seriously, where do people throw away their trash and how is it so clean when there’s no trash cans?

Even Shein has a tiny store front here.

Lots of apparel resale shops here.

They girls are shopping in the store behind us. Little KL looks pretty cute sometimes eh.

It’s starting to get more and more crowded.

And maximum crowd ahead. Kinda the reason why we came to harajuku to check out the scene here.

It’s so hot, must get some soft serve.

The employee making the ice cream was super generous. It’s so much, we couldn’t possibly eat it all. All of us ended up not finishing even though we got the smaller of the two sizes. But man, green tea ice cream hits so hard on a hot day like this.

What we just had, yum.

They’ve got these capybara cafes where you can pet them. It’s like the cat cafe next level.

Yup.

So many people.

There was a really long line to get into the Universal music store. I wonder what the allure is inside? Certainly not for CDs, right?

The end is in sight. So many people and so hot.

We made it. Yum, a 991.

As we were debating on whether to walk a long way to the train station (we are pretty hot and tired) or just call an Uber, Little KL noticed this giant soccer store. Alright, let’s check it out.

Pretty cool, there’s a whole section just for jerseys and he was able to score a couple of local team jerseys, Tokyo FC and Kawasaki. Pretty cool souvenirs for him.

It’s just too much to walk to train station and go through all the stations and transfers, Uber it is. We always need to call the Premium Van since it’s the only vehicle that seats 5. Kinda cool that they show you a street view of where to stand for pick up.

Premium Vans with a giant grill in front.

Oh it’s nice to get out of this heat and just sit in a car that will take us directly back to our hotel.

Everyone’s happy to be in the AC.

For such a massive city, the highways are actually relatively small and light on traffic (at least right now). I think they are all toll ways as well here.

A little fishing spot right in the middle of Tokyo, cool.

Haven’t seen one of these in a while.

That river cruise looks like a spaceship.

Asahi headquarters.

There’s definitely money here in Tokyo.

Made it back! The beer machine was having problems, no worries, the staff got us another bottle of beer and poured it straight from the source.

Beer dispenser troubleshooting.

Alright, let’s spend the afternoon inside out of the heat resting. It’s almost the end of our trip, we need to take today a little slower and recover some.

RL wanted to pick dinner tonight, and she wanted ramen. Found a small neighborhood spot right around the corner from our hotel.

8 person seating only, and they spoke very little English. Good thing they had just enough seats for us. I had to use Google Translate on the ordering menu to see what to order. Also used Google Translate to notify them of PL’s nut allergies.

So much flavor, the broth was slightly spicy, and the kids complained a little. We also ordered too much food, but very delicious. Yum.

Look at this new background for my phone from this trip. It’s so hard to get a half decent family photo for phone backgrounds.

A giant vat of soup base to be served long into the night perhaps. A lot of people get their orders to go.

Footbath and manga time. It’s like a little hot tub for your feet. Fun.

Can’t read…yet.

It lights up all sorts of colors.

Time to catch up on blog. Of course, very behind. And as I’m writing this post now in Austin, it’s 10 days after leaving Japan.

We decided to go visit Tokyo Skytree and the aquarium next to it tomorrow. As I’m buying the tickets online, US is not listed as a frequently used country. Did not expect that.

Japanese Yen has gotten cheaper in the past 3 years, causing the influx of tourists. At least part of the reason.

Got this at the convenience store…we forgot it in the fridge though and didn’t end up eating it. Missed opportunity.

To be continued at Tokyo Day 3 Part 1.