My First Sunday Funday in Tokyo

In this post: Tokyo Skytree, Asakusa, and a little bit of Ueno.

Sunday, June 1st was my birthday! 

And what better gift than going on more adventures in an entirely new place?

We took the subway to Tokyo Skytree. And, conveniently enough, one subway entrance/exit leads directly to the basement of Skytree's Tokyo Solamachi. After taking the escalator up to the 1st floor, one can take the elevator to the 31st floor. That is the highest a person can go for free! The first 5 floor are dedicated to shopping, souvenirs, and restaurants. I'm pretty sure those middle floors are offices. And the 30th and 31st floor have some more exclusive restaurants as well as a damn nice view.

Check it out.

Oh wait, first check out the view of Skytree that we have from the home. This is what i get to see every day when I leave the house:

















Sweet, right?

Anyway, now you can check out the view from the 31st floor:

Seriously, wow.

Some smart (and green!) marketing

Enhance...

Oooh pretty! And are those solar panels on the right?

After going up, we then went back down to check out some of the shops in Solamachi. Oh yeah, why is it called "solamachi?" ソラマチ, can be broken up into ソラ (sola/sora) = sky. マチ (machi) = town. So, Sky Town! Clever!

There's something for everyone here, from the different clothes, toys, and souvenirs, to the meals, snacks, and desserts. 

But I'll have more to say on Solamachi another day.

Here's some more views of the tower. 

Inside, at the base of the tower, you can buy tickets to go up the tower. It's ¥2,500 (approx. $25). I haven't gone up yet. I might one day, but I haven't decided yet. I probably should though, because it's the tallest tower in the world. The tower itself is 634 meters high, and the highest point that tourists can go is 451 meters. Um, still pretty high up. There is even a restaurant, cafe, and shop up there. Hm, maybe I should go. 

After walking around the Skytree area for a while, we were off to Sensō-ji temple in Asakusa. About a 20-minute walk away, I was able to see some more beautiful sights and interesting things.

Getting farther away, but that tower is still huge.

Um........what?

So there are rickshaws in Asakusa. Real rickshaws that you can get pulled around in. I didn't know that was still a thing.

Neat.

I also got to see the Asahi Beer headquarters. The tall building is the Asahi Beer Tower, and it has an interesting shape on purpose. The change in angle of windows at the top of the tower is supposed to resemble the foam at the top of a glass of beer. Cool! Next to it is the Asahi Beer "Super Dry Hall", with a large golden flame-shaped object on top. The sculpture is lovingly known by locals as "the golden turd," with the hall itself referred to as "the poo building." Gaw.
I've heard there's a bar/restaurant on the 22nd floor, so maybe I'll check that out sometime.




There's also the Asahi Beer Annex building close by, which has 4 floors of yummy beer fun. The 1st floor is a more casual beer cafe. The 2nd floor has a beer hall. The 3rd floor has a beer restaurant. And the 4th floor has a more formal beer/cocktail bar. And the 2nd and 3rd floors are where some beer is actually brewed, so you can get super fresh beer there. Hm, maybe I'll have to go there too, yummmm.


After a nice walk, we came to our next destination: Sensō-ji Temple. This is a large temple, and upon getting closer, I noticed quite a different atmosphere leading to the temple itself. Where Meiji Shrine had a quiet, contemplative forest to walk through, Sensō-ji Temple had a long stretch of food and shopping stalls. Walking through this was a lot of fun. I saw a little bit of everything coming through here. Traditional fans and yukata, windchimes, purses, hats, dining sets, toys, and tons of snacks, desserts, and other food. 
And as a birthday gift, I even received a set of chopsticks with my name engraved on them from one of the stalls. Super sweet of my host family to get those for me. I love them!

Anyway, so here's what you see when you first approach the temple:

This is the first gate you walk through. Awesome!

See that huge red lantern thing? Did you wonder what's on the under-side of it? I did. And I wasn't disappointed when I looked:

Bad ass dragon carving.

Here's the entrance to all the shops.

And there's the looooong stretch of shops.

Upon reaching the temple area itself, I was invited to cleanse my hands and mouth at a really cool looking temizuya.

And here's the temple itself

After going up to the temple and bowing and praying, we started to make our way out.

We came upon this gorgeous garden off to the side of the temple. I snapped the picture and moved along too quickly though, so I'm sorry that the next picture is a bit blurry.

Doesn't matter still pretty.

And after our visit to Sensō-ji, we took the subway and moved on to our last destination: Ueno.

In Ueno, there is a large, pretty park that people can walk through, and surrounding the park are all different neat things to see. There is a little baseball field where a kids' team was playing a game. There is the Tokyo National Museum, housing all kinds of national historical artifacts. There is also the Tokyo Museum of Western Art, and the Science Museum. There is also a zoo, which has pandas!!

We ended up heading towards the art museum and then realized how exhausted we were. We decided to just get some light refreshments then head back home. 

Lots of gorgeous tall trees here

A main pathway. I was told that this area is crazy busy in the spring because all these trees are a beautiful pink color throughout sakura blossom season. People come from all over to see the beautiful flowers, have picnics, and get a little tipsy. Man, I'm bummed I missed it!

Here's one of the sculptures outside of the art museum.

And since I didn't see the pandas at the zoo, here's a building with a panda on it.

After coming home, we all got to rest and I helped make gyoza for my birthday dinner, and we all got to have a dessert from the local bakery after our meal.

It was a very good birthday. 

Talk to you all soon!