Did I mention I took a 8-hours train from Sapporo to Tokyo? That's 4 hours from Sapporo to Hakodate, and 4 hours from Hakodate to Tokyo. The shinkansen from Sapporo to Tokyo ain't ready till 2031 so this is the fastest way by train. Train is good if you want to stop at different cities in Hokkaido. I wanted to stopover at Aomori but considering I have to take the first train at 6am I decided not to hahaha. It was fine, I just need a bento, a good book and filter my photos to fill my time and it was a good relaxing day.
Anyway shizuoka is really boring. There's nothing much there. I was expecting to go hiking up a mountain but the weather was too hot and there was no more bus service.
I finally had the famous dipping noodles when I stopped at Tokyo station for dinner.
Yup this is Shimitzu at Shizuoka.
The view from my hotel was nice though.
I was bored to death at Shizuoka and was so glad to go back to Tokyo. I have been wanting to eat this near my usual hotel and voila! Japanese Kampung chicken so juicy.
I explored a new area Jiyugaoka and had Flipper's pancakes for breakfast, recommended by my cousin. It's quite nice with the fruits and all but Café Gram's pancakes are fluffier. But you gotta queue for an hour for Café Gram's pancakes and they don't come with fruits.
As usual, Akihabara for supply runs and cheese tarts. This is Pablo peachy tart. Then Shibuya for some shopping.
Lunch set at a hidden sushi shop at Tsukiji market, much better and cheaper than the tourist traps there. $12 for a set of 9 sushi. Check out Sushi Katsura.
I finally got a sense of direction at Shinjuku, with Takashimaya and Isetan as a station guide. I met Emi-chan for lunch on my last day, she's super nice!! She suggests I go Iwate for snowboarding this coming season and we could stay at her house and she could recommend her friend to bring us around the area. Super excited.
By the way this cabbage/lettuce looking thing is actually matcha shaved ice. It was too hot walking around so I ate some ice at a new matcha dessert shop at Takashimaya.
It was my last day in Tokyo and it was sale season so I went crazy shopping at Harajuku, Shinjuku and Shibuya. I have no idea why my cash ran out so fast so I used my credit card for most stuff.
I wasn't sure if I should buy a NMD because there wasn't one that I fancied until I stumbled into Nano Universe and saw this pair. To top it off, it was on 50% discount and it's exactly my kind of colour and size. I saw the same pair somewhere else and I was like $200 for a pair of Adidas is not worth it but this was $100. No need to think.
After the crazy shopping I was 20mins late with multiple paper bags for dinner with Habu-chan. He brought me to this izakaya which was quite nice. Oh did I mention he could speak fluent Chinese because he studied at Beijing for 2 years before.
Sake sampler. We could actually tell the difference.
Habu-chan is super nice and funny and he works at Shinagawa, which is near my hotel.
I totally enjoyed my 12 days solo trip to Japan. Weather in Hokkaido is much cooler than Tokyo, remind to self not to go Tokyo after July. Summer is hot and humid there I kept sweating once I am outside. Honestly I felt a little lonely at first at Hakodate, maybe because it was a bit boring as well, but my friends are really fun in Sapporo. Furano and Biel were beautiful. Shizuoka was boring. And again, the sale in Japan in crazy. I'm glad to meet most of my friends this time round.
Things that I bought:
Hokkaido sweets
Kinobi gin
Suntory ice gin
Beanie, underwear, shorts from H&M
Shizuoka green tea
Mystic blue NMD shoes
Grey shoes and some clothes from GU
Olive Lacoste tshirt (made in Japan)
Lanvin En Bleu tshirt (made in Japan)
Commodities like eyedrops/facial stuff from BIC camera
More sweets from Tokyo
Shiseido stuff
I feel like I haven't bought enough haha.
This 12 days holiday I spent SGD $3500 in total:
$460 flight
$1200 hotels
$339 Rail pass
$1500 changed from SGD to JPY.
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