I don't know a word of Japanese! - A COMPLETED TR!

[Aussie Wendy]

Loving reading your report and bringing back some great memories-I can't believe how quiet the parks are compared to when we were there in April-especially DL- and I thought they were good then as it was in the short gap before Golden Week started and after schools went back from Spring Break. Battymum-great to hear you have committed! Hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

 

[BecBennett]

Yeah, I was pretty surprised with how quiet it was too! It was the week of a public holiday too, so I was exepcting big crowds, and they just weren't there..? I'm definitely not complaining though!

 

[BecBennett]

All of a sudden there were lights shining overhead and all around so we started to make our way towards them. Then a familiar tune started up – Fantasmic! I had forgotten that it played here! We watched for a little while, but couldn’t get that great a view of it, so we decided we’d use the time to get a few more rides in with short waits.

We rode JTTCOE with only a 20 minute wait. DH made friends with some Japanese girls in the line. They spoke a couple of lines of English (and knew Koala) and DH knew konichiwa and arrigato. He thought it was great being the attention of so many young girls.

Next we rode Indiana Jones again, with only a 10 minute wait this time. Still love this ride. Again DH made friends with all the young girls riding with us.

We then started making our way out of the park, by going out the way we came in, through the winding Mediterranean Harbour back streets. It’s so pretty at night. It had started sprinkling but it wasn’t too bad.

We had a quick look around Ikspiari for dinner, but everything was closing, so we figured we’d get something for dinner back at Shinjuku. On the bottom level of Ikspiari we found a small grocery store. There was a heap of different food options so I grabbed a couple of snacks.

This was easily the busiest trip we made on a train in Tokyo. Does anyone know what time traditional business hours finish in Tokyo? We saw more people heading home from work at 11pm then what we saw between 4pm and 8pm. Bugger that, I finish work as soon as I can! If I can be home by 4pm I will be!!

When we got back to CST we found that everything here was closed as well. My feet were killing me from walking all day, and being off them was far more preferable to food. However DH wanted something to eat, so he headed out to see if he could find something to bring back.

About an hour later he stumbles in empty handed with a cheeky grin. I assumed that he hadn’t been able to find anything, or that he had, but had left it outside the door just for sh*ts and giggles. Turns out he had found plenty of places open, including a noodle place where you order using a vending machine. He ordered 2 meals, one for me and one for him, however he didn’t know how to ask for take away. So when the meals came in the restaurants bowls he decided that all he could do was eat both meals… It was only the other day I asked him why he didn’t think about grabbing me something from one of the 24 hour McDonalds…

I had a few rice crackers (cruskits) with cheesybite (a type of vegemite) from home and some timtams that I'd picked up at Ikspiari and called it a night. I was still happy I didn’t have to keep walking on my sore feet.

 

[jsilvers]

Does anyone know what time traditional business hours finish in Tokyo? We saw more people heading home from work at 11pm then what we saw between 4pm and 8pm.

Here's a Japanese word for you - karōshi (過労死). Essentially, "death-by-overwork." The typical Japanese "salaryman" doesn't necessarily expect to make it home until late ... or at all (and thus the infamous "capsule" hotels).

 

[BelleBway]

Turns out he had found plenty of places open, including a noodle place where you order using a vending machine. He ordered 2 meals, one for me and one for him, however he didn’t know how to ask for take away. So when the meals came in the restaurants bowls he decided that all he could do was eat both meals…

I wonder if that's the same noodle shop I went to on my trip.

 

[BecBennett]

Here's a Japanese word for you - karōshi (過労死). Essentially, "death-by-overwork." The typical Japanese "salaryman" doesn't necessarily expect to make it home until late ... or at all (and thus the infamous "capsule" hotels).

I've heard of that, I just wasn't sure if it was a real thing, or just in movies

I wonder if that's the same noodle shop I went to on my trip.

lol - I have no idea where he went, so it could have been!

 

[BecBennett]

We got home today and I really want to update my TR, but after 2 days of travelling I'm very Meh...

Maybe tomorrow, after a good night's sleep...

I will just say this though, throughout our trip - particularly in Tokyo, DH and I would comment on how late people stayed out, and that we didn't think they slept, and that's why there were so many people always dancing at Yoyogi Park, they weren't doing it for fun, they were just delirious from no sleep.

We often joked that if we kept going the way we were - constantly touring around from morning until night without rest - it wouldn't be long and we'd be dancing deliriously as well.

Well I would like to announce that it is official. DH has had a few drinks and is currently dancing around our kitchen to music from his Ipod.

He is delirious...

 

[BelleBway]

Well I would like to announce that it is official. DH has had a few drinks and is currently dancing around our kitchen to music from his Ipod.

He is delirious...

I am definitely looking forward to hearing more about your trip when you get a chance, especially the non TDR parts. I know it can take awhile to gather thoughts and adapt to being back home etc, so no rush.

 

[battymum]

I am definitely looking forward to hearing more about your trip when you get a chance, especially the non TDR parts. I know it can take awhile to gather thoughts and adapt to being back home etc, so no rush.

ditto!

 

[DreamSweetsLove]

Glad to hear you made it back ok and that you enjoyed your trip!

 

[mikelan6]

Great TR so far ... thanks for sharing!

 

[BecBennett]

Today we decided to sleep in and take it easy. We’d been going pretty hard core since arriving in Japan, and were starting to feel it.

We headed back to Disneyland around 12pm. Something I meant to point out earlier – so many people catch a train to Disney from Tokyo station that the little train line map on the platform at Tokyo is missing the Maihama station – simply because everyone who wants to go there point at the station on the map, and the writing has all worn off… So if you’re ever waiting on a platform at Tokyo station for a train to Disney and you’re worried that you’ve got the wrong platform because you can’t see your destination, don’t panic, just look closer…

We stopped at a sushi place at Ikspiari for lunch. This place was really good! I remembered to ask for no wasabi this time, and really enjoyed my sushi. DH chose a couple of different things and really liked his selections as well.

We then made the walk back into Disneyland.

Again we headed left, and again POTC was only a 5 minute wait, so in we went! I could ride this all day.

We then made our way through the shops in adventure land. I think I’m more likely to buy souvenirs from the US parks then what I am from Japan, which is a pity as you don’t see anything like the Japanese souvenirs anywhere else, but I just can’t go past the price.

While still in adventure land I saw Baloo heading towards us. It might just be me, but I feel like the characters at TDL have a lot more freedom then those in the US. Some people might love this, especially the little kids that were about when he was out and about. They had some really great interactions, and when they walked off, baloo and these monkeys were all walking along in a line, holding hands with a bunch of kids. It was really special, and nothing I’ve seen anywhere else. My problem is that characters creep me out…

Usually in the states I’m ok around them, because I know they’re too busy to single me out and come after me, but when this Baloo pointed and waved at me and started walking towards me I felt I had nowhere to run! I had time to snap a quick pic and then try and hide behind DH.

After our narrow escape from The Jungle Book characters we decided to take a leisurely cruise on the Mark Twain. Nothing really to comment on here, it’s the same as in the US.

We also went for a walk around Tom Sawyer’s Island. We didn’t spend much time over there, but I managed to get one of these! It’s a Stitch icy pole! It’s like a bubble-gummy flavour icy pole, with a strawberry jam like filling – really nice, and it went down a treat!

We noticed that the parade was about to start, so we used it as an advantage to see what the wait time was on Buzz. It only had a 10 minute wait, so we were more than happy to ride. DH and I are pretty competitive, so we love this ride. DH always wins, but I’d never admit that to his face…

The TDR Buzz is the same as the DLR Buzz.

 

[battymum]

Yay, another update! What day are we up to, I will have to go back to the start.
I read the sushi menu "fish guts pickled in salt" hmm, how will I sell that to my family?

 

[PrincessInOz]

Loving all the food porn.


Sounds like a GREAT time with the young girls for your DH.

 

[BecBennett]

meh... second day back at work, and I'm already trying to work out when I can next take holidays...

 

[battymum]

Do you know this thread has had 4354 views -

There is a lot of lurkers waiting for the next installment!

 

[BecBennett]

lol... Are you trying to tell me something??

 

[battymum]

Just sayin,

I am hungry for information and this forum is definitely not as active as the Aussie board.

Although, you have a lot of catching up -
Lurky Lou has had 187745 views

 

[BecBennett]

The parade was still going on, so we also checked out the wait on Monster’s Inc. It was only 20 minutes, and knowing how popular this ride was I thought that was a pretty good time, so we lined up for it too.

I don’t get it… It’s cute, but there’s really very little difference between this ride, and the one at DLR. You get flashlights in your little car, and you aim them at the hard hats you see about the place. When the hard hat lights up something happens. Usually nothing special… Like one of the animatronics waves, or pokes out its tongue, or something else pretty basic.

The Japanese girls who were in the cars ahead of us were squealing and getting really excited over it, but really it’s not worth the line it gets. I’m really happy we didn’t wait longer than 20 minutes for it, and even more happy that we didn’t try and race to it at rope drop in the morning.

We did some more wandering around the park, looking for something to do that didn’t have a huge wait for it, would get us off our feet, but wouldn’t put DH to sleep, because he was pretty tired.

Evilina - This one is for you!

I had seen an icy drink/dessert earlier, very similar to the pineapple one I’d had the other day, but instead of pineapple syrup it had a berry syrup, and there were a few berries sitting with the ice cream on top. I really wanted to try this, because it looked so good! So I decided that we should try and find where they came from. This got really frustrating, I knew I didn’t see them in Main Street, so I figured it was in either adventureland or frontierland. We must have walked through these areas 3 or 4 times before we found the place! We know DL at DLR back to front, but finding this stall at TDL was next to impossible!!!

We finally found the stall though, so I finally got to try the berry option! I discovered that the ice cream was just plain soft serve, but that was OK, because it is awesome soft serve! I think I prefer the pineapple version, but I’m glad I got to give this one a try.

We then decided that we wanted to try and get a good spot to see the Natsu Matsuri show, so we found out that to get in the good seating area you need to enter into a lottery to get seat tickets. The lottery is held in Tomorrowland Hall. Basically inside Tomorrowland Hall is just a bunch of machines where you select how many people there are in your group, and then you scan in all of your park tickets. It then tells you whether you have been successful in the lottery. You can only do this once a day for each show. Unfortunately we were not successful in the lottery.

We decided that we really wanted to see the show anyway (well I decided I really wanted to see the show), so we made our way over to a pretty good position and took a seat on the ground to wait for the show. It was still just over an hour away, but there were a few people hanging around waiting for it to begin. We’ve never waiting this long for any show before, so it was all pretty new to us.

About 15 minutes before the show was to start an announcement came over and everyone started standing up. So we stood up too. I still had a pretty good view of the castle, so all was good. We were about 3 rows back from a large gardened area that separated us from where the prime seating was.

Then a lady in front of DH changed out of her crocs into 9inch platform shoes, so now he had a view of the back of her head… Then her friend stood up and put a face mask on her head (not over her face, just on her head) and blocked a little more of the view. Then a man stood up in front of me, and hoisted a full on professional video camera onto his shoulder… What the..? There was another bloke in between me and the guy with the video camera, so when he saw what was going to be in front of him for the show he adjusted his position so he was between the guy with the camera, and the girl in the platforms (which I would have done in his position too) which now left me with a view of everyone’s heads and a big ar$e camera.

 

[BecBennett]

I tried to focus on a few things happening on the stage in the tiny gaps left available, but in the end just took photos of the castle. It wasn’t long though and I got sick of trying to get photos, and not being able to see any of the show, and DH was being blinded by a girl next to him who kept letting her flash go off in his eyes, so we decided to start heading out of the park. Pretty disappointed that we couldn’t enjoy the show. I really wanted photos of Mickey with the Taiko drum. Not meant to be though…

We decided to try TGI Fridays for dinner in Ikspiari. We wanted something simple, but well cooked. I got the Jack Daniels Ribs and DH had some buffalo wings and the bacon cheeseburger. My ribs were delicious, but DH said his wings could have had more sauce/marinade and all he could taste in his burger was salt.

I also had the cookies and cream blended cocktail (alcoholic) which was amazing, and went down a little too well, and a Strawberry Lemonade crushed ice drink (non alcoholic) which was equally as good.

We then made our way home, very sleepy and pretty worn out.