**Intro:**
Our trip was from November 4th to November 24th. My husband and I are both 30 and this was our honeymoon after delaying the trip for over a year as a result of the country’s covid lockdowns. Originally our trip was only going to be two weeks and we were also considering South Korea but when it got pushed back another year we decided to go all out and stay in Japan and push our trip length to 3 weeks, and I’m so glad we did!
Something to note: We did not really budget for this trip. We agreed to aim for max 10k USD (excluding flights) by the end of the trip. We are privileged enough to have shopped and ate at our leisure. We paid for about 3 expensive meals on this trip and our hotel stays were of average price IMO. Lastly, my husband’s interests include coffee, raw denim, American heritage fashion, and leather boots. Mine include stationary, anything and everything kawaii, and women’s fashion. Of course we both love food, coffee, and sightseeing in general.
We rented pocket WiFi prior to our trip and had it delivered to our first hotel.
We purchased our plane tickets in early 2023 and flew premium economy on Singapore Airlines for approx. $3600 for two round trip, direct flights from LAX. We landed in NRT. A note on premium economy…on an American airline/domestic flight, I can’t really imagine a situation in which premium economy would be THAT much different than economy. However, I found premium economy on Singapore Airlines to offer enough “upgrades” to make the extra cost worth it for us, and it resulted in the decision to get premium economy for any future international long haul flights. We are headed to Egypt in the spring and tickets are really expensive so we were originally planning to cheap out but after our flight to Tokyo I’m realizing just how miserable I could have been.
**Flight Experience:**
On premium economy, it was 2-3-2 on our plane so my husband and I got in a two-seater row which was great because I can’t remember the last time I flew in a row of less than 3 seats! Our seats had blankets, pillows, and noise-cancelling over-ear headphones. The seat’s recline capability was about 4 inches more than in economy and we also had a calf rest and a foot rest. We both pre-selected our meals a few days before our flight because they have Book the Cook options available for pre-booking. Plus, that way, you get your meals first. I was actually recovering from an absolutely horrible case of gastroenteritis right before our trip and had selected the “bland meal” option for the way there lol. It sucked obviously. But my husband had katsu curry for one meal and pork belly for another and said it was good! Another great thing about premium economy for Singapore is you get your own check-in and boarding lane and priority bag stickers on your checked baggage so that they come off the plane first.
**Landing in NRT on November 5th:**
We landed in NRT on Sunday, November 5th at 5:30 PM. We had completed our Visit Japan forms prior to our departure, which I definitely recommend doing. We made it through immigration, customs, and baggage claim in about 15 minutes. It was definitely a well-oiled machine. I had booked us private transfer to our Shinjuku hotel on Klook for approx $120. I used airport wifi to connect with our driver since our Pocket Wifi was waiting for us at our hotel. It took approx 90 minutes to get to our first hotel of the trip *Tokyu Stay Shinjuku Eastside.* We stayed in a “comfort double room with table” for 5 nights and opted out of the breakfast option. Picked this hotel mostly for it’s washing machine/dryer. After checking in, we stopped at 7/11 for some snacks before heading to bed.
**November 6th (Shibuya/Shinjuku):**
Woke up around 4am and I was still feeling pretty terrible despite having gone to the hospital in LA right before our trip. Pushed through to the best of my abilities. We planned on going to Verve Coffee in Shinjuku as it was one of the coffee shops we found that opened early (7am!) that wasn’t Starbucks/Tully’s. While we waited for it to open, we had quick conbini breakfast (individual soft boiled eggs became my bestie) and walked through the empty streets of Shinjuku. Went to Verve at opening and afterwards headed to Meiji Jingu in Harajuku. Completely neglected to consider that it was now the beginning of rush hour and we got on the Yamanote Line from Shinjuku station. Dear god it was crowded. Just when I thought no one else would possibly fit on the train, three more people got on. We made it to our destination and laughed after because our first experience on the Tokyo metro was probably the most stressful it could have been. The rest of the day included:
\-Coffee (Kitasando Coffee)
\-Shopping (Pure Blue Japan, The Flathead, Kiddyland, Marijuan’ Ometesando
\-Conbini standouts: red salmon salt onigiri is goated, maple and margarine pancakes
\-Meals: lined up 35 min before 11am opening of Gyukatsu Motomura Harajuku and wowwww this meal set the bar high!
\-Activities: Hanazono Shrine, Shibuya Sky at 6pm (didn’t knock my socks off but I’m glad we did it and it was crazy to see how big the city is)
Unfortunately I was still feeling very poorly at the end of the day and was sort of panicking about how I was going to manage another three weeks with the amount of regular nausea I was experiencing. Spoke to our hotel staff and they could not have been more helpful. They set me up to head to The National Center for Global Health and Medicine that night. Unfortunately, they weren’t able to help me, but they were very kind and suggested I return the following morning.
Step count: 26,105
**November 7th (Shibuya/Shinjuku):**
I had spent the previous night researching health clinics with English language services that were closer to the center that I had been to the previous night. Ended up having hotel staff make me an appointment at Shinjuku Hiro Clinic which was about a 15 min walk from our hotel. Long story short, they were amazing/helpful/kind and diagnosed me with gastritis and prescribed me the appropriate medicine. And it was only $77 to boot. The rest of the day included:
\-Coffee: (Eight Coffee – we loved this one!)
\-Shopping: Loft (my favorite store of the whole trip), Red Wing, Parco, Momotaro Jeans Aoyama
\-Conbini standouts: French toast (hnnhhh), peach water, coffee Coolish
\-Meals: Shibuya Gyoza for lunch, Oreo shake and fries at On the Corner in Parco, MoMo Paradise Kabukicho for dinner
\-Activities: Game Panic and GiGo for games and gacha, Shibuya scramble crossing, wandering around aimlessly
Step count: 18,344
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**November 8th (Setagaya, Shimokitazawa):**
Jet lag was getting better and we woke up at 6am instead of 4am. We walked to Musashino Mori Diner Shinjuku for breakfast so I could try Japanese pancakes. I’m not sure if it was just this place, as we never ended up trying pancakes elsewhere, but they basically tasted like egg and it was so filling I couldn’t even finish one. Also when I ordered a vanilla latte they gave me a latte with two scoops of vanilla ice cream on the side to add in lol. We headed to Gotokuji temple first thing afterwards and while I am so glad I went and got to see all the manekineko myself, I left feeling super frustrated by the behavior of other tourists around me and this would become a theme of the trip. There were foreign families talking very loudly and letting their children absolutely wreak havoc all over the shrine grounds (running/yelling, touching a bunch of shit that didn’t look like it was meant to be touched). People blocked the general flow of traffic for Instagram photo ops and it just felt very performative. And don’t get me wrong, I wanted a picture of the cats and I can appreciate wanting to document your trip but I think there is a way you can do it without being an absolute inconvenience to everyone around you…at some point you gotta accept that there is gonna be random shit and random people in the background of your photos. The rest of the day included:
\-Coffee: Brooklyn Roasting Company (love!), Bear Pond Espresso
\-Shopping: Tsutaya Bookstore, Colourz Japan, New York Joe Exchange
\-Conbini standouts: orange water, vanilla daifuku ice cream
\-Meals/Snacks: Gansozushi Shimokitazawa, tanghulu (hnnnnh), Ramen Mitaba
\-Activities: Itsukushima Shrine, wandering Shimokitazawa, Don Quijote Shibuya (yikes), more wandering Shinjuku
Step count: 19, 994
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**November 9th:**
Took today easy because I was having some achilles inflammation like an absolute tool and I didn’t want to push it and ruin the rest of the trip.
\-Coffee: Eight Coffee (again)
\-Shopping: LUMINE
\-Conbini standouts: pizza bun, chocolate covered potato chips
\-Meals: Sushiro for lunch and Curry Udon Tatsuyoshi Kabukicho for dinner
\-Activities: wandering around aimlessly, GiGo at night
Step count: 16, 610
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**November 10th:**
Woke up early today to send our bags to Kyoto via luggage forwarding service. Today was reserved for our AirBnb Experience which I had reserved many months prior due to its popularity and limited availability at the time of purchase. [Here is the link](https://www.airbnb.com/experiences/71924), I can provide more detail if you’d like but essentially we met Toshi-san at Toyosu Fish Market at 5:45am to watch the tuna auction. Toshi-san has personal experiences with this business so he was able to provide a lot of insight into the process. He then took us to Tsukiji Outer Market and some treats were provided as part of the experience. Otherwise, we had some time to explore on our own and I had the BEST ichigo daifuku of the entire trip here. Afterwards, Toshi-san took us back to his shop in Asakusa where he and his wife prepared all of the seafood from the market for us. Be mindful though, this is a heeeavvvy seafood meal so if you’re hesitant about eating giant raw oysters, various types of sashimi, sea urchin, cracking open crab legs, etc. then maybe this experience won’t be for you. I’ll admit there were a couple of things I handed off to my husband or to some of the other people at the table lol.
We had Shinkansen tickets to our next destination (Osaka) booked for 5pm. Prior to our trip, I had set up the Smart Ex app and designated the tickets to our IC cards which was super easy to do. We hung out at Tokyo Station for a little and headed over to Osaka!
Step count: 22, 335
My next post will cover Osaka and Kyoto. Thanks for reading!
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