Herb Garden with views of Mt. Fuji

The previous post in this series is here..

After eating Fuji apples we drove to the last stop before lunch. A herb garden. Our driver told us he already had told the restaurant that we will be coming before Noon.

There was a short drive to the Herb garden as it is almost towards exiting the Mt. Fuji area. It was beautiful. There was an observation deck above the garden with a little hike. The garden was free and the deck was not. Given the time constraint, the group just decided to hang out in the garden while I paid and ran up to the deck. Did not do justice to the money paid for the deck. There were lot of activities there including a swing .. you could take pictures of swinging towards Mt. Fuji.. it was all setup for photographers.. clicked what I could and ran back in time to join the group. The photos from Herb Garden visit

A video highlight reel..

After we finished, there was a short drive to the restaurant. There was no one there and the menu was 90% non veg, this after telling our driver that we were vegetarians. The restaurant folks were his friends. Also this wasn’t the restaurant we had checked out and put in the email earlier. Told him to drive us to the Taj restaurant. He reluctantly did and went back to eat with his friends. The Taj restaurant had a fantastic meal for us. We had a great lunch. Then we called our driver and he picked us up to take us back towards Tokyo.

He gave us the option to be dropped anywhere else if we wanted to sightsee before going back to hotel. We were going to see the old tower. He suggested we go to the new one. He dropped us off and we wished him well.

The tower experience in the next post..

Uniqlo from head to toe - Tokyo Day 6

The previous post in this series is here..

We had a really happy dinner at the Monday Apart Hotel after coming back late from Ueno park. Then we had to pack as we had to change to the Tokyo Dome hotel on day 6.

There was a brilliant idea to do laundry, given there was a washer and dryer in the room and the nice attendant had given us detergent to use. I threw all our dirty clothes in the washer (mostly mine) and turned it on. Wash it did. Dry it did not after 4 hours. We called the attendant and they turned it on for another 2 hours.

Went to sleep. Woke up to find wet clothes. Even wetter than before. The menu was all in Japanese in the washer and there was a poorly written manual. So we called the person from the lobby. They turned it on, while we went and had breakfast.

Breakfast was great at this vegan place which had a Tarot theme. The service and food, just great! We came back in hopes of packing up and the attendant profusely apologized and said the machine was defective. They even tried to use another machine in a different room but clothes still slightly wet and damp. So I got a garbage bag full of wet clothes, put it also in the Uber and off we went to Tokyo dome.

I will still recommend this hotel to anyone. Just because I have repeatedly had bad luck with laundry in other countries, doesn’t mean you will. It is a nice hotel with good staff and great amenities.

We showed our reservation and dropped off all the luggage in the cloak room of the Tokyo dome hotel, including the bag of wet clothes. No one said anything. It was close to 9 AM and we had to be outside till at least 1 PM which was when we could check in.

We walked to the Tokyo train station , shopped there.

We then went to Ginza area. We got to go to the Uniqlo flagship store. All 12 floors of it. I have not shopped like this in a long time. Tried on lots of jackets, pants and so did everyone. We got a few things we liked and were happy to come out of the store after a good 2 hours. Then it was time to lug the bags and go have lunch.

As usual Jr. found us a Michelin star Indian restaurant right there. The food was good at Bangera’s kitchen. Then we lugged all the shopping bags and made it back to Tokyo dome hotel. The bags were heavy and I protested more walking. It was already close to 3 PM anyways. We went and got our room keys and got our luggage up to the rooms. The photos from the morning and afternoon..

Everything was slow because of the BTS concert. The seating was starting at 4:30 and there was a large crowd standing for buying concert merchandize. Even getting to the hotel was interesting. We were happy to make it to the room.

A video highlight.

We took a quick Chai break in the room and realized that some amends had to be made. In spite of eating all the packaged food, the clothing purchased was way too much. We will need another suitcase! We tabled that discussion for later and decided to leave the hotel to go sightseeing again. We were in two minds on going back to Ueno park to make up for the previous night. The group thought the photographer should not be denied and off we went..

That and the rest of the evening in another post..

Japan Trip Day 3 - First evening in Kyoto

Previous post in this series is here..

It was close to 6PM when we got to our hotel in Kyoto. It was a massive hotel, the Miyako opposite Kyoto Train station.

We were formally introduced by Jr. to Uniqlo store in Kyoto. I have been to this store before once in bay area and once in Taipei. Didn’t understand the hype given the prices. Turns out the price is right for Uniqlo in Japan. The clothes are amazing and lightweight and fit me wonderfully! We promptly planned for a lot more purchasing at Uniqlo. After the intro shopping we were late for the dinner.

Jr. had already picked a vegan Indian place to dine for the night. So we took an Uber XL and went to the shopping area. We walked around the stores and then made our way to the place only to find it extremely busy.

We begged the owner at Vog and he said “if you can eat and leave in 30 minutes, will give you a table for 6. we have another party coming in 30 minutes”. We told him if the food comes fast we will eat fast.

We had an amazing meal at this place even if it was rushed. Towards the end he came and gave us another 10 minutes but by that time the food was licked clean off the plates. We were full. This place gets a two thumbs up from all of us!

We walked back to the Uber pickup spot. We were told by the little one that as penance for her not being with us, we should get her a branded shoe only available in Japan. We saw that there was a line for the shoe store a mile long and after a certain time they close the line. This had to wait for another day.

A short video of the. evening.

We made it back to our hotel and called it a night. The following day was going to be busy as well. We had already changed the plan for the day while on the bus.