Second Full Day in Japan – Guided Tour

Travel Blog 2 Minutes
From left to right, Rika our tour guide, Sara, Dana and Mark.

Rika spent the morning and half the afternoon showing us around Asakusa. We had a great time. Rika is a fabulous tour guide and a genuinely nice person.

Our first stop was the Senso-ji Temple. A temple is a place dedicated to Buddha and a shrine is dedicated to Shinto. At this temple complex there is a large temple and a small shrine.

This temple complex is over one thousand years old. It has been destroyed by fire, earthquakes and war over ten times, but it has always been rebuilt.

This is a shot of the shopping arcade leading from the main gate of the temple complex to the temple itself.
This is the Senso-ji temple.
This pagoda is part of the temple complex.
Rika was not only a great tour guide, she did an excellent job coaxing Sara and Dana into posing for pictures with dear old dad.

As lunch time approached Rika told us we were going to a restaurant where she was going to cook us lunch! We walked for about ten minutes and arrived at the Monia Koboreya. The hostess was an old high school friend of Rika’s. The hostess led us upstairs and seated us at a corner table. The table had a hot griddle in the middle and Rika started ordering food.

First course. Cabbage and cheese and dried octopus.
Rika dumped all the ingredients on the griddle and with two metal spatulas she chopped and stir fried the ingredients into a steaming pile of deliciousness. We had our own little spatulas that we used to remove bite sized portions of the finished product.
Second course. Shrimp and cabbage.
Third course. Cabbage and green onions and an egg.
Final course. A crepe with a filling made of sweetened red bean paste.

This meal was so good. When Rika was in high school she worked in a Monia style restaurant so she really knew what she was doing. What a wonderful lunch.

After we finished our tour with Rika we took the subway back to the hotel and took a little siesta.

After our siesta we took the subway to see a baseball game. The Yakult Swallows were hosting the Chunichi Dragons.

A beer at the ballpark.

The ballpark was swarming with beer vendors. The beer vendors are teenagers with kegs strapped to their backs. If you want a beer they pull out a glass and pour you a cold draft beer. Amazing!

Beer vendor with a keg in an insulated backpack.

The home team fills the right field stands with their rabid fans and a band to help them with their chants.

The visiting team occupies the left field stands with their equally rabid fans and their band. The fans in these sections stand throughout the entire game and chant and sing songs while their team is up to bat. It is a real hoot and I highly recommend attending a baseball game if you ever make it to Japan.

That’s it from Tokyo. I hope you are having a wonderful day wherever you are.

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Published by abeandmarkonthecamino

I've been retired from the Union Pacific Railroad since 2017. I've been planning to walk the Camino for about 6 months and can't wait to get started.

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