National Museum

From the Meiji Shrine, we headed to Jimbocho - an area famed for 170+ new and second-hand book shops, including many in English. The wide streets with a lovely breeze and lack of people made for a lovely jaunt towards Akiharaba.

At Akiharaba, the Electric City, the streets became rather more crowded, and much more bizarre. The geek central of Tokyo, the shops were full of anime, video games and slot machines. The noise in the pachinko parlour is an assault on the senses in a way that not even Las Vegas manages; the cacophony is almost unbearable! We walked through this main wonderland towards Ueno Park where we took the opportunity to have a relaxing, and quiet, park front beer.

In the park, the oldest structure in Tokyo, standing where t has since 1698 but built decades before, made an interesting detour on our way to the National Museum.

The museum is huge. Floors and floors across building after building of cultural and national treasures. There were examples of art, textiles, pottery, stunning metalwork, armour, swords, deities and more besides. We spent over two hours in the buildings and still missed out whole floors. It was, by this time, around 6pm and we'd been on our feet since 9am. So we departed for the Tokyo Bay to find some food and to see the Rainbow Bridge before we departed Tokyo for good.Read more