Take a Chance: Our Tokyo Travels!

Well our travels continue! Sometime this summer Colin and I finally realized we only had six months left on Guam. A "Woohoo!" and a "Boo!" went through our minds immediately. Woohoo! because we'll finally be in the land of Target, Starbucks and Costco again. Boo because we will be leaving some of the best friends we've ever met. Guam is truly a unique place, frustrating as day but the people we're surrounded by make up for it! So we formed our Guam Bucket List and came up with several things we wanted to accomplish before our departure in February.

Try out more hikes
Get Colin Scuba certified (check!)
Go diving together
Dive Palau & Chuuk (see a theme?)
Run the Koko's Half Marathon in October
Visit Tokyo (check!)

We successfully checked off Tokyo over Labor Day weekend. Wow! If I had sum up that city in one word it would be efficiency. The airport, the train system, hotels, the computerized toilets (seriously), even the convenience stores! Coming from an island where it takes half a day to get anything done, it's totally overwhelming, yet so cool. Upon arrival we were whisked through Immigration right to the train that brought us to Tokyo. The schedule said we would arrive at Tokyo Station at 8:57pm. After a 37 mile journey we literally rolled to a stop just as the clock hit 8:57. Amazing! One of the downsides to Tokyo is the population of 12 million people, with most of the population commuting via train every day. Talk about a mass of humanity trying to catch a train! They actually have people pushers who well, you guessed it, shove people into trains to get the doors to close. Half the adventure was walking and riding all over the city!

Our first day was spent at Disneyland. Colin's never been so I just had to take him there, how could I allow him to pass up a chance to experience Disney? Seriously that place is magical, I went there a lot growing up and just couldn't sit with the fact that Six Flags is the only amusement park he knows. No way. So we were probably the only kid-less Westerners there but that's cool. We FastPassed our way around the park and enjoyed every minute of it! It's just like the Anaheim park, just a little smaller. So fun!

The second and third day we checked out various Tokyo sites. My favorite? The Tsukiji Fish Market! This place is one of the largest fish markets in the world and knowing how obsessed the Japanese are with fish we had to check this place out. We arrived at 5:30am and the place had already been bustling since 3am. The tuna auctions were held at 4am but we would have had to line up before 3 to get tickets...no thank you. There were all kinds of crazy fish, things I've never seen or heard of...nor would I ever want to try. I got the shivers looking at the eels swimming around in a bucket full of red water.

It was a quick three day trip but packed full of fun. Before we knew it we were back to the airport in Guam with a full planeload of Japanese tourists. We clearly knew we were home when we were met at the gate by a customs official. "You American?" she asks. "Yes" we reply. "Oh, I don't think there is anyone here [that being the Immigration & Customs desks] yet. Maybe you wait for a while"....

Welcome back to Guam!