Japan Super Late Throwback: Part 2 - Tokyo Side A: Tourist Spots

Since we didn't pack in a lot of tourist-y place nor famous must-try-shops so I guess our Tokyo trip was pretty lax, stayed in Shinjuku at a pretty good hotel, good location and convenience with a hefty price to pay - definitely not the cheapest option, but all for convenience and comfort.

We stayed at Hotel Sunroute Plaza Shinjuku! The hotel staffs were really fluent in English (i think they speak with better accent than I do, LOL) and really friendly and helpful as well. The rooms were comfy and much bigger than APA which we stayed in Osaka, but the price is definitely higher as well. Price for quality I guess.

It's a 5-10 minutes walk from JR Shinjuku Station, convenience shop (FamilyMart) across the road, a Mcd down the road, Takashimiya is less than 10 minutes walk directly across you (with a Krispy Kreme and Starbucks in between) and basically, just really convenient lol.

Since I had a pleasant stay there, if you guys have the budget to, I think you can keep it on your list! Lol. Although we stayed in Shinjuku, we totally didn't get to go to Kabukicho, which was really disappointing LOL I wanted to check it out.

Tokyo Side A: Tourist Spots - Ueno, Asakusa, Tokyo Sky Tree, Harajuku, Shinjuku, Shibuya

Bento on the Shinkansen! 

Early morning train from Osaka > Tokyo! 

Favourite!!!

CHERRY BLOSSOMS EVERYWHERE <3

Our Tokyo trip was pretty simple:

1. Ikebukuro - Sunshine City, Otome Road
2. Ueno Park + Asakusa + Tokyo Sky Tree
3. Harajuku + Shinjuku
4. DisneySEA
5. Ghibli Musuem + Shibuya
6. Odaiba
7. Shinjuku - + flight home :< 

Everything behind cut as lengthy post and image intensive ahead!

Japan Super Late Throwback: Part 1 - Osaka

I totally forgot about the blog and everything in general cos' a lot happened (incld. me being lazy) and I totally dropped the whole Japan trip posting from Day 2 LOL. I went for 11 days, so I basically left out 9 whole days.

I don't even remember what I did there anymore, but all I could recall is how beautiful the place is and how much I want to go back there. I'm gonna just throwback to the trips in parts... Hopefully it gets completed, or... There's no or.

To pick up where I left off, we dedicated a full day to USJ and enjoyed ourselves a lot with all the One Piece feels, it was REALLY a great day. The third/fourth day was pretty exciting for me, it was the visit to the Osaka Castle and Cherry Blossom viewing!! One of the main reason we picked that period to travel ♡

Last two photos thanks to Life-Saving iphone app filters, lol. 

Quick Travel Tip : 

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this the previous post, but when you're in Osaka, you can totally consider buying their 1 or 2 days pass; They call it the Osaka Amazing Pass! It's like their ez-link card which allows you to travel unlimited for two days, and they give a lot of tourist privileges like free entrance to certain tourist spots - Osaka castle and the park beside is one of them. See the full list here.  

I'm sure if you google online, there's a lot of people who blogs about this and plan an itinerary base on it, but since Michie and I weren't really into all the places, we only went to some that I wanted to go.  

A few of the free facilities we went to was the Osaka Castle Museum, Osaka Castle Nishinomaru Garden (right beside), and also went on the HEP FIVE Ferris Wheel since we were in the area to shop shop at HEP Five. I had wanted to visit the Floating Garden Observatory as well but cos it was really cold that day, we had to skip it TuT

Other than these free facilities, you get a booklet of coupons where you can use them for discounts to facilities and discounts when you shop! As a cheapo Singaporean (and Japan isn't the cheapest place to tour either), all these discounts and stuffs are really really really really useful and helpful TuT 

One of the places we went was the aquarium (Kaiyukan) and I was really really really happy to be there. I swear everything was so cute, and idk about everyone else, but I think Aquariums calms me down a lot. As usual for Aquariums, it's always nice to find out about Feeding time and stuff to get the best experience, but in general I think the creatures there were pretty active! 

We got our Osaka 2 Days pass at the Namba Station, but apparently you can also buy them from Hotels as well. 

I'll blog about Osaka Castle, Nishinomaru Gardens, Hep Five Ferris Wheel and Kaiyukan ALL behind cut, cos' it's REALLY image intensive omg lol.

Ikkousha Hakata Ramen

https://www.facebook.com/hakataikkousha.singapore / http://www.ikkousha.com/ 
T3, Tanjong Pagar, Chijmes
Operation Hours Varies

Rating: ★★★★★
Wallet-kun Safety Rating: ★★★★★


ヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノヽ(；▽；)ノ


I gave up on the blog for months, I'm sure you've noticed. Just gonna update the japan trip in a summary post next time, yea, next time. 

Ikkousha was always one of my favourite ramen store back when they were still with Ramen Champion. If I'm not wrong, they've won for a couple of years and then poofed. I was really sad but then Sam found that they opened their own shop so we HAD to go back!! 

I've visited the Chijmes store twice, both during Lunch and for Dinner, although the place is a little small, you didn't really have to wait crazy long for a seat. It's a pretty cosy place too! 

At the door they will pass you a form where you can pick your choice of ramen, the choice of topping (i.e. no spring onion, bamboo shoots, eggs etc) and even choose how hard you want your noodles to be. I thought it was a pretty neat system, like you can decide while you wait, and with that paper, once you are seated, the food comes pretty fast and definitely to the way you like it! The soup are all kontotsu-based so there might not be a lot to choose from, but this is good for people like me who will never be able to decide lol. 

There's free flow drinks and eggs as well~ 

I personally like their Kara one the best, it's spicy enough for me and the taste is strong enough!