The Gardens of Tokyo

We set our alarms for 8:00am and were checked out of Bunka Hostel by 9:30ish. Arriving at Tokyo Station, Monica and I stashed our bags in a locker in the maze of underground passageways (it took us a good half hour to relocate that specific locker bank later - geo-tag your things).

The surface level of Tokyo Station was surprisingly beautiful. We passed a sign for a BEAMS store as we wandered in the direction of the East Imperial Gardens.

It was a short walk and pleasant. I'm not sure if it was due to the time of day or just the part of the city we were in, but there weren't many people out and about. We cut through a park with a fountain and found ourselves at a bridge. We snapped loads of pictures of one another, which are lost forever, as upon returning home, Monica's phone was stolen before she downloaded her trip pics. :'(

We watched a turtle swimming in the moat before walking around it, to some of the castle walls. We walked up to the garden entrance - and found out it was closed on Fridays. Oops. What we'd seen so far was lovely and more than enough to sustain us until getting to the next place we'd planned to visit, Hamarikyu Gardens.

I'd copied Hamarikyu Gardens from an itinerary that Lara's friend Meredith had done a few months before. The gardens are located close to the opening of Tokyo Bay and its moat contains seawater, but the thing that intrigued me was Nakajima no Ochaya - its tea house.

Monica and I took the subway to the closest stop, then walked... and walked, and walked. Finally, we found a gate and were able to cross the moat and enter. The ticket booth was well stocked with maps, and stamps, and a tree decorated with colorful slips of paper on which people had written wishes for the Tanabata festival - we added our own.

We walked through the garden toward the tea house. The forest path opened up to a lake - and in the middle of the lake was the tea house. It was an impressive sight, especially considering you could still see the tops of Tokyo buildings over the trees.

Once inside, we took off our shoes, a man with impeccable English took our money, and we chose a corner overlooking the lake. There were a few other guests, chatting quietly and sipping tea. We were given a choice between hot and cold matcha and a card to read on the tea ceremony.

We were soon brought the cold matcha we'd ordered, plus two seasonal washagi in the shape of a peach and a sandy beach (complete with a tiny crab and starfish). It was a nice introduction to the Japanese tea ceremony, in that there really was no ceremony involved - just tea and sweets for you to enjoy.

Eventually, a Russian group came in and encroached on the peacefulness of the experience, but it was still a really nice way to spend half an hour. Before leaving, we took a few pictures on the porch over the water - another group of two girls took a picture of Monica and me, lost forever now. :(

Afterwards, we wandered around the gardens for a while, finding a memorial the shogun had built for all the ducks he'd killed on site. We saw a kimono photoshoot in progress and flopped down on wide benches under an arbor laden with bright flowers.

It was an absolutely gorgeous day. It just felt like we should sit and enjoy the sunny morning before catching a Shinkansen to rainy Kyoto... so we did.