Exploring Yokohama...

I spent today exploring Yokohama, which was mostly successful, except all of the Museums were closed. On the flip side, the museums in Yokohama are only so-so (according to the guide books), so I don't think it was a big loss. In any case, I ended up walking all over the city and hitting the major tourist spots. After waking up,I ate breakfast at the hotel buffet, which was quite nice. Then I walked to Yamate, which is on the eastern edge of the city, where I walked through a nice park overlooking Yokohama harbor, I checked out the Foreigner's cemetary, where people from over 40 countries have been buried since the 1850s, and walked down Motomachi street, the city's fashionable shopping district. On the way to Yamate, I walked through Yamashite park, which is right on water and is home to the Hikawa-maru, a retired passenger liner. In addition to a nice view, the park had a most interesting sculpture constructed out of shipping crates.

From Yamate I walked through Chinatown, which is Yokohama's main attraction. It is the largest Chinatown in all of Japan, and is packed end to end with restaurants and shops, in addition to a number of over the top arches (sorry, I guess that's a pun) and a shrine known as Kantei-byo (dedicated to Guan Yu) which sports an abundance of carved dragons. I was not, apparently, allowed to enter the shrine (whereby I offended a Japanese person for being an ignorant gaijin for something like the third or fourth time that day, but who's counting?), but I could look inside and smell the incense, so I don't think I missed too much of the experience. Since it was lunchtime, I stopped by Edosei and got one of those large, fluffy steamed bread balls (made with rice flour, I think) filled with prawns, onions, and a yummy sauce.

I bought at gatorade from one of the ubiquitous vending machines and walked back to Yamashite park to eat my lunch. Then I headed over to the Landmark tower, which is the tallest building in Japan and also sports the world's fastest elevator (750 m/min). My ears popped during the 40 sec ride from the fifth floor to the 69th floor at 237 m, where there is an observation floor providing views of Yokohama in all four directions. The weather was cloudy in the morning, but by this time it was mostly clear, and I got an excellect view of the city and harbor, as well as great look at a rather cool helicopter pad on the top of a nearby building.

I was pretty tired at this point, and headed back to my hotel to rest for an hour. On the way, I passed through a mall which has a great sign warning inattentive parents about the dangers of mall "ponds" (which can be seen behind the rope). After my rest, I decided to make my final adventure for the day be to see the Ramen museum located near the Shin-Yokohama train station. The nearest train station to my hotel is Sakuragicho, and so this gave me a chance to try out the train system. The ticket machines have an English option, and I found a nearby fare map in English, so I was able to navigate the system pretty easily. Also, on the way to Shin-Yokohama, I didn't need to change trains, so it ended up being really easy, and took about 20 minutes. When I got to Shin-Yokohama, however, the station was under construction, and the regular exits were blocked. Plus, I didn't have a map of the area and the directions in my guide book were really vague. Anyway, it took about a half hour of wandering around until I found a local map posted which pointed the Ramen museum out. The museum itself, when I finally got there, was appropriately daffy given it's subject (namely, the popular noodle soup imported from China). The basement where the restaurants are located is a reconstruction of a ramen shop district in pre-war Japan, and is both ridiculous and fun. The ramen I had was ordered using a vending machine outside the shop, which spat out a ticket that I handed to the waiter. The instructions on the machine had no English, and the pictures were a little vague, but it all worked out, except that I ate too much and kind of felt sick afterwards.

Getting back to my hotel proved to be an adventure. I was now in the middle of rush hour, and attempting what I now know is a more complicated trip, as the train from Shin-Yokohama does not go straight to Sakuragicho (or at least the one I boarded doesn't). First, I got confused on the direction the train was supposed to go, so I got off the first stop after I got on, only to realize that the train was going in the right direction in the first place. Then I got on the next train, but after two stops everyone got off, and I (correctly) deduced that the train must then be retracing it's route in the other direction. I now needed to find another train to keep me going in the right direction, and I eventually wandered onto the right island between two tracks, and (unfortunately) got on the train going the wrong direction. I knew this as soon as the train started moving, got off at the next station and got the next train going the other way, which finally got me where I needed to go. So it took me about fifty minutes to get back, instead of the twenty five it should have. I'm good and tired now, so I don't think I'll have any difficulty getting to sleep nice and early in preparation for my trip to Kamakura tomorrow.