Tsukiji Fish Market

Today was quite the sight, let me just say that.

Today we went to the worlds biggest fish market- Tsukiji Fish Market. We saw lots of different fish, shellfish and crustations. The fisherman start their job at about 11:00 at night. They would then bring it to the market and the tuna auctions would start at around 5:00 am, but the lineup to see this famous auction would start at 3:00 am! This market is definitely NOT a market for tourists. It's a really busy market and lots of workers with small shunt trucks zoom around the market, so it can be pretty dangerous! As we were walking around this ginourmas place, we saw tons of buckets with water- where they keep the live fish. Sometimes, they would take the fish out and butcher it right there on the spot. But usually, to keep the fish as fresh as can be, they would let the fish live as long as possible, and then it would die on its own. It was quite amusing (but kind of gross, especially to watch the particularly bloody and gutty fish get butchered), to see the fish being chopped up. Unlike North America, the Japanese use almost every single part of the fish, (including the head, the stomach, the eyes...). 

We saw many interesting fish, such as eel (not electric eel though!), octopi, huge oysters, black sea urchins, HUGE tuna (the size of the height of my dad, or longer!), red fish with gigantic eyes, weird looking yellow eggplant type things, really tiny shrimp, and much, much more! At around 10:00 am, the workers would start closing up their shops and packaging up the fish to send it off to restaurants or warehouses. 

It was really interesting to see all the different species of fish and the workers hard at work. I loved the Tsukiji Fish Market! 

Our Fish Market Vlog: Part 1

Our Fish Market Vlog: Part 2

Convenience store meals!

We are just back in the Apartment after an awesome day out. Morning spent at the fish market followed by a picnic lunch and some R&R in the park. I'm well into my second book of the trip and can't recall getting lost in time as I did this afternoon...back now for some math, blog posting and a rest before our last dinner in Japan. 

Had posted earlier that the food here is really reasonable. Of course you can go for the high end experiences too, but it does really amaze me that you can basically eat 3 reasonably healthy meals right out of a "conbeni" or convenience store. They have one every 300m or so - 7-11, Lawson, Daily 24 etc. This morning while Craig was enjoying a sushi breakfast, the girls and I had a conbeni breakfast of bananas, croissants, pancake things, almonds. For lunch, we had salads, rice balls, sandwiches, pineapple and rice crackers. Delish and doesn't break the bank. The stores are well stocked with bento meals and you can microwave them too. Pretty cool. Can't imagine eating my dinner at a 7-11 at home. 

Last night in Japan. It's been amazing. 10/10 for sure. Have to admit that I am a bit nervous for what is in front of us but suppose that is part of the fun!

Hibiya park

Today we went to Hibiya park.

 We took the train to he park and then got some lunch at Starbucks and seven eleven. Actually the lunch was quite good, And healthy. After we had some lunch we ( Abby and I ) found a zipline that was about 25m long. Abby and I went on it about 80 times. It was so much fun.

 After we played frisbee on the green grass beside the zipline. During our frisbee tossing with Abby and daddy, these really cute brothers thay were about 2 in a half years old, and they wanted to play frisbee with us and play with us.

 After an hour of playing with those really cute Japanese kids, we went to a popcical place and got oranged and calpis popcical, calpis for me and orange for Abby and daddy, and for mommy, nothing. Then we went to the imperial palace (it's were the empieor Iives). Well bye. 

VLOG: Shibuya crossing piggy back

VLOG: Our street, Takeshita

Sushi girls!

We went for sushi for lunch - I'm so proud of the girls for pushing their comfort zones.   We had to split up in twos.  So Robin and I set in one area and Abby and Beth in another.   I was so impressed with Robin - she tried raw tuna, cooked eel, steamed crab, fish egg sushi and shrimp tempura.   Then Abby comes over and reported that she had tried a half piece of raw tuna sushi - wow!

Day 14: Iroiro

It was another beautiful morning in Tokyo.  Beth and I woke up with the early bird while the preteen was mashed to her futon dead to the world.  Robin went into the e-zone (iPad) while Beth and I walked randomly through the back neighborhoods of Harajuku.  I'm always amazed at how quiet Tokyo can be.  One street is busy, then you duck into a cross street and you're in a quiet neighbourhood.

The girls wanted to do some shopping so I took a couple of hours to walk around and soak in more of Shibuya and the surrounding areas.   I could really live here again!

I found this cool banana vending machine...

No cars!  This is one of the busier high end streets in Tokyo... But where are all the cars?  My guess is this city with a population of around 38 million people has half the cars that we have in the GTA.  There's simply no need to have a car to get from one place to the next and they've made the cost of keeping a car prohibitively expensive and used the revenues to invest in transit.  I know, blah blah blah.   But even Abby and Robin, when looking at a highway today both said "where are all the cars".

Weird cart of cats that we have seen a few times...

In the afternoon we went to the new Roppongi Hills area.  Very cool and very modern.   There was a modern art Star Wars exhibit that was awesome..

At night we went to Shibuya for some Turkish cuisine and I piggy backed Abby on the way home....