Day 7 Part 2: Yoyogi Park, Meiji Jingu Shrine and Harajuku

Once we were back out into the Shibuya area we decided it would be nice to visit the large park nearby. After walking for a bit the landscape was beginning to change and we could tell we were drawing near to the park. When we finally did reach what seemed to be the park there was a 4-5 ft wall surrounding it. We assumed that if we just kept walking we would find an entrance. We walked all the way up until we reached a major intersection and yet the wall continued around the corner. The two of us were huffing and puffing up the hill as a man in a fine suit casually passed us without so much as a deep breath.

Eventually we did find an area that allowed us into the park only to find that we were just in a small section of the park. We still needed to take a pedestrian bridge over to the other side of the road for the main park. So we huffed and puffed our way up and over and we finally reached Yoyogi Park. This park was used in the 1964 Olympics for the athlete's village. Some of the facilities are still, mainly contained in the smaller annex of the park where we first arrived. The rest has been made into a functional park. There were a great deal of people out and about in this park being only the middle of the day.

This area is where you can find a lot of people practicing and exercising some of there louder hobbies. After the epic journey over all of the hills we needed to sit so we just walked until we found a bench. Luckily we grabbed a great spot. From our vantage point we could see many things going on in the park. There was a man spinning in circles and drumming a Japanese style drum. Not sure where he was getting all of that energy. We could hear this from the time we came on to the grounds and it continued for the entirety of our stay which was a good 45 minutes. There were many people out walking their dogs around. A few people were practicing martial arts. A big group of small children were there with their care takers. They seemed thrilled to be able to take off across the park screaming at will.

Sitting on the bench was great, we hung out there for quite a while before heading off to find the fountains featured of the park map. We were easily able to locate this along with the Japanese Michael Jackson perfecting his moves in front of the water.

We did not stick around the fountains for long as it was much more crowded in this area. We instead decided to follow the path that would take us along to Harajuku.

The Shrine

As we were entering the Harajuku area we noticed a path leading off to the left with several people coming and going. We decided to take a peek and found that we were entering the Meiji Jingu Shrine grounds. We have seen quite a few temples while we were her but had yet to see a shrine (Temple = Buddhist, Shrine = Shinto). Any other time this may have been a nice peaceful stroll but it was not as much the case today. Due to the amount of traveling we had already done on foot this walk was sort of difficult for our poor legs and feet. We kept going however and after a bit we were able to locate the main shrine. It was very busy and we definitely saw more foreigners here than we had seen at any other time during our trip.

Once we walked around a bit we found the first bench we could and got off our feet for a while. It was nice to just sit and watch the people come and go. Eventually we felt rejuvenated enough that we thought we could make it back down the path so we made the trip back. Some really smart business owner put a cafe at the end of the path. We stopped in and grabbed a snack and a seat with several others. Not long after we settled in it was announced that the shrine was closing for the day so we had to move it.

Harajuku

Harajuku is an area of Japan that is famous for teen fashions. On Sundays, many teens dress in cosplay and gather in this area. We were not there on a Sunday so we did not really see anyone but we have also heard that this is old news. Chrissy wanted to check out the shopping in this area so we strolled around for a bit. We went down the main strip of teen fashion stores which was packed with people...many young girls. There were also a lot of men standing around...just standing...creepers. As we went down we found a few cool places, think about a large mall full of Hot Topics, Forever 21s, Claire's, and Spencers and you have this street called Takeshita Dori. Our favorite store along the way was a four story store called Daiso. This is a dollar store and it is awesome!

Once we made all the way through the crowds and out to the other side we had some more specific stores that we wanted to be sure to stop in while we were in the area. After some more strolling around the crowded streets we located "Kiddy Land" which is a large toy store. Kyle grabbed a cool toy and we looked around at all of the great stuff they had. After the walking and all five stories of this building we were officially beat though we still had a few more things to do before moving on.

As it was still Kyle's day to choose all food, he found a great conveyor belt sushi place just up the street. We were able to enjoy some cool new sushi while we rested our feet. After this we were still pretty beat so we just hit up one souvenir shop before heading to the train station. At this point we were sort of worried because there were a great deal of people about and we had a very long trip back on the train, we did not want to stand the whole way. We had to actually switch trains on the way back so it took a little bit of planning before we got on.

We got on train one and did have to stand but only a stop or two before the switch. After exiting the train we located and started following the signs for our line. The path to our line was stretching pretty far and just as we thought we were about to enter the platform area, we wound up back out on the street. What...what happened? After following all of the signs and exiting the station there were no other signs to be seen about which way to go. We wound up going in the wrong station and back out and looking around a bit before we found the right place. This put us a little behind and we wound up reaching the platform just as one train was leaving so we had to stand and wait several minutes for the next.

The train that came in was packed so we had to stand a few stops but were eventually able to claim some seats and rest for several exits. Wouldn't you know it? We ended up on another one of those trains that was finishing up a few stops before our own. Again we got kicked off and had to stand another few minutes. At least this time we knew what was happening so we didn't hang around the train looking like idiots.The next train was packed again so just a few stops of standing and we were back. We found our way out and back home without incident after that.

What a day!