Our first day in Tokyo we visited the Tokyo suburb of Asakusa. We caught the train following some easy directions from the ticket counter. Try as hard as we could, even with non-existent Japanese we couldn’t get lost. On a couple of occasions we even had helpful locals ensure we got onto the right train – even with their limited or non-existent English.

Asakusa is known for its Shrine which was built in 1649 and luckily survived through World War 2 when many buildings were destroyed. There is also a small market here. We just simply wandered around and explored the area immediately around the temple for a couple of hours. Even though it was spring and the cherry blossoms where in flower, it was bloody freezing! This didn’t stop the locals from enjoying their picnics on the waterfront under the cherry blossoms.  We eventually found a coffee shop (I think it might have been a Starbucks) and sat with a hot chocolate for an hour or so to thaw out.

There are also some shops in the area and I remember we found the 100 yen store called Seria in a small mall.  This is like Daiso but slightly more up market items for the same price.  100 yen is about $US1. What can I say, we aren’t big spenders 😉