Saturday, January 28 – Sunday, January 29, 2024

• Dawn of our final day in Japan!
• Checked out of our final hotel early and headed back to Tokyo Station, where we stashed our suitcases in the coin locker. The thinking is we could then explore Tokyo until it was time to leave, duck back to Tokyo Station to retrieve our luggage, and jump on the direct train to Narita airport from here.

• First order of business (after the mandatory coffee break) was another place that was high up our list of destinations in Tokyo that didn’t quite make the final cut (but between the earthquake and skipping Hiroshima), was the Yanaka area.
• We did some sightseeing, bought some souvenirs (including a Turkish trivet), MBW ordered a custom-made rubber stamp, we had some street vendor grilled beef, and generally enjoyed the laidback Saturday crowds.

• After Yanasen, we had one last stop back in Ameyoko to visit Empachi, our spiritual home izakaya. One last time ’til the next time.

• After that, back to the station, back to Tokyo Station (via one last quick stop in Akihabara to pick up some last minute camera shopping), then on to Narita to check in for the flight home.

• Check-in at the airport was stressful – we did a quick re-pack at the check-in area to make sure everything was the correct weight (using the scales provided by the airport), then lined up for the baggage drop. The line was huge, as I think there were a few JetStar departures around the same time. When we finally made it there, we found that literally all of our suitcases were overweight on their scales. Don’t know if the airport scales were off, or the JetStar ones were, but we had to flag down an attendant and pay for oversized baggage. The alternative at that point was to just start throwing shopping away, which we were too tired and stressed to do sensibly.
• After that, and the delays from how long the bag drop line was, we had just enough time to make it through security, talk to the customs officer about our duty free purchases (he waved us through basically without looking at anything), grab a cold drink from a vending machine and straight to our gate, which was already starting to board. No duty free shopping for us this trip.
• We did see a giant Pokémon sign at the airport and snapped some photos, which the fisheye lens made look truly monstrous. I love it!

• Flight was overnight but mostly uneventful, getting through customs in Brisbane was slow but steady, and we collected all our luggage and made it out into the sunshine, where MBW’s aunt picked us up and got us back home safe!

• And that’s a wrap for this trip!! We enjoyed it so very, very much that we decided to go back…. on January 6th, 2025! That’s tomorrow at the time of writing! We have an Uber booked to take us to Brisbane airport at 6am tomorrow morning, I’ve just dropped my car off for my younger brother to use for the next month, and we’re back on our adventure in….. 18 hours!