Japan Road Trip: Shibuya

I always thought Shibuya was just for the famous crossing and overpriced stores but Ben and I managed to have a lovely roam around, changing my previous opinion on this part of Tokyo. The crossing is fun but there were lots of little and big stores we popped in an out of, plus a cat cafe, happily filling a few solid hours :)

Ben wanted to check out tower records because he read they sold Japanese comics in English subs (unfortunately only super main stream comics!) but I was surprised to find myself browsing and being inspired by all sorts of books and stationery and treasures.

Who wore it better?

Mega regret for not buying that amazing swan boat ceramic. I'm not sure what it is, maybe a soy sauce dipping bowl?

Gachapon

 And the elusive sushi cats!! (I'll show you which ones I got in my loot post later on)

Whilst strolling the semi back streets we stumbled upon a cat cafe, called cafe MoCHA

It cost 200 yen for ten minutes and to be honest, we didn't stay very long because it was sooo packed!

It was ridiculously beautiful though with an amazing view of Shibuya

In the middle of the main room upstairs was a giant cat tree with lot of spots for cats to jump up and sleep the day away. When we arrived a lot of cats had found higher refuge away from eager pats and photo taking. The cats left at arms reach were all busy being loved upon, which meant Ben and I awkwardly sat around, whilst quietly thinking of all our amazing free interactions with street cats and our cats which made the whole cat cafe thing kind of funny for ourselves :p

But hey I can definitely see the appeal, especially if you're living in Tokyo and can't have a cat yourself!

Behind the tree were also these bird cages hanging from the ceiling, I wholeheartedly love that the cats had many places to escape humans!

Some kitties didn't seem to mind though

I definitely recommend a stop to Shibuya, the train station with its many exits and entrances is a little manic but getting lost is sort of part of the experience as well :)

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Japan Road Trip: Tatebayashi

Our first night in our campervan was spent sleeping in the City Hall's car park, which backs onto Tsuusuda river in Tatebayashi. The banks of the river is home to many street cats so it was fun to get to wake up and pat cats.  Since it was super cold, some of them even came and sat on our laps - definitely hard to get up and walk away from that!

On a sidenote, five years ago, at this very park I was standing back just watching Ben do all the patting.  That event became a big stepping stone in helping me over come my fear of cats - so it's a special spot for me :)

When we visited it was also time for Tatebayashi to hang their carp streamers (koinobori).  Tatebyashi actually holds the Guinness World Record for having the most displayed at one time - go Tatebayashi :)

An amazing thing about homeless cats in Japan and I think is a prime example of Japanese people's amazing kindness is all the street cats we encountered on our trip were really well looked after. They had shelters, fresh food and water and for these guys above, someone had even come around and aired out their blankets for them with new blankets put into their box.

We were also lucky to coincide with a dog show happening at a nearby field :)

I went and checked out the website above, I can't understand it but there were some amazing gems in the collection section.

 The lady above was literally vacuuming her dog's coat.

Afterwards we headed off to see my friend Teruko and her three kids, Haruna, Hiroto and Yuto. It was so nice to pull into her house and have them all run out and greet us!

Ben taught them to play paddocks which they picked up straight away - such smart kids!

Teruko is an amazing cook and made us Ben and Fee friendly food - such love!

Haruna made that Lino cut cat painting you see above, I was saying how beautiful it was and then she gifted us with it *gasp* so special, it's now framed and living in our lounge room!

I think Hiroto stole my camera for this portrait of his little bro Yuto - told you they were clever!

 Farewell Committee!

That night we stayed in our first Michi No Eki, aka roadhouse in Haruna. We had an app in our campervan to find the nearest one which turned out to be a really helpful tool for travelling around Japan :) 

There was also an app to find the nearest onsen (public bathing house) which we visited that night. I might explains onsens, in depth, a little later but one thing we found out straight away is if you bring your own towel and face cloth/modesty towel the price is usually cheaper. Onsens will typically have a vending machine next to the front desk with the selections written in Japanese, I quickly learnt the symbol for person and took some educated guessed for the rest. This onsen had one price being slightly more expensive and since we didn't know this meant towel hire we hit the cheaper button and found out the hard way - luckily shirts make okay substitutes for towels :P We eventually hit up a 100yen store and bought our selves a towel and a facecloth so we could save the towel rental for the rest of the trip :)

Onsens were definitely one of my favourite experiences, at the start I had really little concern about my small back tattoo, although I did know that tattoos in onsens are frowned upon and often forbidden due to their association with Japanese Gangs (yakuza). My tattoo is so small and with my first onsen of our trip being so pleasant (a bunch of older ladies came to my rescue when I couldn't turn on the tap) I completely forgot about having my tattoo. Ben and I had a few tattoo rejection encounters later on and then after that I became super paranoid and didn't love onsens as much - I guess ignorance is bliss after all :p

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