Day 4: Sengaku-Ji, Odaiba & Tokyo Tower

Konbanwa!  Yes, I'm still up for once and waiting for my laundry to finish so we can pack.  We are off to Sapporo tomorrow and need to finish packing our stuff.  Luckily, the hotel will let us leave our stuff here while we go to Sapporo and back.  Yay!  A few less luggage on the train will be such a relief!  Thank you Toyoko Inn!

So today, we decided to venture to new ground.  Paul heard about the 47 Ronin shrine and researched it for the trip.  After a late start, we headed to Sengaku-Ji to find the shrine.  We didn't get lost at all!  Yay!

Here's a shot at some of their graves.

I coudn't resist picking up these Hello Kitty 47 Ronin items from the souvenior shop nearby the shrine.

After the shrine, we made our way to Odaiba.  We've never gone there before either and wanted to check out a few things we've read about.  While going to Aqua City, we stumbled on the Statue of Liberty!  Very cool....

The view was amazing on the rooftop.  Here's a shot of the Rainbow Bridge.

This was in front of Aqua City.  You had to hold hands and touch these two metal things and then the gazebo lit up and made music.  I think it's supposed to be for Valentine's Day.  Akemi got a kick out of it and kept wanting to do it with me or Paul.

I think its cool when we find Hawaii stuff outside of the US!

 We found the Daiso store right away...  yay!  I found my Natchan!  Daiso Rocks!

I guess even shopping malls have shrines!  We found this one on the roof top.  It's supposed to be for a god that grants 7 wishes?  

After that we decided to go get some grub, so we tried to find the Rahmen Festival located in the mall.  After searching several floors, we got a little lost and stumbled on this weird store...  They had this poster up and some Japanese girls were sticking their head in and taking photos.  We couldn't resist...

I think Paul had the best face...  It still cracks me up everytime I look at it!!

At last!  We found the Rahmen Festival, which was more like a food court with just Rahmen from all over Japan!  Here's the entrance...

And further down was this huge taiko!  Paul wished he had his sticks.  I'm sure he would've started playing if he did!

He was happy to also find some geocashes in Odaiba!

This was taken at the Fuji TV building... Paul made Akemi pose like this...

And on our way to DiverCity, we found this... I think it was called the golden torch?

The coolest thing in Odaiba was the Gundam Robot fronting DiverCity!  Every so often he would light up and move his head.

While looking for a bathroom in DiverCity, I found this!  Yay Hawaii!

We were going to head home early, but since that was out the door, we decided to just finish up our day by going to the Tokyo Tower, which is pretty near to Odaiba.  It looks WAAAAYYY better at night.  During the day it is red and white, but at night you just see the lights.  Oooohhh, Aaaaaahhhh!

Here's the ant's eye view.

We bought tickets to the observation deck where you can look out on Tokyo.  It's beautiful at night!  Here's my 2nd attempt at a panoramic with my iphone.  Yay!

They also had a shrine there (go figure!).  So we bought one of the good luck wish things and let Akemi write on it...

Here's what she wrote...

And we left it there with everyone else's...

We thought this was neat... apparently they found a mystery ball in the Tokyo Tower!  We think it was a baseball...

Then we went down one level to find those blocks of clear flooring where you can look down to the street.  Paul and I got nervous just looking down.  He is totally afraid of heights but "dared" to step on the clear floor.  What a dare devil.. NOT!

After we had a snack, we decided it was time to go... but when we got off the elevator, they took us here...

It was called Grand Hearts 2013.  I guess it's a special event for Valentine's Day.  I'm sure Tokyo Tower will be very popular on 2/14.  I thought it was cute.  They had each tower form the shape of a heart!

And finally, I got a shot of the Tokyo Tower sign in the gift shop.  What the heck are those pink guys? You can find out here...

OK It's past my bedtime.  Akemi and Paul are already sleeping.  In between writing this post I was helping Paul pack and check the laundry.  Thank goodness we just need to pack the last minute stuff now.   Oyasuminasai!