Logan’s birthday is today. YAY! He got to spend most of it on a train, which was neat, but maybe not his most exciting birthday ever?

We woke up this morning in Takayama, packed, and caught the 11:32 Wide View Hida. The gel cling stickers made an appearance again – this was a dollar well spent.

The ride, once again, was lovely, with views of mountain streams cutting their way through rocky gorges, tall, waving bamboo, and tiny towns all going past our window. 

After two hours, we switched to a VERY full shinkansen (bullet) train to Tokyo. School groups from all over the country seem to be on the move right now, and we were sharing our train with several of them. They were all very well-behaved, fortunately, but all of the crowding meant the car was fully booked and there wasn’t an extra seat for Ami.

Dear Snapchat, how fast are we going right now?

And what does 175.1 miles per hour look like? (Fast. Like really super duper fast.)

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We arrived at Tokyo Station in the late afternoon and transferred one last time to a subway line. Out apartment for the next two nights is in Ginza, near Tokyo Station.​ It’s a very different neighborhood than we were in on our first swing through Tokyo.

After settling in a bit, we headed back out to find Logan some dumplings for his birthday!

Our walk was enjoyable. It’s much warmer here than it was in Takayama, and of course there are a ton more people out and about! 

Dinner was at Ichimirinin, a dumpling and Chinese restaurant in Minato.

Poor Ami was SO hungry by the time we sat down to dinner! Our meals today were pretty ad-hoc, made up of odds and ends we grabbed at the train station, and she hadn’t really eaten much. She was thrilled to choose a stir-fried pork and green garlic shoot stirfry off of the menu, which was entirely in Japanese (though thankfully with some pictures)! 

She loved her rice and furikake sprinkles, of course, but really got into the stirfry dish! She even enjoyed the shredded carrot and green garlic! Logan and I got to eat our fill of dumplings and also a shrimp dish stir-fried with chili oil and black beans. Everything was great!

Tomorrow is somehow, already, our last day in Japan! Unfortunately, it’s supposed to be a rainy day, but hopefully we can still do some sightseeing.