Japan 2010 Day 1

So i think its about time to write some stuff about my last trip to japan.
Booked my trip in February and was roughly 1400 euro's for the flight / hotel package. We left from Amsterdam Schiphol on 30th September. We flew with a transfer to London Heathrow and from there straight to Tokyo Narita. We arrived the next day at 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Took the airport limousine bus to Shinjuku-eki from there but due to a traffic jam it took like 3 hours (gonna check out the skyliner or Narita express next time, seems to be much faster.) I was able to see the high rise Tokyo sky tree from the highway. Its really big already and not even close to completion, so i wonder how tall it will look when finished.


http://www.tokyo-skytree.jp/english/ (Here you can read more about the Sky tree and how tall it is now.)


When we arrived at shinjuku memories started coming up from my last visit. I knew exactly where we got off last year and that we were lost while the hotel was perfectly visible from that point:P but because of all the signs everywhere you don't really see it unless you know where it is. Also the neon signs and lighting in the evening gave me a warm welcome again^^. So from there on i just walked us to the hotel, checked in, hooked up my laptop and internet (which was included in the room) and got a nice shower. The hotel we stayed at was the Sunroute Plaza hotel in Shinjuku. My second time already. Before we left Holland i already set a time and place to firstly meet my friend, (he is a native japanese which speaks almost perfect english who i accidentally met on chat roulette.)
So before we knew we met him and went to an izakaya in Shinjuku. Was really nice finally meeting him. I dont really know the name of the izakaya, but the food was the best. Top quality fish and yakitori (my favorite) and some really good atmosphere. Loud sallaryman and friendly staff, a really great place.
A little bit later we met a friend of his which we had a drink with at a wine bar some time in the evening. Surprisingly there was no sign of my jet-lag from last year. Which made me fall asleep at 8 and let me wake up at 6 every day:P.

Back at home before we left me friend decided to finally read the lonely planet on tokyo

At the kpn place on schiphol where you can pay for internet but you can also just don't pay and use their free power supply hehe ^^

Me watching some IT crowd.

The friendly airport limousine bus is a rather easy way to travel to shinjuku. Will try another method next time because the 3 hours in a traffic jam is 3 hours less of me hanging around in the yodobashi kamera.

I was kinda thirsty so went for some coffee

Our first glimpse of the Sky tree. By then it was already higher then the Tokyo tower.

A really nice place this was. The izakaya was very crowded but the atmosphere was awesome! Will definitely return her next year.

My good friend and me

A little appetiser and some beer before diner:D 

We didn't really knew what to order so we let our friend order. I could read some of the menu and since my other friend was from china he could read some kanji that i didn't knew quite well.

Some really nice tofu

The cucumbers were more crispy here that back in Holland. I loved them

Simple but tasty salad

Dont really remember what this was again but it was frikin' nice.

Some gyoza, and a special fried potato with cheese in it. Reminded me of home.

Off course i wanted to order some yakitori. Was surprised by the variety they had. They were all very delicious indeed^^

I have never eaten mackerel this fresh, and served on ice cubes:P that was new thing for me.

My Japanese friend who worked in an izakaya, told me about people who want the head to be fried and then eat them. So i let hem ask it for me. They did it and oh my god, I was surprised with how tasty a fish head could be when fried naturally

A little later a friend of his joined and we went for some wine place. (Was pretty tipsy already so i took some o-cha

 So that's it for day 1, will try and post day 2 tomorrow.