Originally written December 2018
We woke up at 5:30 this morning so we could have breakfast before heading into downtown Tokyo for our day trip to Disneyland.
First surprise of the day: our hotel only served organic vegetarian food.
A little hard to swallow for the carnivore in me 
, but probably a welcome change for my tummy.
We left the hotel two hours before our pickup time because we wanted plenty of allowance in case we missed a train or got lost.
Very sensible.
And sure enough…
we got lost. Big time.
There we were, standing in the middle of a busy Tokyo train station with crowds of people rushing in every direction, desperately looking for somebody who didn’t appear to be in a hurry.
In fairness, several people really tried to help us.
There was only one small problem.
They didn’t speak English.
And we didn’t speak Japanese. 
Eventually, after much confusion, we reached what we thought was our destination with about five minutes to spare.
Success!
Or so we thought.
When 9:10 came and nobody had turned up to collect us, we started asking around again.
It turned out we were standing at the wrong FamilyMart.
The correct FamilyMart — our actual pickup point — was about two blocks away, inside the hotel.
And yes…
we missed our Disneyland tour.
After all that adrenaline for absolutely nothing, Graeme and I decided the best thing we could do was find somewhere to sit down and rest our aching feet.
Both of us were wearing newly purchased winter shoes, which by then were starting to feel considerably less exciting than when we bought them.
So our next challenge was:
Find a shopping centre.
Which meant, of course, more asking around.
Eventually we found one, had morning tea and lunch, and decided perhaps we had experienced enough of Tokyo for one day.
Time to go back to the hotel.
Simple.
Except apparently getting home was going to be another adventure.
We missed changing trains.
Not once.
Not twice.
Seven times.
Then the GPS took us to another hotel with exactly the same name — two stations away from ours.
So after leaving our hotel at 7:00 in the morning, missing Disneyland, spending most of the day getting lost, wearing out our feet in new winter shoes, missing seven train changes and visiting the wrong hotel…
we finally made it back at 4:15 pm.
Graeme was so exhausted that he fell asleep almost immediately.
And what did I gain from our first day in Tokyo?
Well…
at least now I know how to ride a train in Japan.
Stories Along the Way 