Shin-Yokohama Ramen Museum

As a ramen lover, visiting the Shin-Yokohama Ramen Museum was on my top must-visit places in Japan. I can't wait to go back to Japan to visit the Cup Noodles Museum located in Yokohama as well.  

A little background on the museum. It was founded on March 6, 1994 and it is the world's first food-themed amusement park. At the museum, you can freely enjoy the different regional flavours of ramen across Japan without stepping on a plane or train to get there. There are a total of 9 different ramen restaurants showcased in a street-scape replication from the year 1958 which is also the year when the world's first instant ramen was invented. 

You can easily spot the museum with these green ramen bowls at the top of the sign. 

There is even this moving ramen bowl with a TV screen from RA-HAKU TV the showing all about ramen from ramen world fairs, ramen history in Japan and famous ramen shops.  

Tickets can be bought at the front entrance to the museum. Adult (13 and older) cost 310 yen and child (6-12) and seniors (60 over) cost 100 yen and free for children younger than 6 years old. 

When you first enter the ramen museum, there is this wall that display ramen bowls used in successive ramen restaurants in different unique patterns as well as some history photographs of Japan and Japanese culture. 

You can also grab a pamphlet translated into many different languages as well as renting a locker to store your bag and other heavy duty things you may not want to carry with you around the museum. 

The ramen museum is divided into 3 floors. B1F and B2F is where all the ramen restaurants are and as well as some snack shops with snack and food from Japan's good old days. On the 1st floor there is a gallery where visitors can learn all about the history of ramen, museum shop and an IRIS slot-car race track. 

Loft in Shibuya

One of my absolute favourite department store to shop at in Shibuya is Loft. It has 7 floors that sell a variety of unique and special things including stationary, gifts, health and beauty products, household goods and home decor and interior items. I can spend hours at this place and not be bored! 

The working life in Japan can be quite hectic and you'll often find a lot of different health and body care products sold at department stores. 

Disney Store in Shibuya

If you are in Shibuya then you should definitely make a visit to the Disney Store. It's a super fun and magical place to visit if you love everything Disney. There are 3 floors at the store and you can also purchase tickets to Tokyo Disneyland and Disney Sea at the store too.  

Hokokuji Temple & Bamboo Grove Garden at Kamakura

When I was planning my Japan trip, I wanted to visit a peaceful and relaxing place with nature to clear my mind, body, and soul from all the stress I was going through in the last 3 years. I didn't want to go too far outside of Tokyo since I mainly wanted to stay in Tokyo. So I thought why not visit the Hokokuji Temple with the bamboo grove garden in Kamakura. I have seen a few videos on youtube about this garden and it looks absolutely stunning and beautiful. Although probably not as beautiful as the Arashiyama bamboo forest in Kyoto. In comparison to the one in Kyoto, it is a lot smaller but it is definitely less crowded so you can really enjoy nature in peace. 

Hokoku-ji is a small Zen temple in Kamakura (鎌倉) with a bamboo grove garden of more than 2,000 moso bamboos.

There are different ways you can get to Kamakura from Tokyo and it's about an hour away by train. I took the Yokosuka Line to Kamakura station. At the station, there are lots of exit sign with pictures that direct you which exit to take to where you want to go so you won't have to worry about getting lost. There are actually many temples you can visit in Kamakura including the Kotokuin Temple with the Great Buddha statue which is one of the most famous and popular tourist spots in Kamakura. 

And right outside of the station, you will find a tourist map of Kamakura that shows you all of the temples and where they are located including which bus stop to board at to get to your destination. To get to Hokokuji Temple, you take the #5 bus at the bus stop terminal. 

Near the tourist map of Kamakura, there is also a clock tower and even free wifi service you can connect to in case you need to use google map, very convenient!

Otaru Music Box Museum: Yume no Oto Character House

My final last post on the Otaru Music Box Museum Yume no Ota (Character House) which is actually located across from the main building hall on the left side. This shop specialize in selling music boxes from popular anime characters in Japan. 

Cute Totoro and Mickey and Minnie mouse display outside of the shop.

The first floor of the shop has a small collection of different character music boxes such as Micky Mouse, Winnie the Pooh, Snoopy, Doraemon and other characters that I don't remember anymore as I didn't take pictures of them. Instead I mostly took pictures of my favourite and beloved Doraemon music boxes, lol. 

The entire 2nd floor is dedicated to the most popular Ghibli animaton character of My Neighbour Totoro.