Tokyo: Chuo + Odaiba
This is the seventh recap for LOHOjapan, my 3 week trip to Japan with my boyfriend. After attending a Hokkaido food festival and bar hopping in Shibuya, we head off to explore Chuo and Odaiba.
Chuo city and Odaiba are roughly 15 minute away from each other and there are two things on our itinerary: Tsukiji Fish Market and teamlab Borderless.
Brunch: Tsukiji Fish Market
The Tsukiji Fish Market is a sprawling wholesale fish market with an array of seafood and yummy goodies for sale. Think of it like the Richmond Night Market except it’s in the daytime and everything tastes much better (lol). The fish is fresh – literally caught and prepared the day you go – and it’s always bustling on the weekends.
The Tsukiji Fish Market used to be known as the “inner market” because there is an “outer market” where you can see fish actually being auctioned off. However, this “inner market” moved in 2018 so you will no longer see the auction.
Perhaps eating raw fish in the morning isn’t your preference, but if you come too late in the day, things can get sold out and stores will close up for the day. We arrive in the late morning and still were unable to try the uni bun we saw on Youtube.
Tamagoyaki ($1 USD)
We start off our day with some tamagoyaki, which is essentially egg on a stick. The egg is cooked in a dashi broth and we choose the sweet flavour. You can also choose to have it warm or hot. The inside is super fluffy and sweet.
Eel skewer ($4)
We come across a stall grilling eel skewers over charcoal. The smell is too enticing so we try one – it has a strong smoky flavour and tastes very good. A little small for $4.
Tuna ($7+$5)
We try maguro (tuna) at 2 different stalls. They both look like chopped pieces of random parts so don’t expect to have the best cuts of tuna in this little sample dishes.
Still, the tuna in Japan has a much bolder red colour than any tuna I’ve seen in Vancouver, which is almost always a light shade of pink.
Giant oyster ($8)
My boyfriend can’t pass up on this giant oyster and when I say giant, I mean giant. It is larger than the palm of my hand!
It is kind of hard to eat the oyster because it is impossible to slurp it up in one go. The taste is super creamy and sweet and almost a little overwhelming. Perhaps not the best choice to eat for breakfast – save it for after you’ve tried some other things first.
Strawberry mochi ($3.50 each)
We are wandering around so there is no structure to what we are eating lol. While walking around, we see strawberry mochi and decide to try the strawberry flavour and regular custard flavour.
Wow! I’m not usually a sweets person but these are so amazing. Light and delicious and not too sweet. The strawberry is huge and the mochi has such a soft and chewy texture to it. Definitely worth a try!
Fatty tuna don ($18)
This is the most expensive item we purchased at the Tsukiji Fish Market and it is also the most expensive item at this stall, but this is so worth it. The rice is seasoned so it’s not just plain rice and they put a lot of fatty tuna on top!
The fatty tuna is 10x better than the tuna we tried earlier. It melts in your mouth like butter. So amazing. So good. I cry.
Matcha milk ($5)
We end our day with a cup of cold matcha milk. They have a person standing outside actually grinding the matcha powder so that is interesting to watch.
The drink is refreshing and again, not too sweet or too bitter from the matcha powder.
Things to do: teamLab Borderless ($40)
TeamLab Borderless is a digital art museum. They have a location in central Tokyo but I hear it’s much smaller so we choose the original Odaiba exhibition instead. We purchased our tickets online the night before from their website.
The structure of the building is that there are no set ways to walk around. There are no doors so think of everything like a black maze. You are supposed to wander around and even come back to rooms you visited previously.
This is because the art is interactive and moves throughout the entire building (projects, moving lights, etc.). Therefore, a room you visited previously can look completely different if you wait and come back.
There is a lot of cool and different rooms inside the exhibition. In general, there are lots of flowers blooming and fluttering around. There is also a very cool waterfall room with a sliding slope.
One of my favourite rooms is a LED maze where hundreds of LED string lights descend down on you inside walls of mirrors. They make it look and sound like the fall of rain and it also glitters and changes colours.
I also enjoy another room where there are little discs popping up from the floor, like a garden of giant lilypads. They make it sound like wind is sweeping through and have different colours illuminated on top of the disks so that it turns into different fields.
My boyfriend really likes the ocean room, which is more isolated than the rest of the rooms. There are crashing waves 360 around the room and giant bean bags for you to take a rest.
We line up around 60 minutes for a special exhibition where you can lie on a net above the ground and watch a little projection show on the ceiling. It is cool but not sure if it is worth a 60 minute wait since the show itself is like 2-5 minutes long at most.
There is also a giant lineup for the “Chandelier room”, which I realize after is the lantern room – one of the most beautiful exhibitions. Unfortunately my feet were hurting too much and we decide not to line up for it (the wait time was an estimate of 70-90 minutes).
Things to do: Shopping in DiverCity + Gundam show
DiverCity Tokyo Plaza is only a 12 minute walk from teamLab. It is a fun shopping mall that boasts a giant gundam outside by their food court. They also have a Gundam cafe.
The giant gundam stands at 18 meters tall and it is free to view. They have performances multiple times a day – we see a short light show at around 8 or 9pm.
Dinner: Sojibo
Because we spend the night shopping, we decide to simply eat in the mall. The restaurants in mall are just as good as any other restaurant you find outside, I find.
We choose to try a soba place called Sojibo. We both order a tempura and soba set for $12 USD each. It comes with a soft boiled egg and other toppings like bonito flakes and seaweed. These sets are way too big for 1 person to finish!
Late night snack: Gindaco
We have a post-dinner snack in the food court after watching the Gundam performance. Our friend, Miyu, recommends Gindaco, which is a large takoyaki (octopus balls) chain. We choose one that has scrambled egg mixture on top. It costs around $8-10.
The takoyaki is crunchy on the outside and larger than normal. It is a very savoury and fulfilling snack.
Dessert: Pablo
On our way home, we stop by a Pablo location inside a train station to buy some cheese tarts. We buy one original cheese tart and one matcha tart and eat it back in the hotel along with some drinks from the local Family Mart.
Final thoughts on day seven
I really enjoyed exploring Chuo and Odaiba – I think the two areas are close enough together to make it a fun-filled itinerary.
The Tsukiji Fish Market was one of my top things to do for my first trip to Japan and it did not disappoint! It was exciting to walk around different stalls and try whatever I wanted. Of course, the food is simply amazing.
Some tips for visiting the Tsukiji Fish Market:
- You are not allowed to walk and eat at the same time. If you purchase something, you must stand and eat off to the side.
- There are little restaurants and sushi bars in the alleyways of Tsukiji Fish Market. I found them to be very expensive and I would be too full to try all the other types of food in the market if I sat down and ordered something.
- Go on a weekday! There are long line ups on the weekend.
My feet were very tired from exploring teamLab Borderless, but it was a super fun experience for me and a great photo spot. Sadly there aren’t really a lot of places to sit and rest in the exhibits, although there are rest rooms with chairs and vending machines. I found myself getting lost quite easily inside and it took us awhile to actually leave.
The Tokyo location for teamLab is smaller but they do have some more interesting exhibits related to your 5 senses. For example, they have a giant ball room and more physical/touch rooms for you to experience.
We spent roughly 3 hours at teamLab in Odaiba but from other people who went to the Tokyo location, I hear they spent around 45 minutes.
One thing that was on our itinerary but we didn’t do was that we wanted to visit the Odaiba Ōedo-onsen-monogatari, which is a hot spring. It costs around $30 to enter but you can stay in there for as long as you want. They have indoor and outdoor pools, as well as lots of dining options and festival style games.
The reason we decide not to go is that I read on the reviews that they are very serious about their tattoo ban. If you lie about your tattoo and get caught once you are inside, they will kick you out and you will not get a refund.
As I have two tattoos on my wrist and arm, my kimono robe will not cover it. Also, if I actually go into a hot spring I would be naked so we decided not to risk it and just head back to the hotel.
Stay tuned for my next post and follow along with the other recaps!
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Sincerely, Loewe
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