The Long Way Home

November 20/21, 2025 from the itinerary: - last day in Tokyo and returning home

My flight didn’t leave until 21:55, so I realized I had an extra day to sight see in Tokyo.  There were several things I hadn’t seen on earlier trips, but I needed some way to get around on the metro and also needed a way to the airport.

Breakfast

My research showed I could get a 24 hour metro pass which is a pretty good deal at 800 yen, about $5.  It turns out only tourists can buy this and it had to be from a Tourist Information Bureau.  After about 15 minutes of false starts and Google translate I found out where I had to go and decided to use it to get to the airport as well.  Note to self for the next trip - take the monorail the last portion as it’s less crowded.  I could have probably done that on my JR pass as well.

I had to go to Shinjuku to see the 3D cat video billboard.  Unfortunately, videos and photos don’t work so well, but here’s a YouTube video taken by someone who had better resolution.

I tried to get to the King Kong building, but it was far away and I was getting tired.  Here’s a YouTube video taken by someone else who actually did see it.

I wanted to go to the Ginza shopping district and window shop.  Amazing to me that within 5 minutes of arriving I saw a convertible Bentley and a Maserati, along with other exotic cars.  I saw the famous clock tower, UniGlo flagship store, G500 fancy mall and lots of other small stores along the main drag.

By now I was pretty tired and still a couple hours before I needed to leave for the airport.  I still needed to try the 7 Eleven egg salad sandwich, so stopped by there and the food stalls near the local shrine. I remembered these food stalls from my last trip in 2023 and got a great green tea ice cream and deep fried mochi - was delicious. (sorry, no photos...)

I went back to the hotel and still had some yen cash to spend so bought a black sugar plum wine to drink with my egg salad sandwich.  Not sure these two things go together.  The egg salad was pretty good - I’d give it a 7 out of 10 - rather on the bland side. The photo to the right is a rice/seaweed snack.

It took over an hour to get to the airport as it was during rush hour.  The metro was very crowded.  I don’t think they had the official pushers, but I think it came close at one point.  I was relieved to get to the airport.

The ANA flight back to Vancouver was uneventful.  I think this was the slowest meal service I’ve ever had on a flight.  I finally gave up on dessert and went to sleep as it was already 2 hours into a 7.5 hour flight at that point.  The flight took me back in time since I landed on the same day I left.

Overnighted in Vancouver at the same Hampton Inn as when I went out.  Still looks the same, so no. photos this time.     

This was the food on the flights back in the US from Vancouver to Jax.

How disappointing after 22 days of wonderful food. Anyway, another amazing trip closed in the books and looking forward 2026 and the start of our around the world trip!