It's fair distance from Tokyo and even using the Shinkansen it takes nearly 2 hours.
This was the first time we got to use a shinkansen, and in the Green car, no less.
The Green car is the like business class on a plane. Very roomy an plush. I'm glad we shelled for this bit of luxury as it makes the travelliing around just that bit more enjoyable
We took a bunch of pictures but here is a very good taste of what we saw in a link I found recently.
The stuff I have found on the net doesn't come anywhere near showing what is in this place.
It is not big by museum standard and especially when you consider the amount of stuff it has in it.
It's official title is the Yokota Toy, Doll and Car Museum but it has huge collections of radios, working black and white TV's, vinyl records, soft drink bottles, model cars, glamour posters, Japanese wrestling memorabilia, wines, sake's ..... it's an absolute mish mash of stuff that works. That's after all the old Nissans and Minis and stacks of rare Japanese cars.
One car that made me laugh was squirrelled away, yes, "squirrelled" because it was next to the squirrel enclosure up on the roof, was a Ferrari F40!!
I would love to know more about who M. Yokota is (was?) because not only is he person of immense wealth but also of eclectic taste.
Late inclusion, found on another blog -
The story behind Masahiro Yokota is that he was from a poor family but mastered the art of carpentry and latterly house building whereupon he made his money during the economic boom in 1980's Japan.
Apparently when he was knocking down houses he amassed a vast quantity of unwanted toys and memorabilia and so in the 1990's he decided to open the museum.
Whilst it was something of a gamble displaying more modern history, a trip down memory lane thus nostalgia is what makes people happy and this was the spirit in which the museum was created.
Masahiro Yokota had a passion for cars and racing.
He did quite a lot of competition himself and really it's his old racing cars that are on display as well as other Japanese cars that are of interest to him.
We were grateful for having seen the collection and I'm sure any of you reading this blog would love it too.
We spent a couple of hours there and left in the early afternoon.
We took a cab to the train station, which cost ~$20 and then the train back to Tokyo Station.
As we walked back through the Ginza we discovered that tis and in many other areas of Tokyo they close certain streets off to traffic on Saturday and Sunday afternoon.
It works well, from what we saw.
After getting home and freshening up a bit we had to shuffle off quickly as we had tickets to see the show at the Robot Restaurant in Shinjuku.
Much has been written about this show and none of it does it any justice.
Go here and it will give you a wee little taste of what you will experience.
The place has a total of 150 seats in three tiered rows on each side of the main floor on which the show is staged.
It's a slick, fast paced, over the top, 90 minutes of manga-ish production that needs to be seen (experienced) to be appreciated.
There is a lot of drumming during one of the sets and I'm sure that the love child of Maureen “Moe” Tucker and Peter "Ginger" Baker played lead drums!
Damn that girlie could beat those skins.
The rest of the big haired drummer girls and guitarists wearing masks that looked suspiciously like they had dildo's for noses were quite good too.
By the by, the whole of Shinjuku is no less over the top than the Robot Show.
It's a melting pot of every sleazy, glitzy, neon lit, fad driven, good night out seeking, bizarre loving, bunch of people from all over Tokyo, Japan and the world all in one tiny corner of Tokyo.
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