HAL Westerdam – 33 day Japan/South Korea – Day 18 – Tokyo, Japan – Final Pics!
Saturday Oct 24, 2026
Hi All! We had a fun day in Tokyo today and we reunited with our old guide friend Yoshi from a few weeks ago. If you ever come to Tokyo, get one of their free guides to show you around the city. They make it so easy and they’re such nice people!
He once again navigated us around Tokyo with ease but today we focused mostly on finding unique shopping places (no shrines, temples or fish markets today!). But we did see the replica of the Statue of Liberty that sits near Tokyo harbor, we went to the swanky Ginza shopping area (think Tiffany’s, Prada, etc.), strolled the Yanaka Ginza street cheap shopping area, and bought some Anime and Manga (comic books) in the Akihabara area (I’m looking at you Josh!).
We started at 9 AM and were back onboard around 3:00 PM. Six hours of his time and all we paid was his transportation costs and took him to lunch (along with a big tip!). You can’t beat it! Speaking of lunch, he took us to a Soba Noodle restaurant that was very tasty. They gave you a huge tray of food and it was like 6 bucks. Like I’ve said before, travel does not have to be expensive if you know where to find the deals!
For the evening we got ready early to go out on the upper deck to see the Tokyo Bay Fireworks display. They have not done these annual fireworks for 10 years due to COVID and other issues. They set off 12,000 fireworks and had one huge 1.5 foot long shell that exploded in the air. That’s the largest size fired off anywhere in Tokyo! But guess what? There was a huge building blocking our view! So we could hear them but couldn’t see them. Bummer!
So we did an early dinner at the Lido and went to the show which was also earlier since most people who came on today were probably dealing with jet lag. It was the “Welcome Aboard” show that we saw last time but it was a little different since we’ll have some new guest entertainers.
We finished the night with the thing we like doing the most. FaceTiming with the grandkids! They’re doing great and we miss them dearly! I didn’t dare tell them all the Pokémon stuff we got them! Lol. Tomorrow we’re in Shimizu, Japan. New day, new city to explore!
