Breakfast in the French restaurant La Trianen this morning in our building, the West Wing (true!).

Much nicer space although structurally it is identical to the Japanese restaurant in the East Wing - carpeted, draped, cascading ferns, blue mosaics - it is a beautiful space .

The buffet was great but the cooked breakfast was a work of art - see the pics.

Bus was due to leave at 10.30 so I was checking out at 10.20 when Al came over and said there was no more room on the bus. I told him I'd booked and we'd be getting on.

And we did, and I felt about an inch tall. A very odd young guy we'd seen around yesterday afternoon was asked to get off so that I could have his seat. Worry not, cos he got back on and sat on a seat that folded down into the aisle, along with two oldies who obviously hadn't booked early enough either .  Our bags sat in the stairwell!!

Sat up on the platform at the station and watched a bunch of Hikari and Nizomi race through the station. I'm such a train nerd cos I loved it :)

Boarded and no room for our bags at the back of our Green car cos they're filled with musical instruments so they each get their own seat beside us. So spoiled with out very first bullet train ride from Osaka as our normal car was way better than this supposed top line train carriage that we paid extra for. Was still comfy and super roomy and loved the footrest, even if it was for only 35 minutes.

Arrive into Tokyo Station and head out of the south exit as per the instructions . Pouring rain so not looking forward to the walk to the hotel. Nothing matches the instructions we've printed up. Ask a couple of people for help and eventually the attendant at the JR counter realises we should be at Shinjuku, not Tokyo Station. Mmmm... the hotel is the Hotel Sunroute Plaza Shinjuku. Who wooda thunk we should be at Shinjuku?

So back into the station, onto a cross city JR rapid service and try the south exit of the right station - Shinjuku. We read the directions wrong again and walked twice as far as we needed to but we eventually got there.

Sure the receptionist said smoking room as I was checking in but couldn't be sure. It was. Foolishly we stuck with it for four nights. Just couldn't be bothered going back down and asking for a new room. Apart from stench, room is nice, and there's a spray bottle with green tea deodoriser and I sprayed it constantly for all four days. Being able to open the window also helps and with the typhoon approaching, there's plenty of breeze .

One question for Japanese hotel operators - what's with the pillows????? Two totally different pillows at our first Hearton - one kinda ok and the other we're guessing Japanese sty;le with wheat (?) in it. Pillows galore (at least four, and more if we wanted them), and nice pillows, at the Crown Plaza in Hiroshima. Four pillows at the Hearton in Kyoto and four again at the B in Nagoya, but back to two small, different pillows here at the Sunroute. Possibly could have asked for more but Al made himself a much more comfortable (and huge) pillow out of our (growning) laundry bag.

Head out in search of the Tokyo City Tourist office. Wander around in circles for a while but eventually find it. We want to buy Grutt passes - Good for Round Tour Ticket for Museum. Yes, we also love the acronym.

Fabulous lady who helped us tried to convince us not to buy it (questioned we'd get our money back) but we had a list of places we wanted to see and knew we'd get our JPY2000 each back at the very least (we did) .

After the Bunraku "no" in Osaka, we tried again.

Internet search showed Bunraku no but No yes.

She rang the No theatre to see what the show was but they advised her we'd get nothing out of it, so again No, it was not to be. Nor kabuki or Bunraku. Next time.

Headed through Shunjuku and down to the 'gay area', hoping to at least have a drink in one gay bar. Al had very clear instructions, but surprise, every street we turned down was shooting blanks. Nearly at the 'Pete's fed-up' point I suggested we go across the main road we'd been walking along and bingo, a couple of stores with windows covered with very large posters of near naked men kinda gave the game away.

Even I couldn't believe the names some of the bars were called but printable names were Boy, Man, Bloke, Black Hole, Jock ... you get the idea.

Find the more politely named bar we were in search of - Advocates - so we know where we're heading Wednesday night.

Back to the near the hotel and have dinner at a place with a name, cuisine, and neon sign I'm presuming only the locals understand - Ooze Charm, Italian, a pig. At least the pig is obvious once you read the menu as their specialty is a Japanese pork that is fatty beyond words (yes, we tried it).

An unusual meal to say the least but in no means bad, just different.

Typhoon supposed to hit Tokyo around midnight. We both woke up heaps of times during the night and looked out the window but no wind to speak of and very little rain. A whole country, plus us, were very grateful