Curiously Carmen

Travel: Tokyo DisneySea Resort Review

I actually started writing this draft in April, but never ended up finishing it! Back in November 2018, the fiance and I went on our much anticipated trip to Tokyo. One of the places we wanted to check out was Tokyo DisneySea.

Tokyo DisneySea is the only DisneySea resort in the world! Next door to Tokyo DisneySea is Tokyo Disneyland. Since we have been to Disneyland in the past and had limited time, we decided to only check out DisneySea.

The weather was quite cold for Tokyo standards that day! Also, the Disney resorts are located on the outskirts of Tokyo, closer to Tokyo Bay which also made it colder.

There were also some drizzly periods, but that didn’t stop us from having fun! You can tell from my photos that it was also cloudy that day. I thought about editing them to make it brighter but wanted to show potential visitors what the weather is like in November.

Tokyo DisneySea did sell some rain ponchos and portable sticky heat pads as well.

Getting there: Both Disney resorts are easily accessible from Tokyo, and is approximately 1-1.5 hours each way, depending on the method of transportation.

The cheapest option is to take the subway from Tokyo, but you’ll have to transfer a few times. Since we were meeting with our friends early, we purchased shuttle bus tickets on the same morning that departed from the Shinjuku Expressway Bus Terminal. It was a great decision because I was able to nap the whole way and not worry about transferring trains or keeping our friends waiting from getting lost in Tokyo’s vast subway system.

American Waterfront at night

Just like Disneyland, DisneySea was divided into different themed areas – Mediterranean Harbour, Mysterious Island, American Waterfront, Port Discovery, Arabian Coast, Mermaid Lagoon, and Lost River Delta!

The park was huge, and we were so glad to have our experienced Japanese friends guide us around. If it was just the two of us, we definitely wouldn’t have been able to explore as much as we did that day.

Toy Story Mania, one of the most popular rides! We didn’t have time to go on it though. 🙁

There was also an app that they used, which told you the wait times for each ride. I don’t remember if it was only in Japanese or not though… Clearly that day, we were useless and trusted our friends LOL!

Mediterranean Harbour: The first area of the park!

As the name suggests, Mediterranean is named after a seaside Mediterranean town. This is also where the nightly water show is held too.

For lunch, we went to Miguel’s El Dorado Cantina, the Mexican themed restaurant. The food was delicious!

Also, I brought in some onigiri from 7-11 just incase, as I was still dealing with my stomach issues during the trip and didn’t want to upset my stomach/in case I couldn’t eat anything at the park.

There wasn’t a problem with bringing in my own food, so you could also stock up if you have strict dietary requirements or want to save money on food.

Stella Lou is one of the exclusive DisneySea characters. I fell in love with this adorable, soft purple bunny! Other exclusive DisneySea characters include Shellie May and Duffy.

All the cute Stella Lou’s!

Another Tokyo food exclusive was Toy Story’s alien mochi! I knew we had to get these.

They were cute and also delicious, with either a chocolate, strawberry or vanilla filling. You can find these at a trolley in American Harbour. Just a heads up that there will probably be a line up because they are very popular!

Mickey Mouse chicken nuggets! I forgot which place my friend got these though. They tasted like regular chicken nuggets, except they were Mickey Mouse shaped.

Mermaid Lagoon: This indoor area of the park was dedicated to Ariel and ocean life. It was a huge building with some different rides and a gift shop.

More Mermaid Lagoon

Arabian Coast

Found Stitch at Arabian Coast!

Sindbad’s Storybook Voyage, Disneysea’s version of the ‘It’s a Small World’ ride. We were on a boat which slowly transported you to different themes.

Sindbad’s Storybook Voyage

Gondolas at Mediterranean Harbour

At the end of a fun day, we watched the night show at Mediterranean Harbour. The show was in Japanese so I couldn’t understand what they were saying. It was still fun to watch though!

We had a very fun day at DisneySea! If you are staying in the Tokyo area for more than 4 days (anything less I would recommend only checking out the neighbourhoods in Tokyo), I would recommend reserving a day for DisneySea.

Travel: Tokyo Eats – Part 3/3

Woohoo! Part 3/3, the final post of my favourite restaurants in Tokyo! Have you been to any of these places?

Yakitori: We stumbled upon this small bar in Shinjuku outside of Memory Lane that probably fits about 10 people, and had such delicious yakitori. Unfortunately, there isn’t an English name for it nor do I remember the exact location. I’m kicking myself for not taking a photo of the entrance like I usually (always?!) do… ugh!

Near the end of our trip, we tried to go back because it was so delicious but couldn’t retrace our steps. 🙁 You’re probably wondering why I’m even posting this if I can’t remember the name? It’s because I like to look back on all my posts as memories, so I want to see this when I look back on my trip.

Kagurazaka Kurikoan: In part 2, I shared a taiyaki stand that we randomly came across in Akihabara, Akihabara Kurikoan. It was our first time trying taiyaki, and we fell in love with the taste so much that the next day, the boyfriend researched some places and came across Kagurazaka Kurikoan! It is a small cafe bursting with many different taiyaki flavours.

Compared to the first place, Kagurazaka Kurikoan had a lot more filling. We tried the regular custard, matcha, and cookies and cream. My favourite was the custard. It was so rich and creamy!

Menya Musashi: This was a ramen place in Shinjuku. Ramen and my sensitive stomach does not sit well, so I opted out while the boyfriend went for a quick lunch. He tried the Musashi ramen which is a combination of chicken, pork and bonito broth which was delicious.

Shin Udon: This is a small little place in Shinjuku, hidden from the main and busy area. They make their udon fresh here and it did not disappoint! The boyfriend’s chilled udon was very unique. It came with some citrus peels (?) which added depth to the chilled udon and beef. I ordered the normal soup udon and it was full of umami flavour.

Tsurotontan Udon: The second udon place we tried, and last meal in Tokyo. Both of my local friends recommened this udon place, so we went to the location at Haneda Airport before our flight back home! I was quite shocked to see people line up for an airport restaurant. However, this udon was spectacular! They had pretty unique types such as the duck meat udon (so delicious), chilled udon with spicy cod roe, egg swirl udon, and more!

Yummm! I know I’ll be looking back at these posts and be drooling over all the delicious food I ate. Until next time Japan, you won’t be able to get rid of us!

Travel: Tokyo Eats – Part 2/3

Continuing on our food adventures in Tokyo, Japan! Funny story, I was only going to do two parts… but then I showed the boyfriend, and he kept bringing up other restaurants I didn’t talk about. So two became three! This isn’t even all of the restaurants we ate at in the 8 days. Come to Tokyo with a hungry stomach!

Hakushu Teppanyaki: OMG, Kobe beef. This was our one major restaurant splurge… we both did not want to leave without trying Kobe beef. We were worried that we couldn’t get in without a reso, but luckily the owners squeezed us in the same night.

The Kobe beef was life changing… I’ve never had such amazing steak before. So incredibly soft, and buttery.. we were on a steak high for the rest of the evening. We thought the bread was a bit strange, but it is used to soak up the precious Kobe beef juice so you can enjoy that after the steak. Highly recommend having Kobe beef at least once in your life!

Sushi Zanmai: This is yet another chain in Tokyo, and personally, my favourite nigiri sushi of the trip! We went to two different locations, in Shinjuku and Shinokubo, but I liked the one by Shinokubo more. I’ve never had such amazing and fresh salmon nigiri in my life… for only 100 yen which is $1.15 CAD!

They also had really good fatty tuna. This is more of a sit down restaurant where you order. It was also really cool to watch the sushi chefs make our nigiri. They do it so fast and artfully!

Sutameshi: This was one of the restaurants that we randomly stumbled across, and turned out to be really delicious! The one we went to was on the second floor of a building in Akihabara.

Japanese people love their hamburger steak, which is essentially a hamburger patty with a side of rice and sauce. I couldn’t leave without trying one, and it was so good! The patty was simple but juicy, and the curry sauce went well with it.

The boyfriend ordered a fried chicken bowl and it was so good as well. It had a very strong garlic flavour, like deep fried garlic chicken.

Daily Chico: Eight. Layer. Soft. Serve. Need I say more?! We came here on the last day following a recommendation from a friend. It is unassumingly located in the basement of Nakano Broadway.

The flavours change often, but the 8 eight flavours we had that day were: vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, coffee, chestnut, grape, green tea, and soda pop lemonade.

Akihabara Kurikoan: Going to Akihabara was full of pleasant food discoveries! A couple of hours after having lunch at Sutameshi (see above), we randomly saw a stand that served taiyaki. Actually, we spotted it because we wanted matcha soft serve. At the last minute, the boyfriend decided to also try their taiyaki since most people were ordering that.

Well, it was a wonderful decision on his part because it was delicious! Surprisingly, we both have never tried taiyaki before. The matcha ice cream in Tokyo has a more natural and earthy flavour, so don’t be expecting the highly sweetened matcha from Starbucks. Both the soft serve and taiyaki were delicious, and this spontaneous decision led us to source out other taiyaki places on the remaining days of our trip.

Travel: Tokyo Eats – Part 1/3

After 5.5 years of talking about our dream trip to Tokyo, the boyfriend and I finally brought our dream to fruition this past week! It was surreal being back in Tokyo for the second time and I can easily say that it is my favourite city in the world. We stayed a total of 8 full days, plus 2 half days for travelling.

In these 8 days, we ate a lot and did not come across a single meal that we didn’t like! Here are some of the restaurants/chains that we visited, and I would recommend giving a try. I’m not going to list every single restaurant we ate at because the post would be way too long!
7-11: Our trip started with 7-11 food – yes, you heard that right! The 7-11 convenience stores in Japan are nothing like the greasy junk food served in Canada/USA. They have everything ranging from onigiri, salad, udon bowls, curry rice bowls, steamed dumplings, ice cream…. and more!

The go-to was the onigiri, which was approximately $1-2 CAD each depending on flavour. These are great to store in your bag for the day, and I bought a couple to snack on before going to Tokyo Disneysea as well.

Sukiya: Sukiya is a major quick meal chain in Tokyo. I saw a Sukiya every few blocks or so in Shinjuku! They specialize in beef rice bowls, aka gyudon. I came in here not knowing what to expect, but I actually really enjoyed it.

It is a very filling rice bowl, with lots of sweet, seasoned beef, and mayo. They also added some small pieces of sour, preserved veggies to balance it out.

The total cost was about $7 CAD for a delicious and super big meal. It is very popular during the lunch rush, where you can see lots of salarymen enjoying a quick lunch before going back to work.

A Happy Pancake: I have more of a savoury tooth than a sweet tooth, but A Happy Pancake was definitely on our radar! We went to the Harujuku location and waited for about 20 minutes around 2pm. They are known for their incredibly fluffy and thick Japanese pancakes!

Each pancake is freshly made and there is a window where you can see them making it. The pancakes definitely did not disappoint. I have yet to see something like this in Vancouver, so you should definitely give them a try while in Tokyo.:

Matsunoya: Matsunoya is another chain restaurant, although I did not see it around as much as Sukiya. We passed by one of the Matsunoya locations every day on the way to the subway, and decided to finally try it. They serve gyudon as well, but seem to specialize in katsu aka fried meat.

We ordered both the pork and chicken katsu to compare, and they were both delicious! Very crispy and the curry sauce was delicious as well. Matsunoya was also pretty cheap!

Kaisen Misakiko: We visited this sushi conveyor belt restaurant in Tokyo Dome City for lunch! It was reasonably priced and our favourite nigiri were the different types of tuna.

There are two layers of conveyor belts. The bottom belt offers the standard nigiri. The top belt has the nigiri that you specially order on the iPad and comes delivered on a shinkansen style plate, how cute! The colour of the plate corresponds to the price – usually, there are about 5 different plate colours at a restaurant.

Well, there’s part 1! Stay tuned for part 2!