Shibuya is a popular shopping and entertainment destination, especially for younger people.
We started our day heading off to Yoyogi-koen Park, located in Shibuya. This is a large park which can be a great place for picnic. Festivals take place there during summer.
After a nice walk in the park, we went to Meiji Jingu Shrine, which is surrounded by an extensive wooded parkland. This is one of the shrines of Shinto, it was initially built in 1920 but after being destroyed in WWII, it was rebuilt in 1958. There is nothing to visit at the shrine so if you see a long line of people waiting, do not waste an hour - as we did... - to realize that people (all Japanese) were actually queeing to buy a Japanese calligraphy...
Then, we wanted to see the famous Takeshita Street, which is packed with fashionable shops and fashion bazaar. The street was so full of Japanese teens that it was actually hard to navigate!
We then followed a portion of Omote-sando, which is a fashionable strip lined with high-end boutiques and took a right to reach Cat Street. Do not expect a street full of cat cafes or cats in the street, Cat street is a nice and quieter windy road lined with boutiques. We stopped there in a few shops including the Adidas shop.
We started to be quite hungry and the rain was started anyways so we stopped for a late lunch on one of the main street close to Shibuya Crossing.
The rain stopped so we could pursue our walk towards Shibuya Crossing, known to be the busiest intersection in the world. This crossing is an organized chaos as people spill out from the sidewalks from all sides.
We managed to cross the intersection to Shibuya Center Gai Center successfully! Center-Gai is popular with Japan's youth and boasts trendy stores, restaurants and nightclubs. If you are looking for sport shoes, this is probably a nice spot for a shopping stop.
Then, we followed a narrow passageway called Spain Zaka to Koendori Street, which was (again!) packed with fashionable shops and department stores. We did not stop at the Shibuya Tokyo Wonder Site but this is where you can have a look at the work of young Japanese artists. We walked back to our hotel in Shinjuku as we needed to get ready for the Robot show.
During our stay in Tokyo, there are two things that my boyfriend absolutely wanted to do: attend a baseball game and watch the Robot show. We booked for the show before our trip but this is probably fine to book a few days before. This is not cheap and cost around 7,500 yens if you book online (approx. 70 us dollars). We were advised to take the option without the meal, and to be fair, it was probably a good choice as the food -served in a tray- did not look amazing. The whole venue is weird and the show is weird too! This is actually quite hard to describe but that's pretty much something you love or you hate. This is a 3-part -90-min show - built only for tourists by the way - which combines Japanese culture and robots' battles and performance. Some of the scenes are actually very cheesy and end up being quite funny. My partner loved it. I found the show interesting... :p
After the show, we went for dinner in a restaurant in the surroundings, still in Shinjuku.
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