On our last day in Tokyo we wanted to spend time in Harajuku, a place we both enjoyed from when we were younger! Our first stop was the Meiji Jingu right across the street from Harajuku Station. This is one of my favourite shrines in Tokyo. Though it’s not exceptionally large, the walk through the wooded area leading up to the shrine itself is quite beautiful. After paying our respects at the shrine’s main area, we bought different kinds of omamori, which are good luck charms, as souvenirs.
We then went to Takeshita-dori for shopping. I used to frequent this street back when I was in school, and it was interesting to see how much the area has changed since then. What used to be mostly small stores with unique fashion items is mostly now larger, commercialized chain stores. Some of the stores I remember are still there; it’s always fun to check out Closet Child, which is a second hand that carries used Lolita dresses and alternative fashion pieces.
This is also a great area to grab a crepe! There are tons of different places down and around the block that carry tons of different flavours.
We did more shopping, and checked out the Laforet building so I could visit the Angelic Pretty store in there.
Our next stop was the Q-Pot cafe, which was a bit of a walk away from Harajuku, but definitely worth the hike! We had a dessert set with coffees and the treats were not only delicious, but adorable as well! Q-Pot also makes really fun dessert inspired jewelry and across the street from the cafe is the one of the their retail locations.
Headed back down Omotesando and stopped in Kiddy Land, which is a giant, multi-level store that carries all sorts of goods from things like Pokemon, Sanrio, Disney, and Studio Ghibli/
We took the Yamanote-sen up to Shinjuku for the final leg of our trip. Lynnette wanted to visit a few used CD/DVD stores that sell J-rock items to look for a specific Raphael DVD (Lynnette's Note: if you are not an aging J-rock fan, I was really into this group in high school and they have reunited a few times since!) . We checked out a few shops and also hit up one last Book Off while we were there before finally heading back for the night.