Well today was as we thought, a big day in Odaiba.
We had a later start and Steve found directions for how to get to our first stop of the day, which was the Tokyo Sea Life Park. We had to catch three trains to get there and we did pretty well until we got on an express train which flew past our station. We had to get off at the Disneyland station to turn around. It was tempting to go back to Disneyland (this was all part of Amy’s evil plan). The stop over gave us enough time for Rob to get an ice cream, and for me to get Mickey Mouse shaped Oreos.
Once we got on the right train, we headed out and wandered up towards the Sea Life Park, the walk was nice as was the area it had a very St. Kilda type of feel. We spent a few hours in the Sea Life Park. I liked it. It was not as good as Melbourne’s but it showed a fair variety of fish.The outside bit where you could see penguins both above and underwater was a bit different.
We found some lunch in the cafe. It looked really nice but it was not so (terrible! Second worst meal in Japan to date). When we left the Sea life Park we found a street entertainer and watched him for a while, he was pretty good (I slipped him some cash after the show, he was very good). After the show we knew we had to get moving if we wanted to see Odaiba,
We took two more trains from the Sea Life Park to Odaiba. We are lucky the train system works so well here as it would take a few hours to move around Melbourne so efficiently. We arrived at a station called Tokyo Teleport, I think it is called Tokyo teleport because it is in the central part of Odaiba, and Odaiba is an island (I think its called Tokyo teleport because it teleports you to your destination, if you know how to use it). We decided our best bet for the afternoon was to go to the Museum of National and Emerging Science.
We spent to closing time on the one exhibition floor, there were seven floors in total. The floor we explored was based on new technologies (new my arse! The “flashiest” thing they had to offer was a polished version of my Design project). The boys understood the in-depth theory behind each display, where I just enjoyed working out what it meant by using the interactive display. We saw a robot demonstration which showed us where the technology is heading with robots.
There was also this fast catching robot to play with, he had lightning quick reflexes. Another piece of interesting technology were these lights. When you looked at the lights they look normal enough but when you move your head around and unfocus your eyes, pictures appear on the walls. I bet Anthony could provide more detail as to why (sure can! And here’s a hint: Completion).
We had to line up for a movie that used new technology for Virtual Reality. When we were allowed in we watched a 3D movie. We then had to leave the museum as it was closing time.
We walked towards the Rainbow Bridge in an attempt to find the Carbon Fiber Garden. The Carbon Fiber garden was actually not a garden but a water show with lighting (lost in translation doesn’t even cover the confusion we had trying to explain this to the locals for directions). The show occurs every hour. Near the Rainbow Bridge, we found the Statue of Liberty as well as something I think was meant to be the Liberty Bell. Near here we spotted a Toys R Us, so we had a bit of a look.
The Carbon Fiber Garden show was amazing. The show shot geysers of water into the air and coloured them with lights. They also shot out a water wall and projected images onto it When the show was over we walked along Tokyo Bay beach to SEGA Joypolis.
At SEGA Joypolis, Anthony, Rob and myself went on the indoor roller-coaster which wasn’t to bad. Over the night we did go on a few rides and even got Sarma and Steve on some Roller-coaster simulators which they really enjoyed. We found some girls from Korea, this occurred because Lee was a bit over dramatic in the simulator (they thought he was funny. To be honest, he had me in hysterics too).
We ended up going out with the girls. but I don’t think the knew where they lived. They said Roppongi, so we looked for a karaoke bar somewhere near there. They then changed there minds about where they were staying and Lee ended up paying for their taxi home because there were no more trains. We walked home from Roppongi.