The calm after the storm

What a change from last night

We weren't sure what to expect when we headed out for Yokohama today, but what a difference it was from yesterday.  We were told that the trains were running again, whether it was at full capacity or not we don't know, but the majority of the displaced commuters were gone by the time we got up.  The people still lingering in the lobby were slumped in their chairs, some watching the news, some dozing, all of them looking pretty defeated with nowhere to go.  The intersection outside of Shinagawa Station was clear with only a small crowd gathered around the police stand.

With everything going on around us, we felt thoroughly guilty that we were picking up where we left off yesterday, trying to make the most out of our trip.  Instead of heading into Tokyo, I thought maybe we could take advantage of having Tomo-san's car and head away from the city, either to Kamakura or Yokohama.  The roads were quiet and clear, so we made great time, chatting with Tomo the whole way there.

Most of the bridges were blocked off

There were a lot of bridge closures en route to Yokohama as part of the city's response to the quake.  Traffic was so light though, it didn't seem to affect anyone too much.  Yokohama's Chinatown is one of the largest in the world, but when we got there at around 11:30 there were so few people, it was 10 vendors to every customer.  That would be virtually unheard of in Toronto, Chinatown empty at 11:30 on a Saturday morning?  I asked some of the shopkeepers if it was normally that quiet, and they all shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders.  It was an eerie feeling, that only compounded the guilty I was already feeling.

Dad and I outside one of the Chinese Temples

With a population that rivals Toronto's (3.5million), Yokohama is normally a bustling port city with a huge import/export industry and tourist attractions that include Minato Murai 21, a mini theme park and of course Chinatown.  That definitely wasn't the case today, we hardly saw anyone on the streets and the theme park/Ferris wheel were closed.  Not only that, but the sprawling waterfront Yamashita Park was cordoned off to prevent anyone from going too close to the water due to the tsunami warnings along the coast.

Yamashita Park taped off so you couldn't walk along the boardwalk

As we drove around there was a large section of the street blocked off by police and construction workers.  Looking up, the front of the building had cracks throughout with a pile of rubble on the ground.  All new buildings are required to be able to withstand earthquakes, but some of the older buildings weren't updated so they were the most badly damaged.  I'm still amazed that there wasn't more destruction though, I know Tokyo only experienced small tremors compared to those closer to the epicentre, it still felt like we were being thrown around quite a bit.

We stopped for lunch at a little Japanese sushi place that had live fish in tanks all around the restaurant.  Everything was so fresh, Dad even convinced me to try the uni (sea urchin), something I would never dream of eating back home.  I have to admit, if you can get past the texture, it wasn't half bad.  As we stood and watched one of the crabs try to escape from his tank, the sushi chef scooped him up and attempted to put him in my backpack as he laughed hysterically at my reaction. 

With Yokohama so quiet, we thought we would make our way back to the city, looping around Haneda Airport first to take some photos.  We ended up in Tokyo Harbour, Tomo wanted to show us some of the attractions there - none of which were open either.  We saw the big tv studio there, and the Sega video arcade.  Being on reclaimed land, the island of Odaiba is quite modern, with bridges and tunnels joining all the (man-made) sections together.

Since we were already there, Tomo took us to the Odaiba Marine Park next, which he said is usually jam packed with people.  The park offers a truly spectacular view of the Rainbow Bridge (one of the main connecting points between Odaiba and Tokyo).  The Tokyo boat tours depart from the Odaiba docks, and there is a beach there as well.  We seemed to be the only tourists there, Tomo joked that everyone else there was on a date... and looking around, I was inclined to agree.  It really was a beautiful spot, the water was so still you could see your reflection in it, the sun was shining, and you couldn't even hear any of the usual city noises from there.  It was such a strange juxtaposition to what is going on in the rest of the country, I think we all took some time to reflect on our good fortune and just try to let the peacefulness wash over us. 

We're back at our hotel now, Dad is napping while I wait for a contact at the Canadian Associated Press to try to get a call through for an interview, but he said so far he hasn't had any luck.  I wasn't able to make any outbound collect calls either, the international operator told me that they've discontinued all outbound collect calls due to high volumes and intermittent phone service.  It's getting late, so we better head out for dinner now before we both pass out from exhaustion. 

I spoke with our tour operators earlier today (JTB) and they said it is up to us whether we continue on to Hakone tomorrow.  If we choose not to, we may just head straight to Kyoto and stay an extra day there.  The line has been busy all night so we have the girl at Guest Services trying to get through to find out if our tour is even running as scheduled in the morning since all JTB Sunrise tours were cancelled for today.  If we do decide to go on the tour as scheduled, we won't have internet service again until the 14th when we get to our hotel in Kyoto, but I think the worst is over and I'll find ways to update everyone if needed.

As for the news about the reactor explosion at the Fukushima Nuclear plant, I don't know any more than you do at this point.  it's over 250km north of Tokyo though, so we've been assured that we are safe here.

Signing off, love you all xoxo