With the tour coming to an end, Sue and I had two extra days in Tokyo before returning home.

We were on a mission to make up for our walking debacle of yesterday. We set out to the Shibuya Train Station to take a train.

That train would take us to the Shinjuku Train Station with its over two hundred exits. Our directions were perfect and we were able to find the correct exit on the first try.

Hooray for us!

After exiting the station, we came across the iconic 3-D cat billboard.

It’s an advertisement that draws a lot of attention. However, I can’t honestly say that I remember what it was actually advertising.

The real reason for our journey was waiting at the end of the street. Perched on the eighth floor terrace of the Hotel Gramercy, surveilling the streets below was…..Godzilla!

We dared to move closer, hoping not to disturb him or incur his wrath. We were joined by many others and then…. At the top of the hour, he let out a mighty roar. His red eyes brought tremors to the people watching, his fiery breath (dimmed by the bright daylight) was terrifying. And then, he settled back in his watchful perch to await the top of the next hour.

We had done it. We not only got to see Godzilla, but we managed to maneuver our way there using the train system and conquering Shinjuku Station. And since I’m writing this, we also made it back.

We headed back to the hotel to rest up for a bit. One of us was coughing like crazy and decided to take a nap.

For dinner, we connected with two of our travel companions – Arthur and Pam. They were also staying on for a few days, though they would be leaving for the Hakone region in the morning. We had a lovely dinner together at the hotel restaurant, chatting away like old friends.

Our entire dinner was extremely good, but I had to share the special appetizer box that came with our meal. So many wonderful flavors and textures to prepare your palate for the meal.

At dinner’s end, we parted, hoping that we stay in touch.

For our last day in Tokyo, we were determined to find the Godzilla store. We set out, maps in hand and once again got ourselves lost. This time however, we came to our senses and just grabbed a taxi.

It was an embarrassingly short ride, but our taxi driver just laughed when I showed him a Google Translate message on my phone saying we tried to walk, but got lost. When he pulled up to the building, we cheered and he smiled. The happy ending was that there was someone looking for a taxi that hopped right in when we exited the vehicle.

The Godzilla store is located on the sixth floor of the Parco building. There were many other shops on the various floors, but we were focused on one target. The sixth floor was full of shops related to every character of video game or movie stardom.

And then we found him…

We made a couple of purchases and then departed. The floor was total chaos with people of all ages seeking out their favorite characters.

Having noted the route taken by the taxi driver, we started to walk back to the hotel. And yes, we made a wrong turn somewhere along the line.

This time, we found ourselves in a mass of humanity at the Shibuya Scramble crossing. When the cross walk says go, you go!

Arriving at the other side of the road (the chicken would not have made it), we went in the direction we thought was correct and came across the statue of Hachiko.

It took a couple of tries, but we eventually found a sign pointing to the Shibuya Station and then another that indicated our hotel.

Back in the hotel, Sue displayed her new pride and joy for our Christmas tree.

We had made a dinner reservation at the hotel restaurant to celebrate the end of our fabulous journey. Just the two of us looking out over the city lights, enjoying a meal and talking about our favorite things about the trip.

And that officially concluded our fabulous trip to Japan.