Scramble Crossing

Today we visited the Shibuya area, probably best known for its 'scramble' crossing where hoards of people cross the intersection at one time. It's a real lively and vibrant area and you encounter all sorts of weird and wonderful things, entire shops dedicated to 'claw' machines and shops which have walls to wall machines that disperse those pointless plastic toys in a bubble container (yes of course we got one!) , go karts risking the roads with drivers dressed as various characters, and a 7 floor store called Don Quixote - a sort of Home Bargains on steroids (and yes, we made some random purchases)!

We had tickets to go up the Shibuya Sky - a tall building which has views right across the city. There is an indoor viewing gallery and then an upper roof top viewing platform. We had made our way around the upper platform when there was a lengthy announcement, and then a number of security staff appeared. It turns out that they were closing the roof top due to high risk of heat stroke!! Fortunately we'd had a fair bit of time up there so wasn't an issue.

For tea we moved on to Harajuku, renowned for being a bit bohemian whilst also still having a designer shop avenue at the same time. We ate in a place where each table had a griddle/ hot plate in the middle and you ordered the ingredients for the dish of your choice and then cooked it yourself. It was great, for me best meal ifof the holiday , so far. Carys ordered a dessert and I fully expected it to just be presented, but no- she had to cook that too by making a pancake / crepe on the griddle!

While we were in there, a thunderstorm and rain arrived..when we left we ran straight to the local mini market - Family Mart to purchase umbrellas. They'd had a run in the demand but stocks were low, seems everyone had had the same idea!!