Japan Trip 2016 Part 8 : Kawagoe

Hey guys!!!

Yes yes yes, i'm trying to speed up my Japan Trip posts again, it's gearing towards the end of the trip, i am positive i can finish it before we go back to Japan! Ganbatte me!!!

It's Day 5 and officially the Kawaii Beauty Tour has ended, DisneySea was the last destination as a group and some of the tour members were leaving that day. Stella gave us three options, one is to go back to Indonesia on the fifth day, then there's also two more options with extensions-we naturally picked the one with the longest extension (only by two days, sadly). Stella had kindly showed me a few options of towns that we can explore nearby Tokyo (which are close enough for a day trip) and we decided to go to this old town called Kawagoe!

I LOVE this pic of me in the middle of the deserted Candy Lane in Kawagoe, Japan

So, Kawagoe is not very far away from bustling Tokyo, according to the website it is about 30 minutes from Ikebukuro. Well, we started our journey from Kamata, which is quite a distance away from Ikebukuro already so our journey took longer than that. It can't remember the exact time, but it's probably... an hour in total? Or maybe 1.5 hours because we did get a bit confused when we tried to find the right line and stuffs, Japan train system in really no joke okay...

Anyway, we didn't really know anything much about Kawagoe and what to expect (other than the fact that it's an old, Edo era town) so we just winged it. Turned out we should've gone earlier in the day because the stores and basically any activities in Kawagoe ends pretty early, the last bus back to the main station was at 6 or something. We had a very tiring day the day before so we decided to sleep in and had a very late start of the day which means we arrived in Kawagoe pretty late and we only had a very short time there, i have no regret going there because it is such a beautiful, quiet but super charming town and we LOVE it there (probably more than how much i love Tokyo because essentially i am an explorer and i prefer to explore places than shop when i'm overseas) but if i can give any advise for future visitors, if you have a late start of your day, cancel your plan to go to Kawagoe and visit some other day when you can go earlier.

The train to Kawagoe is thankfully very quiet so we didn't have to stand for 45 minutes or whatever.

Not a sight you would see in trains that go around Tokyo

See how they can sit so comfortably

Heelloo there

It's almost 10 months since that day so i can't remember the details obviously, but i think i was a but upset with hunny because he was yapping about how the journey to Kawagoe would be very long, but when i asked him where he prefers to go instead, he couldn't/wouldn't answer. I HATE that. People who complains about something but has no better solution or suggestions, that really gets my blood boils. Definitely one of the things that we argue about the most, coz he is definitely quite a complainer and i cannot stand that -____-.

Kawagoe station. Now this is what we sees in Japanese movies when the setting is in smaller towns/suburbs for sure!

That's the line that we took to and fro, Tobu Tojo line

As soon as we got off the train, these dudes were attracted to this ramen shop -___-

It's one of those super cramped ramen shops where there's no seats

And you have to eat standing up

Japanese portions are very big (wonder how they stay so slim *most of them. Japanese are human too, i see a lot of bigger Japanese too*, probably because they walk so much) i very rarely order my own meal while we were there, we prefer to split our food so we can try out more stuffs along the way hahaha. This is a clear souped ramen, it was pretty good but honestly all ramens pale in comparison to this ramen we had nearby our hotel. I am convinced that it's the best ramen in the world WTF, i will tell you all about it in another blog post

Tourist information center. Apparently to go to the old town, we have to take a bus and the bus only leaves at certain times of the day. We just barely missed the bus -___- so we had to wait quite a while (i think it was 30 minutes or so), wasting even more time

Thankfully there are quite a lot of stores at the station, there's even a Matsumoto Kiyoshi just round the corner!

And i found a store selling uber cute makeups and accessories, that's where i bought my Sailormoon nonsenses *LOL*, i loveeee Sailor Moon you know

When it was almost the time for the bus to arrive, we headed out

Yup, that's the bus stop

You can buy one way tickets or you can buy these bus pass that you can use for unlimited time during the day (which is much cheaper)

Wefie first!

It's a very old skool type of bus (i will have the pic of the bus from the front later on this blog post) which we're lucky to get because there are only a few of them (the other buses are the usual modern buses). Otw to the Old Town, we passed by a few castles-again i am super sad that we did not have time to hop off and explore T.T

Here we are! Sooo pretty, and very different from bustling Tokyo!

Is that... Old skool water pump...?

Found a museum. If only we had more time, i'd love to go in

Meanwhile i'll just take a pic outside *LOL*

A peek into what you can see inside

I always find this kind of mask disturbing -___-

This one also a little bit hehe

Instead of heading straight to the famous Candy Lane, we kept on being distracted by the numerous stores selling Kawagoe specialties snacks and souvenirs lining the main street.

There's something about these souvenir shops in Japan, the feeling is just different @__@

FYI, Kawagoe is very famous for sweet potatoes as well as their castles, that's why you can find a lot of stores selling sweet potato based snacks

Like this

And this!

Hunny is in his element when foods are concerned, i just borrow them for photo taking purposes *LOL*

Since it's during the week (apparently Kawagoe gets a lot busier on weekends, as expected from a touristy destination), lots of the stores are closed/closing early

Hunny keeps on stopping to buy various snacks

Here he is getting a mitarashi dango from this very kind-faced uncle

While Silv and i crossed the street 

See how all the buildings are preserved to look like how they did during olden days

Toki no Kane-the symbol of Kawagoe

There's a Japanese uncle who didn't speak a word of English but he was trying very hard to show us the right angle to get best shot of the tower!

Sadly it was under renovation T.T we couldn't even get a peek

Fans of green tea, rejoice

I, on the other hand, cannot stand the taste of matcha >.<

So i prefer to taste the sweet potato ice cream! Might sounds crazy, but it doesn't taste weird at all, it's actually VERY YUM!

The ice cream uncle is hilarious, he kept on telling us that his ice cream is the best in the world :D

Finally we resume our search for the Candy lane. And we ran across a girl screaming and crying at a couple whom we assume were her parents. It was intense

Wah, so vintage!

Seriously how beautiful is this place, i can roam around the whole day here and not get bored

Apparently Kawagoe is also famous for eel so we found a lot of restaurants that specializes in eels as well

I think this is a restaurant, we just took a pic here coz it's so photogenic *LOL*

Then we got surprised when we saw these kois huddled up together and being totally still like statues

None of them moved, it was really strange for us. Obviously fishes move nonstop in tropical countries during the day hehe

More touristy pics :p

Finally reached the Penny Candy Lane and... Most of the stores are already closed -___-

It was very quiet too already

And we get to take pictures without too many photobombers at the back ahaha

We strolled the street hoping to find a store that still opens

And we found one!

Those super long sticks are indeed, candies. We're not crazy enough to buy it tho

Seriously very vintage looking and feeling candy store with the kindest obasan! They sold old style, vintage candies and i gotta be honest with you-i don't really like them *LOL*. I am not a fan of candies in the first place, but old style candies just tastes like... sugar?

We did buy quite a few to bring back to Indonesia as souvenirs (to give away)

Then it was already time to head back to the bus stop or risk missing the last bus back to the train station

Found another, more modern but with a very strong "kampong" feeling candy store on the way back

We kinda went a bit crazy here, so many selections and unique Japanese candies, we bought a ton for Little O

A random giant frog statue

Emo style pic in the middle of Kawagoe haha. God, four layer of winter clothes bulk me up like crazy

A free candy from the kind obasan, what is that? A girl's face???

Kawagoers are fond of their gigantic animal statues i think :p

And here's a pic of the old bus i promised earlier

That marks the end of this post! We left Kawagoe (with a heavy heart. I really want to go back there and come much earlier so we can actually do stuffs) and went back to busy Tokyo. Spent the rest of the evening at Ikebukuro where we tried out the famous Ichiran ramen-decided to write it in a separate post because Kawagoe deserves its own blog post :D.

Until next time and have a nice weekend guys!

#Pink