Ah well.
In the meantime, back at the ranch (can you say that in Japan?) we had Culture Day. We weren't sure what he weather would be doing so we opted for indoor activities - and planned out a day of museums and such. The first we hit was the Edo Tokyo Musem, which traced the history of this region from way way way way wayyyyyyyyyyy back in time. It was fascinating stuff, they had everything from early manuscripts to dioramas of kabuki theatre and the bombing raids on WWII Tokyo and 1950 Toshiba washing machines (funky critters, those - think Dalek). I learned a considerable amount about Tokyo's past and apparently the local schools have the same idea because lots of schoolkids were milling about inside while we were there, many of them clad in the Sailor Moon type of uniform I'd first seen back in Yokohama. Very orderly, very mannerly lines of kids with the occasional exuberant high spirits (three of them climbed on the displayed rickshaw - yes, it WAS permitted - and piled on inside on the seat holding finger "rabbit ears" over one another's heads while a fourth took a picture.
We spent a thoroughly enjoyable morning there, keeping an eye on the weather - and the winds had definitely picked up a bit in the time that we were inside but it was still okay so we forged ahead and took the Shinjuku line (oh, we SO own the underground...) to a mid-line station which promised a bonsai museum within striking distance of it but although we went up and down EVERY local street within the radius of a country mile we could not find the place.
This one we chickened out and took a cab to, and it was just as well because it was tucked away in a back alley which housed the premises of the Japanese Sword Research Society and their facilities (including a library of medieval documents on swordmaking, mentioned in their pamphlets but probably only open to serious students of the art. But their display area was AWESOME. Swords from the great samurai era, swords from way back in 1639, swords from as late as the 1800s, all shining, all polished to a wicked gleaming edge, oh, it was beautiful. And the whole THING is a work of art, the blade, often carved - the knotwork on the handle - the lacquered scabbard - the gilded pommels - it was just amazing. They handed us these pamphlets explaining things, and how the swords were made, and how to read the "folding" markings on the steel, amazing stuff.
But by the time we came out it was looking very gray, so we took a cab back to Shinjuku station (where EVERYTHING stops...) and from thence the train back to Shinagawa, and from thence (better safe than sorry) a cab back to the hotel. We don't plan on leaving this building tonight.
Our tour is apparently on as scheduled tomorrow morning - I double checked to see. We might have a few sights to see on the way to Kyoto...
Isn't Japan pleasant and polite - we get the FULL experience laid out for us. Well, no bonsai - but history, and samurai, and swords, AND a typhoon thrown in for good measure...