Come along with me and share the excitement as I explore the world researching freelance articles. These blog posts offer short chunks of travel that you can digest quickly as well as plenty of photos so you get the picture. You'll have some fun, make discoveries, and pick up great ideas and information for your own vacations. Think of me as your canary in the coal mine. For even more travel inspiration, visit my BERKELEY AND BEYOND website at http://www.berkeleyandbeyond.com.
The vibrant Shinjuku area of Tokyo is filled with attractions, and though it was cancelled due to the pandemic the 2020 Olympics were scheduled to be here. The area is also a popular choice because it is centered around a busy Bullet Train station. I checked into a hotel for just one night, and I definitely absorbed the energetic flavor of the area and managed to see quite a bit.
3-2-9, Nishi-shinjuku, 03-3343-3111. Well located, this bustling hotel is just a short walk from the famous Shinjuku section of town. Though it had the smallest room I encountered during my visit to Japan, it manages to include a deep furo soaking tub in each teeny, tiny bathroom . . . and the price is right. I enjoyed meeting the robot valet that hangs out in the lobby in between room service runs, and many small shops operate on the floors below the lobby. During my visit to Japan, I stayed at many sister properties, and all of them provided a white cotton nightgown that buttons down the front--something I started looking forward to each night. And here, a buffet breakfast was served on a high floor permitting lovely area views.
Occupies 39th-52nd floors. Celebrated for being designed by famous architect Kenzo Tange, this skyscraper might be even more famous for its supporting role in the movie Lost in Translation. Even if you don’t stay here, you’ll want to stop in for a drink at the New York Bar on the 52nd floor. Its cool 65-foot-long, four-lane indoor pool--where Bill Murray took a dip in the movie--has floor-to-ceiling windows offering stunning views of Tokyo and Mount Fuji, and a glass pyramid-shaped ceiling allows in natural light.
stroll through Shinjuku
The walk from the hotel to the train station passes an intriguing collection of shops and restaurants. Along the way, the back alley streets are highly interesting. Known as Golden Gai, these narrow streets are lined with small bars with just a few seats. Some are at ground level, while others are positioned up steep staircases, and many are open only to locals. It is on one of these streets that my companion and I found a big bank of vending machines, and the equivalent of US$2 popped out a darling miniature vinyl dog that looked just like her own at home making it the perfect souvenir.
Located in the Times Square area adjacent to the train station, this is considered to be the area’s best department store. Exhibitions and Japanese goods are on floor 11, while a food hall occupies the entire basement and restaurants occupy the top three floors (12-14) referred to as Restaurants Park. After zipping through several of the shopping floors, I headed to the basement and zeroed in on a scrumptious almond croissant from Maison Kayser to take back to my room for dinner. My drink was a bottle of the hotel’s Mt. Fuji spring water.
basement food hall at Takashimaya Department Store in Tokyo, Japan
Near the train station. Tu-Sun 9am-4pm; closed M. 500 yen. Stretched over 144 acres, this former imperial garden became a national garden after World War II. The park holds native and traditional gardens as well as French Formal and English Landscape gardens, plus a spectacular Taiwan Pavilion that perches beside a serene pond.
Thur-M. 1,100 yen. Located off the beaten path in a suburban district of Shinjuku, this slim 5-story white building is devoted to displaying the larger-than-life and avant-garde works of artist Yayoi Kusama. Installations include her newish "infinity room" series (an Instagram sensation), polka-dot paintings, and sculptures. Note that visitors are limited to only 200 per day.
polka dot shoes by Yayoi Kusama, displayed at SFO airport in San Francisco, California
cat cafes
In Japan living space is at a premium and most landlords do not permit pets, so cat cafes are a popular and ingenious solution. Patrons pay an hourly fee (usually about US$10 per hour) for a cup of coffee or tea to enjoy amid free-roaming cats.
Located in the center of Shinjuku, the Calico Cat Cafe opened in 2007 and has about 20 cats representing 17 breeds. Rules include not waking a sleeping cat and not bringing catnip in to the cafe.
Note that the first cat cafe in the U.S. opened in Oakland, California in 2014.
Like most U.S. cat cafes, Cat Town adopts out the cats.
26 Clinton St./Houston St., Lower East Side, (646) 370-5699.
This Koneko cat cafe is a branch of one in Japan. It is appropriate that it is named “Koneko,” which means “kitten” in Japanese. The coffee is Stumptown, and the pastries, which include many Japanese izakaya classics, come from Patisserie Tomoko in Williamsburg (the seafood and pork belly okonomiyaki sell out every day).
You can sit in the cafe and observe the kitties through a large window, or you can take your order into the cattery room and visit with them for an hour (the fee is $15, and a reservation is required at busy times). An upstairs room with an outside “catio” is also available. You will need to take your shoes off when you enter the cattery and will be provided with slippers to use. All cats are available for adoption, and all proceeds benefit the cats.
That the owner of this restaurant featuring creative traditional Truku cuisine is an artist is apparent. His art work is displayed throughout Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant and for sale. Also, his rustic wood pieces are used for tables and benches in the restaurant, where the expansive dining room opens to a view of the not-too-distant ocean. Special aboriginal foods on the menu include wild vegetables, bracken, cinnamon pig, and bamboo rice that is cooked in a covered tube of bamboo that is popped opened by noisily whacking it against a post. Pieces of delicious roasted chicken with skin is memorable. Cats have free roam, and are quick to dispense with leftovers on abandoned plates. Several gift shops sell works by the artist owner as well as by a weaver who demonstrates her skills on the spot.
entrance to Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
gift shop at Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
kitchen at Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
appetizer at Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
leaf-covered rice at Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
bamboo rice at Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
cat at Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
weaver at Dageeli Tribe House Restaurant in Hualien, Taiwan
In this video, restaurant personnel lead a song about appreciating the beauty of nature that everyone in Taiwan learns in elementary school.
If you’re a cat lover, like I am, you probably notice them everywhere you go. I’ve found myself photographing kitties with almost the same enthusiasm as I do a world-famous site. This photo collection of cats around the world begins with a few of my own favorites from my personal travel.
This kitty named Popsicle was hanging out in a kava bowl at the Coconut Grove resort on Taveuni Island in Fiji. He looks like he might have finished off the dregs.
Ernest Hemingway
seems
to haunt every part of laid-back Key West.
Here, at the literal end of the road, everyone has a story about him.
Even the descendants of his own polydactyl (six-toed) cat, Snowball. Read the entire story.
On this self-guided tour of Mazatlan, participants not only get to walk the quiet back streets of the old town, but they gain access to some of the beautiful historical buildings and even to a few homes. I met an artist who paints cats and also saves them from the streets, keeping the kitties in a sort of mini-kennel in her studio/home. Among my favorite stops: the colorfully renovated old structure that houses the Casa de Leyendas Bed & Breakfast; a small complex of shops with an inviting cafe in its courtyard. Artwalk is relatively new, now only in its third year, with 24 sites and more than 41 participating artists.
An oasis of serenity, the legendary Algonquin Hotel is just steps from Broadway, two blocks from Bryant Park, three avenues away from the gay and lesbian nightlife scene in Hell's Kitchen, and a couple of subway stops from the trendy, artsy Chelsea neighborhood. Edna Ferber and Dorothy Parker were once part of the hotel's famous Round Table, and Truman Capote once dined there regularly. The cozy, inviting lobby is a popular lounge bar, and the famous restaurant adjoins. In the evening, The Oak Room stages performances.
Halls here are papered in New Yorker cartoons (the New Yorker offices are just across the street), and a current issue is in each room. The hotel retains its vintage white marble steps in the stairway between floors. Rooms also have some vintage touches, including small bathrooms tiled in 6-sided white tiles (the plumbing might be the oldest in NYC—hot water takes a while to arrive on upper floors, but arrive it does, eventually).
And then there is the hotel kitty, Matilda, a pampered beige Ragdoll longhair who hangs out at the desk—or wherever she likes—and has her own e-mail address. For a shock back to reality, stop at the corner of 44th Street and 6th Avenue and look up, up, up to watch the national debt roll shockingly up, up, up in lighted digits.
-watermark.jpg "painting of Ernest Hemingway in Hemingway Home & Museum in Key West, Florida")
