We jumped on the metro and took the train to Futako-Tamagawa Station and walked to our next destination from there. Futako-Tamagawa Station is not the closest station to Todoroki Valley, but we had spent so much time on trains coming from northern Japan, so we decided to have a lovely long walk along the Tama River.

We walked through a lovely pedestrian street followed by a beautiful traditional garden and then a walk along the river. The last twenty minutes of the walk were through a very fancy neighbourhood, like the Tokyo suburbs, where every house was perfectly manicured and gated. We then descended into Tokyo’s secret valley, entering a heavily wooded area and crossing over a beautiful red arch bridge, apparently called Golf Bashi. On the left of the bridge there was a stairwell that followed a bamboo grove and descended into the gorge. The sun was filtering through into the valley and reflecting on the perfectly clear water.

A walking path followed the water and there were ducks playing in the stream, forged by the Yazawa River. The pedestrian walkway criss crossed across the water with different types of bridges and stepping stones. Near the end of the pathway we crossed another bridge and arrived at a shrine with dragons that breathed waterfalls.

There was a red shrine and a stairwell that led up to a shrine right in the rock face. We spent about an hour in the gorge, exploring all the hidden pathways and shrines along the way. I would totally recommend visiting this gorge as a little side quest in Tokyo, it is a lovely escape from the busy downtown vibes of Tokyo city. 

Next we took the train from Todoroki Station (the closest metro stop to the gorge) back to our place in Shibuya for a quick rest before heading back out on another adventure. At Shibuya station we found some Jo Jo murals and stopped for a little photoshoot.

We visited an arcade where Jives tried his old friend the Taiko drum arcade game. We then went to a restaurant under the new Miyashita Park, an izakaya… it was actually pretty terrible despite looking amazing and super 80’s nostalgic. The staff really didn’t want us in the restaurant, which was a rough experience. This happens sometimes in Japan, and we are pretty lucky that this was our first experience with staff not being incredible at a restaurant in Japan. The food was terrible and they didn’t have about 50 percent of the menu available… We asked for the bill and waited about 40 minutes to get it, as pretty much everyone else around us got their bills and food. The decoration in the place was really cool, sort of 80’s vibes with lanterns and small tables with stools, but it was not worth the 50$ bill (we each ordered one dish which was about three bites of food each). 

After dinner we went to a few shops like Don Quixote, Mandarake and Tokyo Records, then we went back to our airbnb and went to sleep.