My trip to Japan was mostly spent in the Tokyo area with a few trips to surrounding areas where there were sites of interest.

I stayed in Shinjuku which is a few kilometers west of the centre of Tokyo where the hotels were somewhat cheaper.  Shinjuku is a major commercial and administrative centre and boasts the busiest train station in the world (over 3.5 million passengers each day).  It is also home to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building together with numerous office buildings, hotels and stores.

I was concerned that I might find it difficult to get around but the in the event it was easier than I could have expected.  The Rail and Metro maps are available in English, stations have their names repeated in English (helpfully Metro stations are numbered), station announcements are repeated in English and the ticket machines have an English button.  In addition the major stations always had someone who spoke some English at their information desks and frequently had printed documents to assist you.

Even the journey from Narita 2 airport was simple.  I used the Airport Limousine Bus to Shinjuku Station, their ticket desk was right in front of me when I came out of customs and the pickup point was right outside the terminal building.

I visited a number of sites including the East Gardens of the Imperial Palace, the Tokyo Tower and the Battleship Mikasa at Yokosuka (about 70 km south of Tokyo) and the following pages describe these with a variety of pictures.

I was fortunate with the weather, it was never really cold (it hovered around 2 degrees) and apart from some light rain it was mostly dry and I could get around easily.  There were even a few days of beautiful blue sky, see the photographs of my visit to the East Garden of the Imperial Palace.