Yokohama is the second largest city in Japan. This modern city is dominated by Skyscrapers and malls, on first glance makes it an intimidating visit.
Located just 35km from Tokyo, it is only 45 minutes drive between the two major cities or just over an hour on the Shinkansen Bullet Train. It’s size means the suburbs stretch into Tokyo’s edges grouping them together into one megacity. It is also the port destination for our Japan Cruise.
We’d already spent time in Tokyo, so we skipped the excursions and opted to explore the city on foot.
The cruise terminal is just a short walk to the downtown area of Yokohama so it was easy to wander into town. Our initial impressions were a lot of skyscrapers and not a lot of green, and certainly not a lot of ‘old’ buildings and obvious history. As with any Japanese city it was spotlessly clean, quiet and perfectly safe to wander around.
Most of the shops and entertainment complexes are at the base of these huge skyscrapers which all merge together making it a little bewildering at first – and confusing if you’re relying on a Google map for directions.
There were many malls with plenty of unique Japanese stores, a Japanese HMV which was amusing (full of J-Pop and K Pop bands) as well as a massive Snoopy store.
We had coffee in a Marie Antoinette cafe (Le Salon de Nina’s) which was enjoyable and felt totally out of place next to a huge Mall.
Some of the malls were definitely for ‘young people’ (yes I feel old saying that), especially the capsule store which fascinated us. In short it is a shop full of small vending machines in which are different toys or gimmicks contained in plastic balls. You simply picked the vending machine, put in your coins and got the toy. The boys seemed to be converging around Yu Gi Oh whilst the girls were more Hello Kitty. There was also a massive area selling Hawaii merchandise which was interesting.
But our overall feeling was that Yokohama was quote dull by day. After we’d visited the huge Gundam Robot and walked along the prettier waterfront, we decided Yokohama would look better at night.
And we were right, in the dark Yokohama is lit up in bright colours.
We could see the iconic Cosmo Clock 21 big wheel from the ship and from pretty much the entire city. Not only was the wheel turning but the lights would change to bring out different patterns on this massive canvas. The wheel stood above a permanent, and popular amusement park.
The Hard Rock Café (a long way from the original Hard Rock in London )looked cool with a bright guitar.
But it was the beautiful Sail Training Ship Nippon Maru that stood out as the highlight for Yokohama at Night. By day this is a great museum sharing the history of this ship and the wider Yokohama port. At night it sits beautifully still against the modern backdrop of the city.
The short cable (Yokohama Air Cabin) car that travels between JR Sakuragichō Station and Unga Park for (World Porters Mall) is a great place to get some pictures of Yokohama at night. To be fair. you can get them during the day, too! We bought a ’round trip’ ticket that allowed us to get off after the first leg and come back in the evening to do the return trip!
We loved walking around the city which is great for photographs, with no shortage of places to stop for dinner or coffee. After a lot of ancient history on our Japan cruise, this was a refreshing stop for something a bit more modern.
