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How nice that you were able to visit Japan after all these years. The photo of your mother's family on the day she departed is a real treasure.

My daughter and I are planning a mother/daughter trip and Japan is on our list. She's been before but I have not.

Thanks for sharing these.

Looking forward to your daily Japan trip threads. Thanks for sharing.

I think you're right Sealavender.

View of Tokyo from the Sky Tree.

That was day one, Asakusa, the Tsukiji Fish Market, Sky Tree. We were so tired and sick to our stomachs from the heat that when we got to our dinner place we declined. It was an hour wait, about 9 pm at night and Rachelle was about to pass out. She didn't drink much that day and it was so hot and humid. Lauren and I had no appetite and my feet were killing me. I felt bad but we were done.

what a trip you had

Curious I has seen so many people comment that the places like 7-11 have such a good selection of well prepared food and am wondering if you tried any of it. The pictures I have seen make it look really good not like the tired sandwiches that you might find at one of our convenience stores.

Maifleur01, we did eat a few meals from 7-11 and Lawsons. The food is really good, although, we didn't try everything I wanted to try. Onigiri were delicious! (rice balls filled with different things) My favorite was the tuna and mayo and Ikura (salmon eggs). We also tried some delicious sandwiches with big fluffy white bread with no crust. Ham with eggs, lettuce etc, kiwi and strawberries, weird but good... but my favorite was part of a triple sandwich my cousin sent us off with on our second to last day. I shared it and the rice balls with everyone in the van, as it was way too much for me to eat. So I only ate the tuna, which was so good I wanted another one! The fried chicken in 7-11/Lawson's was good too as was the curry and pizza buns. The girls loved the ramen, although, I had none of them. Lauren and I also shared a katsu curry bowl that was really good.

I'm getting ready to eat some chili tomato flavored cup o noodles my cousin sent us home with. Should be interesting.

I have heard raves about the tuna and the egg salad. One of the places supposedly layers them into one sandwich. Did not sound that good however a fruit sandwich did look yummy. I think of the crusts as a stabilizing feature to keep the bread together unless they are bite size and the pictures I have seen were normal size. Maybe next year or the year after.

Maifleur, the sandwiches are half sandwiches, usually 3 different types in one package sometimes. Never saw any with crusts. I did have a egg salad one, which not only was egg salad but had bigger pieces of egg in them too. It was really good also. None of them were ever soggy or old tasting, like you find in the states.

Looking forward to today's thread with more travel pictures of Japan. Keep them coming, Kathleen. Japan's new Sunday thread.

I, too, have been following your postings on Facebook, and enjoyed them so much.

Enjoying seeing your photos, Kath. I'm glad you had this opportunity to connect with your family.

When we were in Thailand, the 7-11's also had a lot of prepared food. What I tried was surprisingly good.

Nice photos, glad you had a good time.

My experience when visiting other developed countries is that food standards are higher and food quality is higher than in the US. A lot higher. For some things, you may not prefer what's being served or how it is prepared but that's a different story.

Wow, kudos for you taking the trip. Great photos!

Seeing that photo of Tokyo scares me. It's too 'peopley' for me! LOL

Jasdip, I thought that would bother me too. We did try and avoid rush hour in train stations in the early morning and late afternoons. We only ended up riding a couple of packed trains where we had to stand. Most Japanese are extremely polite and quiet. Trains, amusement parks...so quiet. I got a rude reminder on our return to LAX. It was so jarring, the rudeness and loudness that I turned to Lauren in the airport and asked her why are Americans so d@mn loud and rude?!!!

Even Japanese car horns are politely quiet. Extremely muted beeps. Even with the packed streets in touristy market places, it wasn't bad.

Did you notice the children? I think other countries value little ones more than Americans.

Very quiet and polite too. Saw some riding trains home from school. A bunch of teenage school boys once, very quiet. I don't recall hearing any screaming babies or small children either. Not so in the U.S. A lot of very tired babies and toddlers not getting their afternoon naps.