My last night in Tokyo was pretty loud. I figured I could put up with it for one last night. I got up and had to make it to Tokyo Station to catch the Shinkansen for Hamamatsu. Man, was it crowded. I had to push my way onto the first train.

Part of the trip was through Shizuoka prefecture and I tried to take a picture of the hills. There’s tea in them that hills. Instead of fields of rice paddies, there are fields with tea 

Some of the stops were quick and I was expecting Hamamatsu to be the same, but there were lots of people getting off and it was a long stop.

And there goes the train.

Hamamatsu looked inviting.

I dropped off my bags at the hotel and started walking towards Hamamatsu castle. I saw a temple and the gate was closed.

It was a rainy day and there was almost no one on the streets. It was a lot different than the streets of Tokyo.

Here’s a temple I saw on the street. It looks like a shrine from someone’s house.

Holding the camera under the umbrella is going to make for a lot of crappy pictures today.

But there were larger temples on the way.

I finally made it to Hamamatsu Castle Park.

I couldn’t figure out where I was and the signs led me to believe I was supposed to go up these stairs.

Fortunately, the stairs lead to the tower of the castle.

I found out that the tower was rebuilt in the 1950’s and is the only part of the castle left other than the walls.

But there was a nice view from the top of the tower. Here’s the view back towards Hamamatsu station. I also saw a lot of jet fighters from the self-defense station in town.

Here’s another crappy picture of the statue of Tokugawa Ieyasu who was at this castle.

Then I went looking for some lunch, but there weren’t many stores to be found. In fact, all I saw were several Lawson convenience stores. I finally found a store and at 1PM it was pretty empty. I was also told that they were out of the daily special and only had the tonkatsu. Turns out the tonkatsu was pretty good.

I started back towards the station and the Hamamatsu City Museum of Musical Instrument. But I did see some large temples. This one, I think, is Shofukuji Temple.

Whatever it is, it’s new and big.

Across the street is Saint Christophers, which was odd looking enough that I took a picture.

I also saw Shinzoji Temple, which looked pretty large from the street. I had to go way around the neighborhood to find the entrance.

Next door was an even larger shrine, Gosha Shrine.

It was a huge temple.

I finally found my way to the Hamamatsu City Museum of Musical Instrument and it was pretty cool. I listened to the museum recording and there were EIGHTY stations. The pictures are especially shitty because, well, they’re shitty. The first display was of a gamelan.

There were also a lot of Korean instruments.

Of course there were traditional Japanese instruments as well.

 

When I got downstairs there were lots of western and African instruments and there was a demonstration of a giraffe piano (a type of upright).

It was in a hall full of pianos, clavichords, harpsichords, and other unique keyboards. There were also cutaways that showed how the keyboards worked.

The other half of the floor had lots of percussive instruments as well as string instruments and wind instruments.

I mean seriously, this is a European instrument from the 1800’s that is no longer played.

Or this valve trombone thingy?

This was amongst all the other trombone-like things.

Tucked away upstairs were the electronic instruments.

And hidden behind those was a large room of Japanese-made pianos, and then a play room with lots of instruments to try out (including a banjo!).

The third thing I wanted to try was the famous Hamamatsu eel. I went to a small shop where I was the only customer and the prices of the fresh unagi varied by size.

I had a medium one. The unagi had a fresh flavor and not just the cooked and flavored taste I’m used to. It was tasty.

So there’s Hamamatsu. I’m blaming the blurriness on the rain. Just pretend I did it on purpose with Instagram like I was a hipster.