If you follow us on instagram, (@kevkberg, @nicolehberg) you know that, a few months ago, Nicole and I took an amazing trip to Japan! Normally, we jump on editing our vacation images and share them as soon as possible…but this time we were a touch slow to share. See, as soon as we got back from Japan, wedding season kicked into high gear and our Japan images were put on the back burner. Thankfully, we’ve had a bit of down time and editing Japan pictures was a great way to avoid this crazy summer heat! So here it is, a super long personal vacation post!!! Seriously, we are sharing tons of images from our Japan trip so get comfortable and enjoy!!! (We were joined on our trip by our good friends, Larrion and Sam! You may remember them from our Prague and Ireland trips!)

We had a wonderful hotel, the Ana Intercontinental, as our home away from home. It was a great location as there was a subway station just around the corner. And even better? A 7/11 where we were able to load up on Cokes for the room! The hardest part of this trip was having to adjust to Coke Zero. Nicole and I are huge Diet Coke fans, and Coke Zero just isn’t the same!

Our first day started with a trip to the Tsukiji Fish Market. I’m not too big a fan of seafood in general, but it was tons of fun seeing all the fish and other seafood!!!

We became very familiar with the subway system during our visit, especially the Ginza line! (Of course, it helped that we had a guide to teach us how to use it the first day!)

We visited several temples and shrines during our trip. Meiji Shrine was our first stop. While visiting, we came across a wedding in progress! It was fun to see a photographer from Japan shooting his bride and groom.

Nicole grabbed this pretty awesome shot of me wearing two of my favorite things, my Wolverine jacket and my Holdfast Moneymaker!!!

We next stopped by the insanely busy, teenage-filled Takeshita Street! As you can see, we weren’t the only ones there!

Our travels next took us to Sensoji Temple. The Temple was beautiful, but our favorite part of this experience was when, on our way out, we were stopped by the most adorable class of elementary school children. They asked to speak to us as part of their English studies! The kids were just too cute!!! (You can see that photo on Nicole’s instagram account!)

Breathing in the smoke from the incense is thought to bring good health.  And, before entering temples and shrines in Japan, one should purify their body and mind with water.

We made it to Japan about two weeks before the cherry blossoms were in full bloom, but we were lucky enough to catch a few trees who were showing off early.

We made sure to stop by Akihabara and check out the electronic shops as well as the anime and manga shops. If I recall correctly, one of the stores we stopped in was about 8 levels of nothing but video game statues, models, and books! Our tour guide called Akihabara “Geek City.”

I tend to give Nicole a pretty hard time about some of our travel plans, and I may or may not have made a few jokes about the fact that we were going to Japan to cross a street! (Of course, that crossing is the world’s busiest street crossing!) But it made good sense why we had to check it out when we got to Shibuya crossing and saw the sea of people crossing the street at the same time!!! It’s pretty evident why it’s considered the world’s busiest street crossing!

It’s become a tradition of ours when traveling with Larrion and Sam to find a T.G.I. Friday’s while overseas and stop in for a meal! So, of course, we had to stop by and grab a quick bite! Sam was clearly thrilled!

Our next morning, we made our way to Kamakura, which I was especially looking forward to as there is a gigantic Buddha statute that I couldn’t wait to see! It was looking a bit overcast so we stopped by the 100 yen shop and got umbrellas…100 yen is less than a dollar, so these were well worth the money!!! Before we made the way to the giant Buddha, we stopped by Hasedera, which was a beautiful Buddhist temple.

We made our way to the Daibutsu (Giant Buddha), and walked through the cute little town of Kamakura along the way.

I always feel like…somebody’s watching me!!! (Seriously, this statue was huge!!!)

After the giant Buddha, we made our way to Tsurugaoka Hachimangu, which is Kamakura’s most important shrine. It was moved to this site in 1180 by Minamoto Yoritomo, the founder and first Shogun of the Kamakura government. Along the way, we saw a group of ladies in kimonos praying before the shrine…they looked like they were having a great time! (Not pictured, the like ten million stairs we climbed to get to the top!!!

We got back to our hotel earlier than expected from Kamakura. Nicole and I had planned to stop by Disney Tokyo Sea the next day, but, with a good bit of the evening left, we decided to make a run for Tokyo Disneyland! I mean, it would be a shame to NOT visit Tokyo Disneyland since we’re huge Disney fans. We jumped into a cab and headed over to Tokyo Disneyland to spend the evening. In perfect Berg fashion, as soon as we got in our cab, it started to rain…and it kept raining. Thanks to the rain, the first thing we did was buy some rain coats before we even walked into the park! We didn’t let the rain stop us, though. We were on a mission. The walk down Main Street was a bit different than back home.

How adorable is my wife??? Super cute in her Minnie Mouse rain jacket! The castle in Tokyo is the same as the one in Orlando, but everything around it was setup different.

The sleeves on my jacket may have been slightly different colors for the rest of the trip because we got soaked! We both joked as we walked around lost and soaking wet that we now understand how some people can hate a trip to Disney. Lost and wet isn’t the most fun, but, when you walk into the Country Bear Jamboree, and hear it almost completely sung in Japanese, you can’t help but smile!!! (Check out my instagram account to see a short clip!)

After a wet evening at Tokyo Disneyland, we headed back to the hotel to prep for our next adventure. We woke up early and headed to Disney Sea! From just seeing it on the road, we were stoked to check things out! As soon as we walked into the park, we Facetimed my sister, who was in Disney World with my Mom and Dad. It was pretty funny having Berg’s in Disney parks in different parts of the world at the same time! Of course, it was morning for us and much later in the day for them.

After showing off the park entrance via my phone, we said goodbye and made our way into the park. We quickly learned that this place was beautifully themed! By far, the best design theme of any Disney park! However, it was also the single busiest park in the entire world! Wait times were all over 200 minutes and even the line for popcorn was constantly 40 people deep at every single stand! (Each popcorn stand had a different flavor as well as an individual character popcorn bucket! You can see Nicole’s popcorn bucket on her instagram account) Despite the crazy crowds, the people were amazing! So many people were showing off their “Disney side” by wearing hats and dressing like characters! Basically, those who weren’t dressed in all their Disney glory were in the minority. Nicole, a huge Donald and Daisy fan, was happy to see a family of Donald fans and a huge group of girls all dressed like Daisy! I really enjoyed riding the Indiana Jones ride, as well as every other ride, and laughing as we couldn’t understand a word that was said! But still, somehow, we understood what was happening! The saddest part of our Disney visit was the lack of cool t-shirts. There was one…seriously, ONE…t-shirt that said Disney Sea on it in the entire park…and yes, we both got one!

After satisfying our Disney needs, we geared up for a day trip to Kyoto. We started the morning by boarding the bullet train. The bullet train was a cool way to travel. Man, that thing was fast! Our guide told us that, if the weather was good, we would get a great view of Mt. Fuji from the train…and, lucky for us, it was a beautiful day and we had an amazing view of Mt. Fuji!

The trip to Kyoto was probably my favorite day of the trip. We hit several shrines that day, but the Golden Pavilion was the highlight!

Ok, so truth time. Maybe Kyoto was my favorite part of the trip because of the beer vending machine I spotted. And maybe that was the real highlight of my day! Thanks to a King of the Hill episode, all I wanted to do in Japan was get an ice cold beer from a vending machine! Well, lucky me found one! And surprisingly, it was a reasonably priced, ice cold, and delicious beverage! (Side note, how great does my hair look in these next few images?! Sometimes everything just comes together!!! Hahaha!)

The Tokyo train station was a stunningly beautiful building! Not to mention, it had a Café Du Monde in it! (No beignets, but we did get a doughnut.)

On our last full day, we traveled to the Imperial Palace. At this point, we were all pretty worn down from the tons and tons of walking we had done. But it was a beautiful cool morning and we were all in good spirits. It was a great spot to pass the camera off and get a few photos of us! After several trips abroad together, Larrion is getting the hang of taking pics for me and Nicole on our big camera! He’s now a back-button expert.

The bridge at the Palace is called Meganebashi, or the Eyeglass Bridge. I had taken a few of the bridge and then this swan came by and made the picture even better! That’s what you call production value!

After taking the picture of the bridge, we turned around to see this group of people riding horses. The hazy buildings in the background was a wonderfully contrasting backdrop for the horse riders. Who would have thought we’d see horses being ridden in the city?

We spent our last night at the biggest tourist trap with the most silliness possible…the Robot Restaurant! Robot guitar players and terrible lounge singers were the warm-up act for the big spectacle…and was it ever a spectacle!!! We laughed the entire time at how gloriously bad it was. It was the kind of bad that made it awesome.

My personal favorite item from the Robot Restaurant was the proton-pack-like beer keg this lady had on! Thirstbusters!

We fired off one last photo from the interstate on the way to the airport. Goodbye, Tokyo!

If you made it here to the end, thank you so much for stopping by and enjoying our vacation pictures! Traveling is a high priority for us. We hope that sharing our fun adventures will inspire others to get out and see this great big world because adventure is out there!