A highly recommended activity to do in Tokyo is to visit the Tsukiji Fish Market, which is the largest and busiest fish market in the world. Many travel guides have suggested to head to Tsukiji early in the morning to catch the tuna auction; which only allows a maximum of 120 visitors a day, and to complete the trip by having a sushi breakfast there.
The plan was to wake up at 3am, reach the fish market by 4am, get in line for the tuna auction and then have breakfast at Sushi Dai. There are many sushi counters there, but Sushi Dai is known to be one of the better ones, and is so popular that you can expect to wait in line for hours before even seeing the front of the restaurant.
So how did the plan go? The alarms went off at 3am, and we were dead tired and really not keen on getting up at all. We woke up a little later and got to Tsukiji at around 7:30am. To get here, we took the subway and hopped off at Tsukiji-Shijo Station. Looking for Sushi Dai was the first thing we did, and when we found it, my heart sank. The line was super-duper long. As we hopped in the queue, a local walked passed us and told us that from this point, the wait time would be around 3 hours. Given all the good things we heard about this place, we decided to, for better or worse, wait it out.
So how did the plan go? The alarms went off at 3am, and we were dead tired and really not keen on getting up at all. We woke up a little later and got to Tsukiji at around 7:30am. To get here, we took the subway and hopped off at Tsukiji-Shijo Station. Looking for Sushi Dai was the first thing we did, and when we found it, my heart sank. The line was super-duper long. As we hopped in the queue, a local walked passed us and told us that from this point, the wait time would be around 3 hours. Given all the good things we heard about this place, we decided to, for better or worse, wait it out.
From time to time, a lady from the restaurant would walk out and apologise for the long wait, and passed around umbrellas to shelter us from the hot sun (which was nice). I hate to admit this, but we were standing for close to 6 hours before we were able to get a seat in the restaurant.
We went with the Omakase "Trust the Chef" course for ¥3,900, which included the chef's selection of 10 pieces of nigiri sushi, 1 sushi of your choice, an egg roll, some sushi rolls and miso soup. Our chef took very good care of us. He'd tell us what the fish was, and how we should eat it. He'd always tell us beforehand if he has already splashed some soy sauce on it, and if wasabi was ok for us. It was an interesting meal. There were a lot fishes we haven't seen or tried before. But was it worth the wait? Unless you really love sushi, I don't think the wait was worthwhile for a traveller. The meal had also upset our stomaches a little because it was the first thing we had all day, and raw fish isn't something we were use to. In saying that, I would still recommend visiting Tsukiji and having a bite there. If you want to have sushi, just be prepared to wait some crazy hours (or get to the market very, very early).
TOKYO, JAPAN
Tsukiji Fish Market
5 Chome-2-1 Tsukiji
Chuo, Tokyo
No comments:
Post a Comment