We're at the SkyBus desk by 11am, very impressive for us. With an hour to kill before departure, we have a picnic in the palace gardens under one of the most beautiful Sakura trees we've seen this trip, big thick rose like blooms. We get as far as the palace gates before it's time to head back - this is a very modern area, beautiful streets of cafes and restaurants filling up on this sunny day.

We're in the queue for the bus when a dozen people without tickets get in front of us, buy tickets on the spot and fill up the remaining seats, no bus for us. Gab peacefully articulates her unhappiness to the service staff, I don't think they get such frank and fearless criticism very regularly - they reverse their no refund policy on the spot just for her. With our shambles of a morning behind us, we're off to Shibuya for the afternoon.

Somewhere in the warrens below Tokyo station, we come across "Character Street" with stores for everything: Pokemon, Snoopy, Hello Kitty, Miffy and a hole bunch more I don't know. But most importantly they have a pop-up Disney Beauty & the Beast store all the same stuff we've already seen, but they arrange it differently so we have to soak it in. Meanwhile, Fid has disappeared into the Pokemon store to buy a case, 20 minutes later I find him engrossed in someone else playing his new favourite Pokemon game.

We're in Shibuya station wondering which way to head when Gab eyes a crowd of people taking pictures through the window in front of us, that must be the crossing that way. It's 2pm on a Wednesday, and it looks like a Saturday night crowd exiting the SCG. There's a Hello Kitty bus in the Station Forecourt that we have to check out, then we're jumping on the crossing zigzagging our way back and forth a few times to be part of the spectacle.
  
Our first Sushi Train restaurant of the trip is just up the road. They're making all kinds of Sashimi Nigiri at the moment, Boo orders up her favourite Cucumber rolls sans wasabi while fid eyes his favourite ebi nigiri passing by, he swoops only to realise its standard with wasabi when it's all too late. He discovers he likes it! Our first trip away Gab had to smuggle weetbix away with us, now he's into everything a box of surprises! 

The girls go to see if UNIQLO in it's hometown is any different to UNIQLO at Chatswood, while Fid and I assess a nearby bar. A group of tourists at the table next to us have just met up and are dumping their Japan stories on each other - "ohh it's so fantastic, we've started a bidet fund, we have to get one at home!" I feel the same way. Later when we catch up I tell Boo what they said, "That's perfect, we have to do it, $5 a week ok?"

Turns out UNIQLO is different on home turf, they score some Disney things they hadn't already seen and a Yebisu t-shirt for Fid. Back at the crossing things are heating up, Starbucks is packed, and it's you know, Starbucks... The diagonal corner has a L'Occitane cafe, weird concept, but great vantage point and Croque-monsieur sounds much better. We score plumb seats and settle in a for a bit. Fid escapes all the french stuff to take himself around the corner a treat himself to a Krispy Kreme, a palette addition I'm less excited about. 

While he's away Boo rearranges all his Pokemon tablets from this new arcade game he's playing. He's collected over 14 of them this week, but he'd tell you we've deprived him of playing it all week. When he returns he instantly spots the anomaly, "who messed up all my cards? I had them all neat in order!" Boo returns "Neat? Oh come on, we've all seen your locker!"

We're off to pick up our Friday night Baseball tickets and spot some arcade and karaoke targets on the way. We pass a Park24 where the attendant is just putting one of the cars away. Yesterday we saw a car lift, the double-decker kind, but this one has the cards on a carousel like a three carriage Ferris wheel, how clever! Tickets in hand it's karaoke time.

Beauty & The Beast isn't out here yet in Japan, it comes out this weekend. That's why there's so much B&TB merch everywhere, we're in peak anticipation mode. They have official Disney B&TB songs on the Karaoke machine, complete with scenes from the new movie, girls are ecstatic, Fid and I get in trouble for joining in. 

We do some nocturnal crossings again in front of the station then check out 109. Gab is repulsed by the lack of any European brands, but Boo is uncontainable - every store has the perfect thing she's always wanted. She gets some princess socks and some pink fabric platform high heels, she's bursting to try them on, I'm trying to convince her to wait until she gets home and can Scotchguard them, the boring pragmatist has no sway.

We wander the streets getting lost in this electric atmosphere and suddenly realise it's after 8 and we were aiming to be back early tonight. At dinner Boo is telling us how much she loves Japan, Gab still prefers Paris but the rest of us are all completely sold on returning to Tokyo as often as possible. Boo is trying to convince Gab she should love Japan as much as everyone else - "You want to go to Europe? Why? You can come to Tokyo and just visit DisneySea!"