Day 1 · Off the ship
Collected at the terminal at Yokohama whenever the ship released them, not at a time agreed in advance. The luggage went into a second vehicle and straight to the hotel, so from the pier onwards they carried nothing and the room being unready stopped mattering.
Then Meiji Jingu, which is about half an hour from the terminal. That is the reason it opens the trip. A forested walk to a shrine works just as well arriving at ten as it does arriving at half past twelve, so a late disembarkation costs nothing, whereas a timed entry at ten would have cost the whole morning.
Lunch in Omotesando, then Shibuya: the crossing from street level, then Shibuya Sky above it. The open rooftop there closes in high wind, which happens more often than people expect, but the enclosed gallery on the floor below stays open and the view is the same view. Worth knowing before you queue.
Check-in late afternoon. The hotel sits in Toranomon, which is quiet at street level after dark and looks like nothing is happening. Shimbashi is fifteen minutes on foot, where the izakaya alleys run under the railway arches, and that is where they ate.
Day 2 · The one full day
The only day that belongs entirely to them, so it starts early.
Tsukiji outer market first, while the stalls are still busy and before the tour groups. Then Hamarikyu Gardens, a five-minute drive and a complete change of register, with a tidal pond and the Shiodome towers standing over the pines. From the garden's own pier, the water bus up the Sumida to Asakusa, which is a better way to arrive than any road.
Senso-ji and Nakamise, then Kappabashi, the street where Tokyo's restaurants buy their knives and where most people find the souvenir they actually wanted. A private tea ceremony in the afternoon, booked with chairs available, because a three-day trip is not the moment to discover who can and cannot sit on the floor for an hour. Up the Skytree afterwards.
Dinner in Ginza, reserved months before they sailed.
Day 3 · Departure
Luggage into the vehicle at check-out so nothing gets tracked or waited for. Narita is ninety minutes from central Tokyo on a good day and that number, not the flight time, is what shapes the morning.
So: one thing, close in, and no ambition. The depachika food halls under the Ginza department stores, which is where the last of the shopping gets done and where lunch is better than anything at the airport. Then the airport, three hours before an international departure, which is unhurried rather than tight.
How a program like this is built
The first hour decides the trip. Luggage goes to the hotel in its own vehicle from the pier, so the party is free from the moment they step off the ship rather than from the moment their room opens.
The first stop is chosen for being time-tolerant. Anything with a timed entry goes on day two, never on the morning a ship decides when you get off it.
Three days gets three or four things a day, not six. The difference between a good short program and a bad one is almost entirely how much of it is spent in transit between things that were too far apart.
Contingencies get named in advance. A rooftop that closes in high wind, a garden that shuts at half past four, a market that is dead on a Sunday. The alternative is already chosen before anyone is standing in front of a closed gate.
The departure day is built backwards from the drive to the airport, and on a Narita departure that drive is ninety minutes. It is the single most common way a last day gets ruined.
