Tokyo Station is the largest station in Tokyo and maybe in all of Japan. There are patforms for the Japan Railway trains, both local and express; there are platforms for the many private railways that serve the Tokyo and surrounding areas; and there are the shinkansen platforms. In short it is a huge place with six large entrance/exits, three on the east and three on the west
After I bought our tickets at the local Japan Travel Bureau office I asked which entrance would be best so we would be close to our platform. I was told the Yaesu Central and that is where we entered but even then we had to scurry around to find shinkansen platform # 18. I saw signs for 24 shinkansen platforms, but I'm not sure how many total there are.
On the platform there are food kiosks, smoking rooms and a waiting room for passengers holding reserved seat tickts. We were in that category so we got to take a rest before our train arrived.
Friday night while we were wandering around the area near our hotel we saw a stand-up noodle shop similar to the one on our platform. To save room there are no table or chairs, just counters where patrons stand up and eat their noodles and rush off to catch their train. If you go, remember to purchase your food ticket from the vending machine outside before you go in.
We boarded our train and it pulled out of the station right on time at 1310. Five hours and one minute we pulled in to the Hakata Station in Fukuoka, on time to the minute. Quite a change from when I made the same trip the first time I was in Japan in 1960. Then it took just under 24 hours on an express train pulled by an old fashioned steam engine, except for the tunnel under the strait of Shimonoseki between Honshu and Kyushu when an electric engine pulled the train. But what an adventure it was to be traveling in a foreign country half way around the world from home.
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