August 5, 2026

The hardest days of any trip are the last ones. Today marked our last full day in Japan before heading home tomorrow. It's been an unbelievable trip, and we woke up this morning grateful for every second. We were so worried about being away from Elle, having her stay overnight with both Norma, her nanny, and her Grandpa and Cookie. But like everything in her 2+ years, she did incredibly well. This morning was the first morning of the entire trip that you could tell on our FaceTime call with her that she wanted her Mom home.

After having our second-to-last breakfast in the beautiful dining room of the St Regis, we were back out for the day. We had so little planned for the day. Our first stop was a giant mall, where we scoured for an authentic tea set to take home. Unlike previous days, when we fell in love with antiques, there was something cold about the mall setting and the offerings. After some back-and-forth, we decided against it and made our way back to our hotel. We stopped for lunch at Ichiran in Dotonbori. There was a line, but after 15 minutes we went up a few flights of stairs and got the last two individual booths in the row. It continues to not disappoint, and we both slurped our ramen down, even if it was nearly a hundred degrees outside.

We made our way back to the hotel after lunch, cooled off, packed a bit, and later went to the spa to get a 90-minute hydration facial. After the incredible massages in Tokyo, we were both ready for more. We decided on facials, since they sounded more relaxing, and after the sweltering heat of the past week, we thought a hydration facial was the way to go. It was definitely relaxing, if not too much. Both Jenn and I fell asleep at some point, and after the third or fourth mask, I was starting to get over the experience. At the end, though, we left with beautifully rejuvenated faces and an expensive nap. We decided to ruin our facials by going back to the St Regis bar and having cocktails. I had the classic Red Snapper and Jenn had one of their signature cocktails.

We went back up to our room and packed up for our train journey home tomorrow. We tried to get some last-minute reservations but instead ate at the St Regis’s French restaurant downstairs, Brasserie Regine. We were one of the only patrons there that evening and had excellent service. They have a few different set menus, and we chose their middle offering: a slightly elevated menu with better options. After a few small amuse-bouches, we moved on to a delightful cold corn cream soup, followed by smoked salmon and then the fish of the day. For the main, I chose braised beef cheek in a red wine sauce, while Jenn went with the Kobe beef rump. For dessert, we had their lemon cream fromage blanc mousse. The entire meal was good, not great. Something felt a bit cold or “hotel” about the food and its preparation, but we had a really nice time.

After dinner, we walked for over a mile to go back to Dotonbori to see the famous tourist spot one more time, but this time at night. It was exactly what we’d expected: overly crowded with tourists and jam-packed with restaurants that made our dinner tonight look like the peak of luxury. But there is still something special about the energy in a place like this and the excitement of being somewhere else in the world. We didn’t stay long, so we took the subway back to our hotel to turn in before our long travel day tomorrow. As I write this, I am 40 years and a few days old. I don’t feel that old; if anything, I feel like I still forgot to study for a test or turn in my homework. But time will keep ticking, and I hope that with that time, Jenn and I (and of course Elle) have plenty more adventures that still await us.

August 6, 2026 (The Journey Home)

I’m here again. This likely doesn’t deserve its own separate post, so I thought I’d do a quick recap of our trip home. This was a full planes, trains, and automobiles day. We woke up and had our final breakfast at the St. Regis. Jenn went bold and had their Japanese set breakfast, which she did not enjoy. We left the hotel at 10 AM and arrived with plenty of time to catch our 11 AM train back to Tokyo. When we arrived at Osaka’s train station, I made a quick pit stop at 7-11 and grabbed a sushi roll and an egg salad sandwich. We boarded our train after filming several coming-and-going shots for Elle to watch at home, and made our way back to Tokyo. I ate my sandwich, which was incredible, and the sushi, which was quite good, and we enjoyed our beautiful train journey back.

We grabbed a taxi at the train station and arrived at Haneda Airport. After quickly clearing security, we grabbed dinner and brought it to the Delta lounge. I was slightly worried we'd miss out on a Delta One experience like in LAX, but this was closer to a standard Delta lounge, so we were relieved we'd grabbed dinner. After an hour, it was time to board, and like that we were ready for our nearly 12-hour flight back to LAX. We got two seats next to each other, which meant I could bother Jenn the whole time. We had a second dinner on board a few hours into the flight and spent most of the 12 hours sleeping.