- Riding the Tobu Revaty train
from Tokyo to Fukushima Prefecture.
I'm Chris, this is Yellow Productions.
I do travel guides that are fun, informative
and entertaining, and in this video,
I'm gonna tell you everything you need to know
to take the train from Asakusa into Fukushima.
And we're starting here, (happy music)
at the Tobu SKYTREE Line Asakusa Station.
So when you come to Asakusa to take this line,
you should know there are three lines
that come into Asakusa.
There's a couple of subway lines,
and then there's this line, the Tobu line.
So look for that building that I was standing in front of
to make sure you take the correct line.
Sometimes these stations in Japan
can be really confusing, as to which line you're getting on.
And in fact, they're all different companies,
so if you end up in another company's part of the station,
it might not really be easy to find the Tobu line
from inside of those.
So coming in this train station,
like most train stations in Japan,
there's a really intimidating bank of vending machines,
that if you're a pro, you can use.
I'm not on this line, so I'm actually gonna go
into the Tourist Information Center,
'cause I think there's gonna be some people
that speak English in there.
I've traveled to Japan quite a bit,
and I find the vending machines
still to be a little bit intimidating.
Sometimes we've used those machines, not on Tobu line,
but on other lines, we bought tickets,
and we've tried to get on the train,
and we ended up buying the wrong one,
or we didn't get the express charge,
or we didn't get the right seat.
So coming here, here being the Tourist Information Center,
and they'll totally help you out.
So when you get your tickets for this train,
they're gonna be in Japanese,
so there's some important things you'll need to know,
like what the date of it is,
what time the train is, okay,
what car you're gonna take, - Car number two.
- And what your seat is.
Now that we got our tickets,
we just go up the escalator to where the tracks are.
Coming up the escalator, the first thing here
are these wickets to go through.
These tickets will not go through those wickets.
So there's actually, there's this little information gate
that we have to come through,
and they're gonna validate
these tickets for us through here.
All right, now we got the stamp,
on each of our tickets, and they're ready to go.
(man speaking in Japanese)
All right, thank you very much.
- Thank you very much. - Okay.
Let's go find the train, thank you.
- Thank you, have a nice day. - Thank you.
So we've got about 10 minutes for our train,
it's a long ride, it's about three hours,
and we're gonna be hungry.
So we're gonna pick up some ekiben.
So when you come, there's this little place right here,
and they have these bento boxes.
They have a whole bunch of different ones right here,
in different specialties,
and so when you take trains in Japan,
you definitely, like try these out, they are really good.
And it's best to get the ones
that are like special to the region.
These all say they're from Tokyo,
but in particular here in Asakusa,
there's two that are special for Asakusa,
and we're gonna pick these up and eat these on the train.
So the Revety trains always go
on track four and track three.
Ours is on track four today, we are in car number two.
Looking at the floor, as you can where the cars stop,
they always stop at that place.
So we need to get on car number two,
so we're gonna walk down and find car number two.
By the way, I wanna point out, I always love,
they clean the trains, look at that,
the train arrived here, and they are cleaning it
before anybody gets in.
(happy music)
By the way, and if you ever kinda get confused
about what track your train is on,
they've got these great signs that are up here,
they'll tell you, in English and Japanese,
the time the train is, what track it's on,
where's it going, and then what stop it's making.
So actually the next train that's leaving right now,
at 10:50, which is like right now,
is this train right here,
and that tells you where that train's going to.
But we're still looking for our car down this way.
So I found car two, but these are for different trains.
Our's is gonna say Revaty,
so let's find the Revaty car two.
So right in front of the door, door number two,
door number two right here,
it says on the thing.
Hey, but here's the other train leaving right here,
and I just love like trains leaving places.
But that's one of the things to be careful of,
since these trains leave really close together,
but they're on time, make sure you don't get on the one
that's a wrong track.
If this is Amtrak in the U.S.,
then that might actually be your train,
leaving 10 minutes early or 10 minutes late,
it's all close enough.
By the way, about cleaning, I'm talking to you, Amtrak.
What's also neat is here,
they've got a little bit of a ramp,
so if you've got your luggage that you need to take in,
it helped make that gap kinda shorter, okay,
see you on the train.
All right, inside car number two,
we've got this car all to ourselves,
because they just finished cleaning,
and they just started letting people on.
And first of all, you'll notice these seats,
(bells chiming)
they're really nice seats, these big blue seats.
They've got these things
to kinda keep your head sweat off there,
they've got places that you can put
your small pieces of luggage up here,
and let's find our seat,
which is all the way at the end of the car this way.
Here we are, 12A and B, our seats for the next three hours.
If you've got a small piece of luggage,
you can put them in the overhead up here.
If you've got bigger pieces of luggage,
there's a couple spots behind the seats.
We typically stow them like this.
If they've got wheels, you'll wanna put them on the side,
so that they don't roll off.
If you wanna make sure you're on the right train,
and the right car, when you get in the car,
once you're inside, it'll tell you what car you're in,
and it also tells you where it's going.
This rotates in a few different languages,
it said it in English just a moment ago.
It's got more than just luggage storage right here.
It's go free wifi on the train, that's pretty good,
so if you're coming to Japan,
and you didn't get like a data or sim card,
and you need to stay connected, well, wifi on the train.
Okay, you know it's not as cold in here,
I wanna take my jackets off,
and they've really thought of everything on this train,
including where you can put your jackets.
You don't just have to stuff them in the overhead,
but they've actually got little jacket holders,
right there, on the seat.
Hey, and you know what time it is?
It's exactly 11 o'clock, and you know what, we're moving.
(gasping) It's on time.
And leaving the train station,
you can see the Asahi building.
It's the one that's the tall building on the left.
It looks like a mug of beer, with froth on top.
And then looking out just to the left,
you see Tokyo Skytree, the tallest building in Japan.
On every seat back, it's got a little map of the train,
and it lets you know which direction is moving forward,
depending upon where you're going.
And a pretty good size, pretty good size tray too.
In addition to the tray table,
it's also got a drink holder,
some paraphernalia, you'll find every seat
has a little recline button right here,
and power in the seat.
You know they really thought of everything in this train.
In the armrest right here, there is another table,
(grunting) right here.
So these seats have a small table,
and a big table, 'cause you might not want a big table.
So in that case, you get the option
of also having a small table, or just a drink holder.
Lots of places to put your stuff.
To open the doors on the train,
it's an optical center, you put your hand next to it,
to get yourself in the next car.
There's a few restrooms on the train.
You push the button to open it,
they're big restrooms, they are disabled friendly,
toilet, sink, there's actually two sinks,
there's a low sink and a big sink.
When you're using the restroom,
make sure you close the door,
and then you lock the door,
which is a separate button right here that you push,
that actually locks the door.
And you can put that latch down too,
if you really wanna be sure.
This isn't just any toilet, this is a bidet toilet,
so you can clean your rear end after you do your business.
And to flush it, you can just wave your hand right there.
You don't have to touch it.
And if you've got a kid or infant,
well they've got a little spot right there,
that you can put your kid in that chair
while you're using the restroom.
And if you wanna lift up the seat,
you don't wanna touch it, well they've thought of that,
they got this button right here, you press that,
and it will open the lid for you.
Oh look, they've got smaller ones,
and they've also got a little urinal room for men.
We've got our two ekiben,
let's open them up.
By the way, this one being very decorative,
this is the Senso-ji Temple,
right in Asakusa, and we saw that just earlier,
before we took this train, it looks like this.
(fingers snapping)
All right, but now that we're back here to eat,
let's see, let's open these up.
All right, let's take a look down here.
We'll first start opening up the temple one,
and in here, oh, this is interesting.
It's got some rice, and some meat over here,
and some shumi, and the smallest soy sauce you'll ever find.
It is worthwhile to know that all of these are cold,
they've been cooked and chilled,
and then in that next box, this one's another rice dish,
but this one's rice with various types of seafood.
It's also got like an egg omelet,
and some picked vegetables on the side,
and then in the box top right here,
they think of everything,
the boxes are just the perfect size
to fit some chopsticks and a napkin.
And the one thing we forgot, before we got on the train,
was something to drink.
They've got someone with a push cart,
that I haven't actually seen pushing up the train,
but she was in one of the cars,
and this green tea, which is 200 Yen, two bucks,
pretty good for something I bought on the train.
She also sells beer and snacks, and all those things.
And when I say that like people eat ekiben on the train,
walking down the train,
about half the people on the train right now
are eating ekiben.
And after I got this green tea,
I realized that most of those people
are actually drinking their ekiben,
not with green tea, but with beer,
which makes me wonder if I made the right choice.
Still thirst quenching though.
And if you find it too sunny,
well the windows also have window shades,
that you can pull down, to make it a little darker.
But I personally like to look out and see the scenery.
In this case, the farmland.
Another cool destination on this train is to Nikko.
Actually, halfway through the train ride,
the train splits into two.
Half the train goes to Nikko,
and half the train continues on to Aizu Wakamatsu.
Nikko's a really neat historical town.
If you wanna know more about Nikko,
I've got a whole video on it, you'll find a link
in the description below, in my Japan playlist.
And that split happens
an hour and 40 minutes into the journey,
at Shimo-Imaichi Station.
Half the train goes on to Nikko,
the other half the train continues forward.
At two hour and 40 minutes into the trip,
the train makes a two minute stop
for the train bound to Tokyo to pass by,
at Nakami-Yori Station, and we are here in February,
and oh it's cold, here it comes.
(happy electronic music)
So after three hours and 20 minutes,
we got on at 11, we got here at 2:20 p.m.,
we arrived at the final stop, Aizu-Tajima Station,
on that train right here.
And it's February when we're doing this,
so it is quite snowy here.
But I will say it was a really good ride,
it feels just kinda like a mini Shinkansen,
so if you are coming to the Fukishima region,
I definitely suggest that you consider this train.
And if you're watching this video,
well chances are, you probably will.
Well you know what, there's one more thing
that you need to know, before you ride this train,
and that is that we've got a whole bunch more videos
on Fukushima Prefecture, where you come in right here,
you'll find videos right here on the screen,
or links in the description below.
And as usual, we won't say goodbye,
because we'll see you in one of these videos.