Osaka at Night

     After Osaka Castle, we were quite hungry and after getting off the train, we ate at a small restaurant in the underground shopping mall. Most restaurants have plastic food displays of what they offer and it's pretty  accurate in what you get.

      Jacqueline wanted the egg and rice and I think she thought the egg would be cooked but when it arrived, it was a raw egg on the side, just like the display.

     She looked at us when it arrived and I shrugged my shoulders and said she knew exactly what she was getting. She made the most of it and said it wasn't that bad.

      Tony had the soba noodles and Brittany & I had the tempura with udon noodles. You can't beat a meal when it's filling and less than $5 a person.

    We went wandering around town just to look around and I loved the mural at one of the stations. It was rather large so it was easier to film it rather than take multiple photos. 

           We wanted to catch a baseball game in Osaka but they weren't playing the week we were there so I went searching for the next best thing - merchandise. I am a huge Lilo & Stitch fan and know the Stitch is very popular in Japan. So popular that he's up there with Micky, Minnie and Donald Duck in terms of branding.We went to a department store that carried Hanshin Tiger merchandise. They had a whole section devoted to just their merchandise.

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Interesting architecture and a great place to rock climb! 

The girls liked shopping at Claire's in Japan and bought some cat ears.

Had to pose with the kawaii (Japan for cute) Crab Mascot! I didn't realize how short the person inside must be to fit inside the costume

Jac wasting her money trying to win a Rilakkuma bear on the claw machine

Dotonbori at night

a restaurant with moving fingers into the character's mouth

 

Video showing a moving crab above a restaurant

The famous Glico man

I loved the neon lights reflecting in the water

Day 2 - Osaka in the morning

 

View of Osaka from our room in the morning

 On our first day in Japan, Tony and I were wide awake by 5am. The sun was already out and we knew the girls wouldn't be up for a few more hours so we headed out to check out the town.We were hungry so we went to the only place we knew that was opened - McDonald's. We call it having brekkie at Macca's (it's Australian slang for breakfast at McDonald's). I will be doing a separate entry on just McDonald's since the regional differences fascinate me.
     After eating, we walked around the streets of Osaka to get a better idea of what there was to see and do. The city was the least researched of the whole itinerary as there didn't seem to be quite as much to see as the other places we would be visiting so a day was okay with me.
     I didn't realize at the time but we were walking through Dotonbori, the famous street that runs along the Dotonbori Canal. It's not much to look at in the morning as it comes alive at night with all the neon lights and lots of people.

 Dotonbori Canal in the morning.  

     I fell in love with the hotel on the left with the painting of the women on the wall. It reminded me of a painting my sister-in-law has. We walked in the front to see what the name of it was so I could find out the name.     

       It's called Petit Hotel - Rose Lips. When I looked online later that night I found it was a love hotel! Japan is know for it's love hotels which are short term stays ranging from an hour but not more than a day for the purpose of couples getting it on. I should have known from the various pricing on the sides but it didn't occur to me at the time that this is what it was. These hotels are very common in Osaka and Tokyo but this was the first time I had confirmation of one. I want to visit one on our next trip to check it out, you know for journalistic purposes of course!

 We actually saw another one on the way back to our room - A Year of Your in Provence.

     We walked by a bike rack lot where you can park your bike for up to 24 hours

     Japan has limited land so they make use of their air space and that goes for parking spaces. This car pulls in,  the hydraulic lift moves it up to a designated spot and voila, you can park a dozen or so cars in this small space. When we came back with the girls, we showed them this and look a peek inside at all the cars. A friendly man came out and asked us where we were from. We said California/USA and he said he had visited California and was happy to make a connection. He said he was from Korea and Tony said a few words in Korean and his face lit up. He made some more small talk and we went on our way. As we left I said the only Korean words I know - kamsahamnida - thank you very much!

Day 1 - USA to Osaka, Japan

     We departed on Saturday at 11am from San Francisco and landed in Osaka on Sunday at 2:30pm. It was an 11 hour flight and Japan is 16 hours ahead so we lost a day flying there but would make it back when we returned.

     Our first stop was to redeem our Japan Rail Pass vouchers for actual passes that would allow us unlimited use of JR trains for 2 weeks. You can only get it by purchasing it at home and can't be bought once inside Japan. I held onto all the passes and we presented them at the side entrance/exit every time. At times we had to wait for others but most of the time it was pretty quick. It also makes a great souvenir!

     This was our first time in Osaka so we weren't as familiar with the area or exactly how to get to our hotel as the directions/map weren't the best. I chose our hotel based on the proximity to the JR station since we would be lugging around our suitcases and reviews from several websites. I booked two rooms with twin beds since getting a room with 2 queen beds for 4 people was nearly impossible to find. Most hotels in Japan have either single/twin beds or double/full size beds. I learned the hard way last time that two adults in a double is not comfortable unless you just lie down and don't move at all during the night. I asked for the rooms to be next to each other and the girls loved having their own room to themselves and all the toiletries that came with it.

     Our hotel gave us two goody boxes from the Glico company. The Glico man sign is famous in Osaka and I had no idea what they made or sold. I originally thought it was healthy stuff since they use a runner as their model but no. I later found out the 300 meter running man was used since their first candy contained 15.4 calories and a average man could burn that number of calories from running 300 meters. The only product I was familiar with was Pocky- which are chocolate covered biscuit sticks.

     We checked in and I didn't have anything planned for the rest of the day since it had already been a long flight and it was more important to rest up for the next day. Many business buildings in Japan have underground shops like convenience stores, banks, cafes and in our case a grocery store. We went there to get a quick bite of sandwiches, fruit and drinks before settling in. They had self check outs like back home and wasn't hard to figure out.

We watched the sunset while we ate and relaxed the rest of the night.

Jacqueline brought along stowaways in her bag.