A couple of days in Osaka

Osaka is a huge industrial/commercial city not far from Kyoto and a rival in many ways, for the capital, Tokyo.  However, it’s not a patch on Tokyo for history, culture or “feel”.  It has the rushed and crowded atmosphere in the subways and on the streets, but it doesn’t seem quite as logical in layout, or feel as clean and spotless as Tokyo.  There seems to be a department store on almost every corner – 10 floors of just about anything you could imagine to buy then two or three floors of restaurants.  I’m sure there are more restaurants in Japan than there are in the rest of the world and the variety of cuisine is incredible.  The Japanese food we have at home is just a small fraction of the variety on offer here.  And on top of that, each department store seems to have a fresh food market in the basement plus access to one of the multitude of subway stations underground.  You could live your life forever without seeing daylight.

We arrived yesterday afternoon by Shinkansen from Hiroshima and checked into our hotel, then set off to explore the area around us, getting lost several times in the labyrinth, but eventually finding our way.  We dined last night after a couple of heart-starters at the hotel, on the 10^th floor of one of the local Daimaru stores (there are several) with tonkatsu, pickled vegetables and rice and we ordered  a bottle of white wine, not knowing what the local brew was like – NOT GOOD!  We finished up ordering beer instead and the waitress removed the charge for the “wine”.  (Cat’s pee)!!!

We set off this morning to find the local coin laundry having been given directions and it turned out to be in the basement of an hotel, some 2kms away.  Whilst the washing was on, I ventured across the road to the local barber shop, feeling in need of a little grooming.  1000yen in the ticket machine (approx $11) bought me a place in the queue and the opportunity to try to describe to a non-english speaking lady, what I wanted her to do!  Apparently, that’s not allowed!  Anyway, I finished up with a VERY SHORT version of a military snip and I feel so much better. 

This afternoon we jumped on the train (one of hundreds) to Osakako, where the world’s LARGEST (ostensibly) ferris wheel is situated and given that the Princess has never before in her life, been on a ferris wheel, that was a great place to start!  Since I am still nursing the nail marks where a grip like KING KONG grabbed me, I think she enjoyed it!!!!!!!!!!!! Actually it is the largest diameter wheel in the world, but the one in Tokyo is 2.5meters higher off the ground!

After lunch and a couple of beers, we traversed the underground again to Dotonbori where the major players in retailing in the world have stores and explored the excess that exists, but that mere plebs like us are not regularly exposed to.  Absolutely AMAZING!!

This city exhibits some amazing architecture and if I can keep the Princess out of the department stores, I’ll try to post some photos of our adventures and some fantastic buildings