Osaka. Home of giant things.

Our trip to Osaka from Naoshima island wasn’t very far, but did involve a ferry and five different train rides, including regional, Shinkansen and local! Our Japan Rail Pass is certainly being well used. Having checked into our really nice hostel with friendly staff, we headed out to the Kita neighbourhood to have a look at the Umeda Sky building, which is described in Lonely Planet as a space age Arc de Triomphe. It is a 40 story twin tower building with a connecting observation deck at the top. Impressive also was the humongous Grand Front shopping and office complex. We popped in for some lunch at a Korean restaurant, as Graham was missing Kimchi (fermented cabbage) and then headed back to the hostel to relax.

The hostel was called J-Hoppers Universal and must have been pretty new. Sparkling clean and with a really nice lounge and kitchen. The afternoon movie was Léon (so great) and after that we went to explore Dotomburi, the neon lit, colourful neighbourhood with throngs of people, restaurants, shops and stalls. Unfortunately, it was heaving down with rain, and suitably drenched despite our waterproof coats, we gave up and headed back to the hostel!
We treated ourselves to a relaxing morning of coffees and laundry the next day and with lovely dry, nice smelling clothes we headed off to Osaka castle. The original castle was built by General Hideyoshi who is credited with unifying Japan in the late 16th century and the castle give beautiful views out over modern day Osaka with autumn foliage. The current structure was reconstructed in 1931.

Determined to have a better look at Dotombori, we went back and discovered that it was even bigger than we had imagined the night before. I had read about the ‘big signs’ like the giant crab, big dragon and the giant hand holding a piece of sushi, so we snapped some pictures of those and continued on to Shinsaibashi-suji shopping arcade which is 8 blocks long! Graham has been scouting barber shops for the past few weeks and spotted one that looked trustworthy in the arcade. They didn’t scalp him and he emerged about 10 years younger, happy that his head was now much lighter! We celebrated by popping into a waffle shop and eating so much that we didn’t need any dinner that evening!