We started with breakfast at home before packing our day bags and walking to Kyoto Station to catch a train towards Osaka. Once in the new city, we went to Osaka Castle shortly after it had opened. We were thankful the line to get tickets was only 15 mins long as opposed to the 1 hr (+) when we left since it was already feeling pretty warm outside.
Osaka Castle was pretty impressive but again was rebuilt twice due to fires. Lola’s favourite part of the castle was the large rocks that made up some of the inner walls. They were huge! The largest was 59.43 m^2 and weighed 108t and came from Inujima Island, not close to Osaka. As we were preparing to walk in and putting on sun screen, a Korean Dad and child came and asked some questions about the kids age, and if he could take a photo. It was pretty funny because the dad didn’t speak a lot of English and the kid was too shy to say anything.
The view from the top of the castle offered a pretty good view of Osaka.
The castle museum is T’s favourite on the trip so far - he liked learning about all of the different army clans that fought in one of the Osaka wars.
Everyone was getting hungry so we were on the search for somewhere to eat. Lola found Suninco Burgers which was a 25 mins walk from the castle. Arriving at the restaurant, we saw how small it was (seating for 8) so we had to wait about 15 mins before being seated by the owner and his wife.
The small restaurant setting was an experience, watching the chef make each order fresh in front of us. The burgers were delicious!
After lunch, we made our way to the Osaka Aquarium, which was highly rated. We had to wait 30 mins after purchasing our tickets before we were able to enter so we killed some time looking at the Osaka Port and having a drink at Starbucks.
Inside the aquarium we were quickly immersed into the different aquatic biomes of the “Ring of Fire” - starting at the top of the 8 storey building and working our way down and around all of the different exhibits. It was very interesting to see the different fish and other aqua life from different perspectives as we went through the 885m aquarium path.
Some of the noteworthy creatures that we saw were:
- whale sharks (they are huge!)
- some large Japanese crabs (they are huge!)
- Tufted Puffins (they are not huge)
- Emperor and Rockhopper Penguins
The aquarium was a big hit, everyone was impressed.
After a short stint searching the gift shop, we made our way to a nearby food court to get something to eat for supper before starting the ride back to Kyoto.
Five of us got food from one restaurant (4 orders of beef udon and one rice cutlet bowl) and Lola got some fish and beef sushi from two different restaurants. The food was decent and we could even get some beer.
The train ride back to Kyoto was uneventful and went by quickly, letting us rest our tired legs, feet and backs.
Back at Kyoto Station, we made a quick pit stop at 7-Eleven to get food for breakfast for the next day. The kids went to bed pretty easily (they were tired) and the adults played more video games before going to bed.
Tomorrow is another travel day back to Tokyo. DD is excited to ride the “Shinkansen” again.
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