I've been to Tokyo twice before once during high school and once roughly 4 years ago with my mom. I remember being homesick when I went with my mom after 7 days. I didn't want that happening on this trip and I hate flying on airplanes. Since I hadn't been over seas for a few years now I jumped at the opportunity to travel. I shouldn't let the fear of being homesick and the fear of traveling on airplanes stop me.
On this trip my mom invited my best friend from high school Eric and his mom (Caryn) and dad (Ronald). She also invited my neighbors Aunty Jere and Uncle Roy. My mom's idea for this trip since both groups hadn't been to Japan besides me and Eric was to fly into Osaka, go to Iwakuni, Miyajima, and Hiroshima, somewhere in between all this visit relatives. Then go back to Osaka visit Kyoto and Nara and come back home after 10 days of traveling. It was a packed itinerary with lots of stuff to do. When we finally got home I was jet lagged and tired but on the up side I didn't feel home sick, I didn't get sick, and I had the best time I ever had since I've visited Japan and I wouldn't mind doing it all over again!
The next few blogs will be a small blurb or something similar to this ^^ and a journal entry from what I did each day.
March 21-22 all mushed into together because I lose a day when we fly over the International Date Line.
That flight was way too long... Almost 10 hours =/ I hate flying. Anyways we arrived in Osaka at the Kansai airport and we are leaving for Namba in Osaka. When we arrived it wasn't too cold. I was wearing just some jeans and a tshirt! We got to the hotel around 8 pm and unloaded our stuff. The next thing we had to do was get our rail pass vouchers for the next day. We spent almost an hour looking for the place to get it. When that was over we went to find Dotonburi and we ate at Kinryu ramen. I took a few pictures of the street but not too many. We found a tako yaki stand and ate some. We finally headed back to the hotel and I crashed out so quickly I don't even remember seeing a Gyukaku in Dotonburi.
My mother and I waiting to board the Hawaiian airlines air bus. Luckily it wasn't crowded and I got to change seats and have a row next to the window by myself.
When we landed we quickly got onto a bus for the OCAT (Osaka City Air Transit) terminal. It brought us near our hotel and not to our hotel. We ended up walking around and asking for directions in a shopping mall kind of thing.
We popped out of the OCAT terminal and found our hotel, the Hotel Monterey Grasmere Osaka.
After putting our big bags down we had to look for the train station to get our rail passes. We ended up walking around Namba Walk for over half an hour looking. At least there were a lot of stores that you could look in!
We got our rail passes and headed to Dotonburi where they were known for a ramen shop called Kinryu Ramen. This is the dragon pictured above the store.
The ramen was good but wasn't as good as the ramen at the ramen museum in Odaiba.
Night time in Dotonburi.
A night time stand selling tako yaki. It was delicious!
My mom sharing some tako yaki with me.
I don't understand why I didn't see this sign before. During our return to the hotel there was a huge light up sign saying this is where Dotonburi is. I guess I must have missed it!
This was only our first few hours in Japan and I was pooped from traveling. I barely had any sleep on the plane but I got to watch a movie on the way there. There isn't much to do on a ten hour flight. The airplane food wasn't that good either. Our first night in Osaka, looking back was ok. We saw a lot of night life and also buy me drinky bars. I had enough of the city... where is the country side and the scenery!
Stay tuned for more!
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