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Showing posts with the label Osaka

Himeji Castle, Dotonbori

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Ah, well, I had a good run. Today tsuyu finally caught up with me: it was hot and rainy, just like they'd promised me my entire stay would be. I got incredible weather until now, though, so I can't complain! (I may still complain a bit) Undaunted by the rain, I set on my journey to Himeji. It is 90 km west of Osaka, but it's on the shinkansen line so the train ride takes just 29 minutes! And when a Japanese train says 29 minutes, it is not 28 or 30, it is exactly twenty-nine minutes. Once again, the JR Pass pays for itself (a one-way ticket would have cost me maybe €40 without it, so in practice I would have taken a regional train that would have taken twice as long). When I got off at Himeji station, the castle was immediately visible at the end of the large avenue that connects the two points. The castle is also called The White Egret, which to me was puzzling: the "white" part is because the walls and the roofs are covered in plaster (by comparison, pict

Osaka: Last day in Japan

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So I had to do the whole bus/cable car/train combination again, and it felt decidedly longer this time around. Eventually I arrived in Namba Station at about noon. I am so proud of the prescience I showed when I booked the Dotonbori Hotel . I had a vision that by this point in the trip I would have neither the energy nor the will to look for a place in a map, or take several subways, so I looked for something that was so close to the station that I could just throw my bags out of the train doors and into my room. And indeed, this hotel is in Dotonbori street, which itself is two blocks from Namba Station, so already that's my transport and the main sightseeing spot all together in one place. It's a pretty nice hotel, too -wifi and LAN, breakfast included, Western style, neko-map of the city, and for those staying longer they have free bike rental. If you check out their website -yes, the front really does look like that! So I dropped off my stuff, rested a little bit, t