Asia Trip Day 10 - Osaka > Taipei (November 2015)

Tuesday 11/3

Another travel day, this time from Osaka to Taipei. Kansai airport is pretty far from Namba Station so we had to get up pretty early to catch our flight.


We took the 7am Rapit train to Kansai. It was designed to look like an anime character.


First ride in a 787 Dreamliner. The flight didn't feel any different but the large dimming windows were cool.

We arrived in Taipei and found our driver. I was going to take the high speed rail or an airport bus but decided on getting a van instead. Our driver's name was Double (as in 2x). We asked for an English-speaking driver but I ended up speaking Chinese the whole time. Like Japan, we stayed at an Airbnb near Taipei Station. The building was a commercial building so the "apartment" was kind of weird.


2/28 Peace Park


Longshan Temple


Waterfall inside temple grounds


The temple was pretty chaotic, very different from the temples in Kyoto


Afterwards, we walked several blocks to Modern Toilet, a bathroom themed restaurant. The food was so so but the kids wanted to eat here.




After dinner, we walked around Ximen for a bit, and bought some fresh shredded pork and pork jerky

Asia Trip Day 9 - Kyoto (November 2015)

Monday 11/2

Our final full day in Japan was spend visiting Kyoto. I had planned 3 or 4 stops and dinner in Kyoto but we ended up only seeing two temples and ate dinner back in Osaka.


Train ride from Osaka to Kyoto took about 45 minutes. This is the rapid (rapid express?) train on Keihan Railroad.


First stop: Kendonya udon restaurant


Yummy


Fushimi-Inari Shrine




Prayer gates


Deep-fried sweet potatos


Sanjusangendo Shrine. There were over 1000 buddha statues inside but we could not take any photos.


Dinner in a tiny one-man curry restaurant in Namba Station back in Osaka

Asia Trip Day 8 - Osaka (November 2015)

Sunday 11/1

We arrived in Osaka late Saturday night and was able to check-in to our Airbnb place without any problems. This apartment was a bit larger than the one in Tokyo, though it did not have a dinner table.

The next morning, we decided to skip Osaka Castle and headed to the Osaka Aquarium instead.


Hugh ferris wheel next to the aquarium


Aquarium exterior


Model of huge whale shark in the large tank inside the aquarium


We spent a long time in the aquarium. It was dark when we left. The ferris wheel was all lit up with animated lights.


Dontonbori


Famous crab restaurant


Sushi


We couldn't decide where to eat and ended up with take-out sushi, and some pork buns from a Chinese restaurant in Namba Staton


We also got some Portuguese egg tarts for dessert

Asia Trip Day 7 - Tokyo > Osaka (October 2015)

It's been six months since our Asia trip; time to finish posting trip photos.

Saturday 10/31

Today is a travel day. We are taking the bullet train (Shinkasen) from Tokyo to Osaka in the evening. Train tickets are actually pretty expensive. It would have been faster and cheaper to fly but the best fares were from Narita to Kansai which would add hours and lots of cost to the trip.

We checked out of our Airbnb this morning, placed our luggage in lockers at Tokyo Station, and went to see a few local sights.


Tokyo Station. It's our 3rd time through the station and I still got lost. It took forever for us to find enough empty lockers to store our luggage for the day.


Imperial Castle. After lunch, we went on a free tour of the East Garden given by volunteers in English. Here is their blog post for that day.


One of the tour groups. They broke us up into 4 groups. Their guide spoke perfect American English.


We left the tour after about an hour and took the train to Shibuya. There was a Starbucks nearby so we took a break. The workers kept coming over to tell us not to take pictures. I don't get why.


Shibuya scramble crossing. Lots of people crossing the street.


We then took the train one station to Harajuku Bridge. We were hoping to see people in crazy clothing but there was no one there. This is the Daiso on Takeshita Street (竹下通).


Fancy crepes


Heading back to Tokyo Station. Some had subway lines over 1km from each other.


Nozumi Shinkasen


Train interior. Top speed of the train was about 180 mph. Too bad it was dark so we could not see anything outside.

Asia Trip Day 6 - Mt. Fuji (October 2015)

Friday 10/30

Another must see in Japan is probably Mt. Fuji. I had originally tried to plan my own day-trip to Mt. Fuji but due to time constraints, we ended up joining a guided tour. We bought the tour through Viator but I think several travel agencies sell the same tour organized by JTB. The tour was ~$100/person and included a nice Japanese lunch. We did have to get up early in the morning to take the subway to Keio Plaza Hotel near Shinjuku to get on the tour bus.


Our tour bus. One return option was to take the shinkasen to Tokyo Station, but since we wanted to look around Shinjuku, we stayed with the bus option.


First stop was the Mt. Fuji Visitors Center where we had 10 minutes (I hate these tours). It was still cloudy so we could barely see Mt Fuji.


Second stop was one of the 5th Stations partway up the mountain. Lots of people and very cold. This time it was more clear but the sun was behind Mt. Fuji so it was hard to take good pictures.


Lunch: this was probably the best part of the trip. Main course was some type of noodle cooked in a miso soup.


View of Lake Kawaguchi(?) from the restaurant. Too bad we couldn't see Mt. Fuji from here.


Boat ride on Lake Ashi


The boat ride was nice but very windy, and we still could not see Mt. Fuji


The final stop was supposed to be the Komagatake Ropeway, which would have taken us up the side of Kamiyama. Unfortunately, it was closed due to high winds so they let us into a small crappy aquarium next to the ropeway. Oh well...


After the bus dropped us off at the Keio Plaza Hotel, we walked to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Office to visit their free observatory. We walked past a huge bicycle lot with individual racks and you pay at a machine. Much different from China where you give some random person to watch your bike and hope it's still there when you return.


I though about going to Tokyo Tower or Tokyo Skytree but ended up here because it's free. This is looking northwest-ish.


Southeast view. You can see Tokyo Tower in the middle of the photo.

For dinner, we tried to find something to eat at department store food courts. Typically these were in the basement levels and served cheap and quick meals. Since it was Friday night, it was super crowded and after wandering for 10 minutes, we decided to find a nicer sit-down place, and ended up at Wako in the Odakyu Department Store. It was katsu restaurant, very similar to Kagura in Torrance. I got the $20 pork cutlet set and it was excellent.

Asia Trip Day 5 - Ghibli Museum (October 2015)

Thursday 10/29

One of the must-do things on the itinerary was to visit Ghibli Museum. Studio Ghibli is famous for producing animated films such as My Neighbor Totoro, Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, and many others. Almost every list of top animated movies contains several Ghibli films, most directed by Hayao Miyazaki. I probably have all his movies on DVD.

The museum is actually in Mitaka, which is about 25 km from Tokyo Station on the JR Chūō Line. To get tickets outside of Japan, I went to JTB Travel in Torrance 4 months before the trip and pay $5/ticket extra for handling. Reading online forums, overseas tickets usually sell out quickly since they only reserve 100 per day worldwide. In Japan, you can go to any Lawsons and buy tickets from a vending machine.


Since it was going to be a long day, we stopped by a few convenience stores to get snacks. Here is a spaghetti bun (that we did not get).


To save a few yen, we walked from our apartment to Ueno Station to keep the trip all-JR. The green train is the famous Yamanote Line which loops around Tokyo. We took the Keihin-Tōhoku Line instead to Kanda Station and transferred to the Chūō Line express.


Instead of Mitaka, we got off the train one stop before at Kichijōji Station. This was the street right outside the station. Ghibli Museum is about a 20 minute walk from either train station.


Totoro in the ticket booth


I heard they were very strict about enforcing the no photography rule inside the museum so I only have photos from the outside. This is from the rooftop garden.


Large robot statue from Laputa (my favorite Miyakazi film) on the rooftop


On the way back from Ghibli Museum, we stopped by Akihabara (electronics and otaku/anime/cosplay) and Ginza (shopping area). We stopped by the Sony company store and they had lots of cool stuff, including a $50 HD projection TV that projected from the ground up. There was a hi-res audio system (CAS-1) that was interesting but still not sold in the US yet. I also tried on a pair of MDR-1A headphones and ended up getting it back home for $300.


We were supposed to meet up with an ex-coworker who was also traveling in Tokyo but we were too tired. For dinner, we ate at Jonathan's, which is like a Japanese version of Denny's, that was next to our apartment. I had a hamberger steak... it was just ok. We also had to get up super early for our Mt. Fuji tour the next day so we didn't want to spend hours looking for a place to eat.