Our last stop in Japan was two nights in Osaka with a day trip to Nara. Osaka is known for having a totally different personality than other big cities like Tokyo, for being louder, flashier, and always in search of good food and a good deal!
OSAKA
Welcome to Osaka!
I read that the motto of Osaka is "kuidaore" ("eat until you drop") - so it only makes sense that most of our activities there revolved around food! The day we got in, we walked around the Dotonbori district, which is like a big, neon amusement park for food. Shops advertise their specialties with larger then life creatures and neon signs.
It was amusing to walk through, but we wanted to get a slightly more authentic taste of the city, so we booked a tour with Yuki from Inside Osaka. It was a great tour that I'd definitely recommend to anyone who wants a glimpse at local Osaka life. He took us to a few local spots and explained a lot about Osaka culture along the way.
First stop: Osaka specialty Takoyaki: batter filled with octopus. Yuki said that a lot of popular places on the street rush the process and the batter doesn't cook fully. This is a sixth-generation Takoyaki stand where they really take their time to do things right!
Second stop: A local Izakaya (informal standing up bar), where we tried some sake and a few Japanese foods like tofu and roasted peppers. He explained that a common way Japanese people can judge if a place has good food is to taste their dashi (broth)- if that's good, they know what they're doing! He also told us that the bar after work is an important part of bonding with colleagues, and the only place it's acceptable to disagree with your boss!
Third stop: A grocery store which looks more like a video game arcade. It was just as bright and colorful inside, with loud music bumpin'! Yuki told us that in Osaka, everyone likes good food at a good price- this particular chain is known for their 1 yen sales, where every day you can get certain items for only 1 yen!
Last stop: A great chicken restaurant! The best Japanese restaurants specialize in just one thing- if they have many different types of food (like sushi AND ramen) it's not likely to be as good. This place even had....CHICKEN SASHIMI (pictured above). Yes, that's raw chicken. Restaurants can only serve it if the chicken has been killed that day, and it's a mark of a quality restaurant if they have it. I tried it, and it tasted like tuna sashimi. Will not be making this one at home :)
NARA
Nara is about an hour train ride from Osaka, and known for its temples and deer. We were getting a little tired of researching sights at this point, so decided to go on a tour with Nara Walk. Our guide wasn't as good as the others we experienced, but it was nice to have someone showing us where to go and giving us some background info.
First up, we met some of the famous deer, and fed them their favorite food, deer crackers!
Julia's caption for this photo: It's all fun and games until you run out of deer crackers!
We visited a shinto shrine where we prayed to the matchmaking god, saw a beautiful garden, and marveled at the world's largest buddha statue.
Moss covered lanterns leading to the shrine, purchased by wealthy believers to help fund the upkeep of the shrine.
We caught the last of the cherry blossoms in Nara!
This is the Todai-Ji temple that houses the Buddha- I've made some notes to try to communicate just how big the statue is!
It's hard to tell from the photo just how large he is!
After the tour, I had lunch at Maguro Koya, which looks like a hole in the wall, but has the best tuna sashimi I've ever tasted!
We headed back to Osaka after lunch and a little browsing (including a shop that had a live owl....normal?). They were having a sakura festival, even though most of the cherry blossoms were done blooming. As you'd expect in Osaka, there were tons of food booths selling all types of good eats. We had some of the most amazing dumplings ever, and a weird tostada thing made from tempura bits and covered in mayo. Not that good.
Pass on this one
Banana cuties!
Even though the cherry blossoms were mostly gone, there were tons of blooming plum trees, and a crowded walkway to view them!
v. crowded
We enjoyed a glass of wine outside at the nearby Garden Oriental and then tried to go to a steak place for dinner. Well, we did GO there, but the offerings on the menu started at $150, which was a bit rich for our blood, so Julia called it a night and got some to-go food, and I went to FUKUTARO for some tasty Okonomiyaki.
And with that, our trip was almost at an end! We headed back to Tokyo for one more night before our flight home. I'll add what we did there to my original Tokyo blog post.
Where we stayed in Osaka: Mitsui Garden Hotel. We liked it a lot, though it was in more of a business district so not a lot to see in the immediate area.