The sleep on the bus was phenomenal. The trip took 12 hours after all… I practically sleep walked outside each rest stop to have a cigarette. Seriously smooth sleep and on top of that I had no one sitting next to me – it was great!
I woke up finally, and looked out the window. Osaka Station. OH, THIS IS MY STOP!!! Almost missed it (not really, as they would have come and woken me up – but it would have been embarrassing).
Dragged my suitcase across Osaka Station and through to Umeda, charged my ICOCA and got onto the Midosuji Line train bound for Namba (¥230).
Arriving at Namba, I wandered around the appropriate exiting area before finding a lift, exit #14 through Namba Hips. Yeah, that’ll do.
Headed over to my first hotel, Osaka Teikoku Hotel near Dotombori. They were nice, but seemed to freeze up a little once I told them I hadn’t printed out my reservation voucher. Easy. I showed it to them on my phone and they were fine.
They also took my bags and stored them until check in, which is 3pm. No earlier? Nope, no luck. Oh well.
That does suck though, because I’m the kind of person who can’t stand a day without a shower. I feel disgusting, but anyway…
For breakfast, I decided to have a lavish feast (joking) at Yoshinoya. The large butadon (rice topped with grilled pork) cost ¥460. Have prices gone up? Still, a filling meal for that price is fair, I think.
Then after paying, I realised that it was still 8:30am. Too early to do anything… So I stepped into the Lotteria nearby and ordered a coffee (¥200) and 3 “Choco Burgers” (¥180).
Choco Burgers, you ask? That’s what I thought too, they look like this. Like macarons.
But, the outside isn’t crumbly-chewy like macarons, rather it’s more like bread (hence, the “burger” name). Inside is solid milk chocolate. Actually really nice! The bread part is flavoured – in this case, it’s mandarine with dark chocolate, walnut with milk chocolate, and blueberry with white chocolate. All were good, but the blueberry is my favourite 😀
Till here, then. Still deciding on what to show you here in Osaka!