Japan free & easy - 5th to 14th Mar 2019 : 11th Mar 2019

For today, as my wife suggestion, decided to buy the Osaka Amazing 2 days pass. Remember that it is valid for subway and bus transport as well, all free within 2 days.

For the list of free entry, refer to this link.

The pass, you can purchased at any of the station

 

 Map trail for the day

The first stop would be the Umeda Sky Building (梅田スカイビル), we bought bento and eat it at the building there, hehe. Mind you, the admission fee to this building was $1500 yen, not cheap at all. I think if not for the pass, don't think would visit here.

 Destination

The building up-close

 Collections of the city sky-line

 Couple shot

 Shots from the top with the building landscape

 Model of the building

 The open air walk about

 Pix taken at the top open air walk about

 Raining at the left side while sunny at the right side

Couple shot spot, they also provided one handphone stand

 Going out and down of the building, along the escalator down

 Nice photo spot, the tunnel effect

 More shots of the unique building

 Different angle

Next stop would be the HEP FIVE Ferris Wheel.

Wheel from a distance, it is actually on top of one of the commerical building

Entrance

Before going onboard

Views from the top

Before heading to the next spot of attraction, we would need to top-up our energy ! And that would be lunch !!! This time round we just randomly selected one restaurant to settle our meals.

My set

Lizzy's set

 

 After lunch, found one cafe for a coffee and cake

If you are in Osaka, one of the tourist spot that one must visit would be ?!?!?! Osaka Castle, part of the Amazing Pass list.

 Gate of the castle

The walls with towers

 The castle wall stones are huge, amazing how the ancient people constructed them

 Front of the castle

Couple shot

Castle shot

 Inside the castle

 Views from the top, around 8 stories high

 The story of the famous battle Battle of Sekigahara.

 Castle shot

 You can actually take the boat in the area, but last call is 4pm, which we missed

Closed-up of the boats

 Final shot before going back to Dotorbori for boat ride

Back here for Tombori River Cruise

Nothing much taken during the cruise, maybe I can put up some video of the crusie. still tuned...

Thats for the day......

Japan free & easy - 5th to 14th Mar 2019 : 10th Mar 2019

Alright, decided to travel out to visit the land of the deers, Nara (奈良).

Today travel plan

 Breakfast at a cafe near our hotel

 French toast set for me

 My wife's set, that black stuff is red bean paste

Our drinks

We opted for the more affordable normal train ride, not the bullet train, the time spent was not that much different but the price sure was.

 Oh yeah, we gotten one day bus pass for today as well

Don't worry about not able to meet any deers there, it was abundant throughout the park area. Hence, no need to start snapping away once you reached there.

 Deers

 Scare scare

 

Attempting

 Still attempting

Finally

 Rickshaw lady, first time seeing

 As usual, flowers along the way

First stop, Todaiji (東大寺, Tōdaiji, "Great Eastern Temple").

 Todaiji (東大寺)

Entrance

 Always have beautiful garden everywhere in Japan

 Todaji

Couple shot

 1st entrance door gods

 2nd entrance door gods

 Lizzy on the path to the actual temple

 Different views

 Buddha

The top right is the size of the lotus petals of the actual Buddha seat

 Bodhisattva

After my tri, I was told that alot of people would queue to try to squeeze thru this hole. If you can do it, it would mean a bountiful year for you. I only saw one kid playing there when I was there.

 

History of the original temple, seemed it was rebuilt twice, scaling down each time.

 

 

More flowers

 

The tower behind the temple

 The history of this mocked tower

The museum before the temple, shows the actual show of the buddha hands

Lunch place, took us 2 hrs of queuing in the rain

 The menu

 Interior of the joint

Lunch

Lizzy's lunch

After lunch and with renewed energy, we set off to Kasuga Taisha (春日大社).

 Various types of lanterns at Kasuga Taisha

 The corridors

 Stone lantern

 Wandering around Nara

Next we detoured to Nigatsudo Hall.

 The hall

 View on top - panning shot

 View down

 Walking down

 Back to Nara station

Before going back to hotel, decided to visit Kuromon Ichiba Market. We reached around 4+pm, most of the stores already closed or closing.

It is a very long stretch of street

 Wife's recommendation, cheap and good sushi located in the market

 Our sushi, the unagi was very generous, overall not bad

 Addon

 Mind you, my throat was still painful, but what the hecked, went for grilled food after sushi.

Fun fact, the grilled shop actually did not speak any english nor english menu. After sometime, the young gal attending us called another young chap to help us with the menu. At first I thought this guy could speak english, turns out he was from China and hence we spoke in mandarin. We also found out that the young gal seemed to like mandarin as well and try a few words with us. I think she might secretly or is the gal friend of that guy, lol.

After reaching our hotel, decided to try their free ramen, not bad.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz