Saying goodbye to Almaty, it was time to fly to Japan with a brief stop in Seoul. As with my stop in London I contemplated briefly popping out, this time to a new VR centre close to the airport where they had an interesting rollercoaster VR attraction. However whilst I'd landed early the park wouldn't be open for over 3 hours and it would leave it tight to get back for the onward flight. As there are a few development projects going on in Seoul I can see myself there in the not too distant future.
Instead I tried to pass the time in the airport, spending some of my leftover dollars on breakfast, avoiding spending my holiday money in the shops and hunting pokemon (I've no shame). Both flights were fine and passed without hitch. The second was only a couple of hours so worth considering as a future South Korea/Japan trip. I landed at Kansai Airport, built on a man made island just off the coast and unlike the US immigration that was painful, the Japanese immigration couldn't have gone better with every gate manned and open and the process being kept straightforward and not overly bureaucratic. Even better, having passed immigration, there's a Nintendo Switch promotional stand with games to play; how could I not resist an opportunity to play Mario Kart?
Once done with the games I collected my Rail pass (essential for long distance travelling in Japan) and made my way into Osaka, specifically Namba where the hotel was located. I was staying in the Red Roof Inn, a compact business style hotel on the edge of the Dotonburi district, where the locals and tourists visit at night. There are tons of eating places here and as a fan of Okonomiyaki, a local dish, that was dinner for the night.
This is the VR centre in Seoul. I think this is a great way to use VR with rollercoasters. In theory you can have the simulator run any number of rides. It's way better than how VR is being used in parks where they try to fit a futuristic scenario around an existing ride; operationally dealing with the headsets kills the ride but here where the VR is mandatory and you don't have a track to run the cars around I think the overall experience would be much better..
Incheon airport is huge and you can spend a fortune here. There are designer shops here trying to sell the western ideal of beauty to a country that doesn't look much like it. That made me chuckle as did the signs for how not to behave.
The best welcome to a country ever, and my first vending machine of the holiday. There would be many.
The JR Office is very easy to find and, not a surprise, completely efficient. I was in and out in under 5 minutes.
Namba is a district not far from the city's castle. On the way to my hotel I passed an obvious love hotel, a business unique to Japan where couples go to treat themselves for a couple of hours.
This is my hotel, highly recommended.
Dotonburi is the main touristy area in the city, especially at night when the neon comes on. The restaurants do what they can to attract people into their establishments. A lot feature pretty cool frontage.
The most famous piece of neon here is the Glico sign, which is a national landmark. In 2014 the neon sign got an upgrade to a huge LED screen behind the runner which now allows the man to appear to run through various locations around Japan and the world.
Dinner was easy to pick tonight. I love okonomiyaki and I wanted to have some in a city famous for it. I picked this place along the canal that runs through the heart of Dotonburi. They had a large good selection of the dish.
The first time I came to Osaka I got to ride the unusual big wheel, the only one of it's kind situated on the front of a branch of department store Don Quixote. Whilst it looked great it didn't really offer much of a view. The ride looks to have closed some time ago and now stands as a photographic monument now.
The Hip5 building has also suffered further decline in it's amusement ride offering. It opened with a drop tower, which is still there. On my last visit the ride was down although we were allowed out onto the platform to take photos. However I guess the ride never re-opened and it has now been converted into a climbing wall.
The street level was pretty busy, especially at Shinsaibashisuji, the main shopping street.
Namba also has an underground shopping city that runs for what feels like ever. This is quiet at night but gets busy during rush hours. I found a supermarket down here that I would use each day for snacks to bring back to the hotel.
When you're travelling light and away for a long time, there's inevitably going to be some laundry time, and that is how I spent my first evening in the city (after I'd been out, eaten and played some video games of course)
No comments:
Post a Comment