Day 11 - Osaka

Today I decided to stay in Osaka and go to see Osaka castle and the Kaiyukan aquarium. The entrance fee for the castle was 600 yen and it allows you to go up to the tower to take a look at all of Osaka from there. Most of the castle had to be reconstructed because it was hit by lightning and burned down. The museum itself I didn`t find very interesting or maybe I was because I was tired and had no patience but I took a quick walk through and headed to the aquarium.

The aquarium is located in the west end of the city where the universal studios and kids land is. Now this is definitely a tourist trap. The entry fee is 2000 yen ($20) and it was packed full of people. It me took about 1 1/2 hours to get through, again I wasn`t in the mood for crowds today. There was nothing too special about this aquarium except for the whale sharks and multitudes of jellyfish. I think it`s the first time I had seen whale sharks. The cool thing about this aquarium is the fact that the pathways are built around the tanks so as you descend you are walking around the tanks able to see the different levels of the aquarium adn the different forms of marine life that live there.

For dinner I went to Kobe to meet some friends. The JR ride from Osaka to Kobe is only about 20 min but took me longer as I took the train and got lost yet again :). Eventually I got there and we found a place that sold Kobe beef. I mean I`m in Kobe, it`s famous for its beef and it was totally worth it! I probably won`t do it again for a while but it was fantastic. The meal started with 2 tiny appetizers, one constisting of a squid salad and the other was a fish salad. The beef was really tender because the fat is marbleized in the meat. The slice was 130 g and came with fried garlic, yam, snowpea (yes just one), slice of eggplant and 2 pieces of this root vegetable that tastes like starch but is chewy like jelly (really didn`t like it, can you tell?). It was cool because the chef cooked in front of us and waited for us to finish eating half that he cooked and then made the second half. This was probably the most expensive meal l`ll eat for a long time if not ever!