Business trip to Hyogo Prefecture at the end of May.
Tokyo to Nishi-Akashi by Shinkansen — over 600 km, quite a journey.
After the March schedule change, direct Hikari Shinkansen service to Nishi-Akashi became less convenient. Searching on the Express reservation system often doesn’t show direct trains — it usually defaults to a transfer at Nagoya.
Anyway, that’s not the main point.
I had Sunday completely off between work days, so I headed to Osaka for the first time in a while.
Kuidaore is closing in July, so I had to properly say goodbye to Kuidaore Taro while I still could!
Absolutely packed…
But really only in the immediate Dotonbori area. The proportion of obvious non-Osaka visitors was much higher there than anywhere else.
With some time to spare, I walked from Dotonbori to Umeda along Shinsaibashi-suji and Midosuji.
Like Nagoya, Osaka has a very organized street grid — easy to navigate. The more I think about it, Tokyo’s city planning looks kind of chaotic by comparison.