Two days in Osaka
Osaka is a great town to eat and shop your heart out. We arrived on a 15 minute bullet train from Kyoto. We scheduled two days with little concrete plans: no hikes, temples or castles. Of course they have temples and a big old castle but my plan was to make the family happy with a minimal itinerary. Our Airbnb was on the edge of Americamura. This location was ideal and, as usual, I picked it because it had a great patio.
After we dropped our bags we walked through the streets of Dotombori around Kuromon market and Sennichimae Doguyasuji Street (kitchen goods heaven). It is a huge collection of restaurants and shops, many under covered arcades. It was a lot more pleasant than the market area in Kyoto- Nishiki Market, which is so dense with people that it was hard to enjoy. We looked at some Japanese knives (does everyone buy one on vacation here?), and grabbed lunch nearby.
I was told to get some Okonomiyaki during my trip by a couple friends. Cabbage pancakes? Oh yeah! We hit Teppan Okonomiyaki Mitsuki and it did not disappoint. Delicious food and great people. I think there were 2 or 3 Michelin starred Okonomiyaki places in town but this one had the highest reviews. These babies are one of the dishes Osaka is famous for.
After lunch we headed over to Americamura, hub of youth culture and ‘street wear’. This neighborhood came to life in the 70’s when they converted warehouses to shops to sell vintage clothes imported from the US west coast. Check out Americamura Free Market for vintage watches (bought one), cameras, and all kinds of cool stuff. The clothes shops in this area were just our style (two teens and two wanna-be teens).
It’s looking like we are going to need to buy another suitcase. This was predicted but I pretended we were going to stay under control. Where to get a screaming deal on a suitcase, D. Kelly of course!
We had dinner by the Osaka Canal under the shadow of the Glico Running Man. With all of the insane signage in the area it’s hard to believe this sign is the famous one. It should be the rotating, angry Japanese chef with the chopsticks, but the Glico man is the one people come to see. There are tons of people all along the canal and boats full of tourists that run through it. It has a pretty fun atmosphere. We were jonesing for cheeseburgers so we went to a place called Richard’s Smash Burgers: if you can eat 3, you get on the wall of fame. Good burger and very funny owner.
Second (and last) day in Osaka: We started with the current trendy breakfast in Osaka- fluffy pancakes. We went to Elk a couple minutes from our place in Americamura.
It is a cute spot and the sweet pancakes were great. The savory (cheese covered or with shrimp and avocado) less so- what a shocker.
Next stop was Umeda Sky, the famous building in Umeda with an observation deck on the roof. This type of thing is big in Japan with multiple options in each city we visited for sky scraper rooftop viewing decks. Tokyo has a few and this is the biggest of several in Osaka. Most recommend going for sunset but warn of big crowds or require reservations for that time of day. At midday it was no wait and the view is pretty incredible.
I planned on walking around the nearby neighborhood of Nakatsu next. It sounds great: spared ruin from bombing in World War II, it has old wooden buildings that are now boutiques, art galleries and cafes. I didn’t have a specific destination so we wandered aimlessly without finding much, which was a bummer. We headed back to Namba and had more shopping and ate one more great meal (recurring theme for Osaka). This town is known both as Japan’s kitchen and also the kuidaore, or eat till you drop place. We needed to get out of town before it was too late, so we headed back to Tokyo on the Shinkansen for a brief stop then home.
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