Japan Day 02 – Osaka, Hiroshima

After checking out of my hotel this morning I left my bags with reception to find some food. I walked down Dotonbori to my favourite ramen shop. I really have no idea what it’s called, only where it is and what the shop front looks like. If you want to know I can give you directions and a photograph.

It was the first ramen and first meal I ate on my first trip to Japan last year. It ticked all three ramen boxes for me; the noodles, the broth and the egg. Oh the egg! Cooked perfectly to my liking and it has this really nice flavour from the stock they cook it in (I’m just guessing here).

You buy a ticket outside from a vending machine before going inside. So even if you don’t speak Japanese, it’s absolutely no problem at all. Just walk in, pass the ticket to one of the staff, find a seat and wait for a bowl of deliciousness to be placed in front of you.

After my breakfast ramen I made my way to Shin-Osaka station to get a shinkansen to Hiroshima. This took me much longer than it should have because I walked to use the JR lines (trying to change my JR pass, which I found out I could only change at Osaka station) and then didn’t get off a train at the right stop to switch to the Osaka Loop. Oops.

I eventually made it onto the right train and arrived in Hiroshima. Oh I forgot to mention that on the way I found so many Kit Kats. Kobe pudding, some kind of cake, tea, Sakura Maccha Latte and citrus.

Japanese Kit Kats

I took a tram from Hiroshima Station to my hotel which is near the Hiroshima Peace Park. On the way it started snowing, REALLY LIGHTLY, but hey, it’s still snow right? It melted before it hit the ground, but it was the first snow for this trip.

I went for a walk through the peace park at sunset and took some photos. But I’m going for another visit in the morning. It’s a really beautiful place.

At the Children’s memorial are lots of paper cranes and paper crane artworks that people have donated. One of the display cases was bulging with cranes.

After walking through the Peace Park, I stumbled across a long shopping mall. I found a Uniqlo store and stocked up on heat tech. Tomorrow I will be sporting some very comfortable and nice looking heat tech socks and shirts. I wandered around for a while trying to decide what to eat and where I was willing to go into by myself. Eventually I could smell Japanese curry, and followed my nose to a curry shop. Chicken Katsu curry o kudasai! Then I strolled back to the hotel and passed out at 8.30pm after a Skype date with Andrew. Zzz.