I slept very well last night, 7 hours! There is a French-style bakery on the 1st floor of our hotel. Mom and I went to investigate and found it's the type of place where you take a wire basket lined with parchment paper and tongs and help yourself to the items laid out for the taking, putting your selections in the wire basket, and then pay at the counter, where you can also order drinks. There were sweet choices as well as savory. I chose a multi-berry custard brioche pastry as well as a bacon/potato roll type item. Mom had a ricotta & blistered cheery tomato toast. Hers looked really good! I'll have to get that one morning, for sure. My berry brioche was yummy, but the bacon/potato bun was hard to cut & bite into. We both ordered lattes. While we were waiting for our order to be warmed and lattes delivered, Kenji texted to see what we found and he decided to join us, as Leo was still asleep. We all agreed it warrants another visit!
The three adults ventured out into the heat and humidity, headed to Osaka Castle while Leo stayed behind to work on an essay he has to submit soon for his summer PE class he registered for so he doesn't have to take it during the school year. He's having to report on his daily exercise activity, too. The subway ride to Osaka Castle was short and we arrived at the station quickly, but it was a 15 minute walk to get *to* the Castle itself, through the expansive grounds. I was a puddle halfway there, and still I persisted.
Kenji had purchased our vouchers online this AM so we got to bypass the very long line outside and go right in. We took the elevator as high as we could, the 5th floor, and wandered around looking at the exhibits, learning the history of the Castle and the rulers who lived there. The elevator was only a one-way direct ride to the 5th floor, so we walked up to 7 (there were no exhibits on 6) and learned more about the warring factions throughout the 1800's and how the 2 sides of the Summer War of Osaka recruited other clans to their side to help fight. There were 155,000 soldiers vs. 55,000. Seems very unfair to me, but what do I know.
Walking up to the 8th floor brought us to the Observation Deck and a 360 degree view of Osaka. It was a hazy day, unfortunately, but we enjoyed being up high and seeing what we could. The Castle itself is an imposing structure and quite impressive to see. We had to walk all the way down an stopped on the 4th, 3rd and 2nd floors to see the exhibits there and then we were quite done in and ready to get back to the hotel for some strong a/c (the Castle was air conditioned, thank goodness, but just enough to not be hot inside. We reversed our path in and found ourselves back at the entrance to the Castle grounds easily after stopping in the shade for a bit at one point and buying a couple of cold drinks at the Lawson (convenience store like 7/11) for the remainder of our walk to the subway.
Once back at our subway stop, Mom and I grabbed a quick lunch at 7/11. I got their famous egg salad sandwich and a bag of cheddar potato chips. These chips are rolled like a cinnamon roll and are not as long as my thumb. VERY crispy and flavorful. I knew I still had a bottle of grapefruit/muscat juice in the fridge in our room. I *really* like that flavor! I attribute it to visiting my paternal grandparents, Janet & Bud, and that they'd frequently have grapefruit for breakfast. I think I learned to like it at their house.
We brought lunch back to the room, changed into dry clothes and turned on the TV to watch fun shows while we ate on our beds. Mom had chosen a small container of cabbage and corn slaw-type salad as well as a bag of popcorn (not a surprise for her to eat that, but a surprise to find it here!). She also managed to find a small sleeve of salad dressing for the salad we bought a few days ago in Tokyo that we haven't been able to eat since we didn't have any dressing. I thought we could just eat it like rabbit food, undressed, but she was on a mission to find dressing.
After a few hours cooling down and rest, watching he first couple of innings of the Carps/Tigers baseball game, we met the guys and all got on the Metro to Osaka Shinsekai, an outdoor shopping/restaurant district. The advertising outside of shops and restaurants in Japan is next level. The size of the signs & banners, the size of the fonts, all to grab our attention and lure us in is over the top, to say the least.
Shinsekai is known for their fried food on a stick. I looked at all the large A frame menu boards outside, looking for something not friend for Mom to eat as she had expressed a desire to not eat anything fried anymore. I entered one restaurant whose door was cracked open and indicated we were 4 people. The lady behind the counter crossed her fingers in an X and said "Close". Ah, ok, really? At 8 pm? I thought this was supposed to be a hopping, nightlife area. Guess not. Another lady at a different place told me the same thing, "Close". She was helpful, though, in taking me outside and pointing next door and saying "Open". At this point I was melting. We went inside and the a/c was great. This was the place I was stopping. We'd just have to make it work for Mom. Thankfully, she wasn't too hungry. As we walked in a lady stopped me and pointed to the sign on the door that explained about the Seating Charge of $300 yen per person. I said hai (yes) and she pointed to a table. All the tables had a teppanyaki grill built into them and ours was already on and was hot! After she sat us the lady pointed to a QR code on the table and indicated that we were to order using the online app that came up when we clicked it. Thankfully Leo handled it for us. We perused the menu and decided that the 3 Lusters were going to share the sampler platter of 10 battered and fried skewers of the restaurant's choice. Mom ordered edamame.
We ended up receiving a prawn, onion, chicken thigh, quail egg, asparagus, squid, lotus root, hot dog and 2 beef skewers, we think. Kenji & I were still a little hungry so we ordered the fried noodles. When she brought it she scrapped them off the plate onto the teppanyaki griddle, to keep them warm. Then she sprinkled bonito (dried shrimp) flakes on top and we watched as they danced with the heat. The sauce the noodles were in was very flavorful and I really enjoyed them! To pay we took a sign from the the table, indicating our Table #, to the cashier, who was able to pull up our bill because we ordered online. Technology!
As we left we found a statue of the fried skewer guy, presumably a man who made them a thing in Shin seikai, and took a picture of Kenji with it as it's his doppleganger! A quick Metro ride back to the hotel and into dry clothes and a chocolate/peanut cluster while I blogged and I was ready for bed.
This hotel is in more a busy part of town than our last one and I can hear cars racing. Thank goodness for earplugs! Here's to sleeping as well as last night.
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