Finally we reached the part of the trip where neither of us had clean clothes to wear fortunately the hostel had some laundry facilities. Afterwards we grabbed a breakfast at a nearby store then hopped on the train to Osaka castle. The weather was much better today.
Osaka castle grounds are a lovely the castle itself like many in Japan is a reconstruction the original having been destroyed in the war. It's tourist central with a lot of food halls and convenience stands. The outside of the castle is rather magnificent the inside is a little bit more like a hotel.
It was full of exhibits and stories which were interesting unfortunately a lot of the English translations were not well done. I came away a little disappointed.
After the castle we took the Shinkansen to Kobe. I sent to a card back home to my parents. We wondered around and found one of the best examples of a Japanese Garden of the whole trip. We were also fortunate that it was very quiet we had the place nearly to ourselves.
Kobe is a small city it took only 40 minutes to cross from the garden through China town to the port area. The town was very pretty and well kept which was a marked difference to Osaka.
Next we attempted to visit the memorial grandees getting quite lost in the process. So lost in fact that a local girl asked if we were lost and did we need any help, certainly we did. Her name was Aki and she was so kind walking with use chatting about Kobe.
The memorial gardens were for the 1995 earthquake which had a bad impact on the city. We walked around, its seems to be a place for couple as we saw several cuddling up on secluded benches. I really enjoyed Kobe but we had to leave on the train back to our hostel in Osaka.
