This is the ninth, and final, post about my six-day trip in Japan.
It was our last full day in Japan. For the last five days, we’d been giving new meaning to the term, “power vacationing.” On the itinerary for this, our last day in the Land of the Rising Sun: one last temple in Kyoto, lunch in Osaka, three-hours of horrific history in Hiroshima, dinner in Fukuoka, with a total of six hours in a train.
What were we thinking?
As we surveyed the 360-degree view of Osaka from the 34th-floor Windows on the World restaurant, coffee and dessert in hand, we scrapped what promised to be an action-packed, emotionally-exhausting day in favor of … the aquarium.
Don’t laugh. Osaka has a world-renowned aquarium with the only tiger and whale sharks in captivity, along with a slew of otters (I love otters), penguins, dolphins, porpoises, hammerheads and other standard aquarium creatures that both Kat and I can, and did, spend many happy hours gazing at.
So instead of rushing through the day, trying to fit it all in, and sweating up a storm along the way, we opted for the climate controlled luxury of Kaiyukan, the Osaka Aquarium, and never looked back. Trust me, being up close and personal with the biggest fish in the world is an awe-inspiring experience. An aquarium might sound like something you do to entertain the kids for a few hours, but this one is not to be missed.
We were so happy at the aquarium that we got into Fukuoka sorely late and hurried to our ryokan. On this, our last night in Japan, we were forgoing the hostel an splurging on a ryokan, a traditional inn where rooms are enclosed with wood and paper walls, flooring is made of tatami mats (so shoes off) and you sleep on a futon with a bag full of beans as a pillow.
It was spacious and light and so very comfortable. We peered into the little Zen garden, scrubbed down in the communal bath house, and the next morning, we sat down (on the floor, of course) to a massive traditional breakfast of fish, rice, tofu, sausage, egg, fishcake, fruit, veggies and green tea – just the sort of thing to get us going for the ferry ride back to Busan.
Oh, what a trip it had been.
Check out the photo album, "Not just another bowl of ramen," on my facebook page.
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