After arriving in Shin Osaka Station, we transferred to the local JR line to take us to Umeda, where our hotel is.
Umeda (“plum field”) is a major commercial, business, shopping and entertainment district, and the city’s main northern railway terminus.
We checked into our hotel, which is the Hotel Sunroute Umeda (ホテルサンルート梅田).
Hotel lobby – although still classified as a “business” hotel, this one seems a cut above in quality compared to the one we stayed in Tokyo.
This is the hotel restaurant. It served the best breakfast buffets out of all the places we stayed in Japan.
When I checked in, I discovered they had allocated us “American” rooms – these are supposed to be larger than the ones typical for Japanese hotels. I discovered when we entered the room there was another reason why it’s called an “American” room – it’s decorated in Americana (complete with car plates).
And the bathroom was quite large by Japanese standards – I didn’t have to hit my elbow against the wall whenever I turned.
Despite the American style decor, I pity the poor Western fool (the previous phrase must be read aloud with a “Mr. T” style voice) who has to figure out how to use the air-conditioner (or the toilet bowl).
Luckily, I remembered just enough Kanji to figure out the top switch was Power, the middle switch was Heat/Cool, and the bottom was fan speed.
The view from the hotel room wasn’t exactly inspiring, but it was okay.
Next to the hotel was a fire station. We discovered the fire engines get called fairly regularly, particularly in the middle of the night. We heard the sirens!
We took a walk towards Umeda (梅田), which is one of the main commercial and shopping districts in Osaka. On the way, we passed through the Umeda Arts Center (梅田芸術劇場).
This is the overhead rail track that leads into Umeda Station.
This must be a fire engine from the fire station next to our hotel.
There’s a small shrine near here, the Tsunashikiten Shrine (綱敷天神社).
Lyn at a cute bar called Drunk Bears. This is in a shopping centre called NU Chayamachi. They also serve food like pizza, as well as craft beer.
This is another shopping centre that is adjoined to Hankyu station – it’s called the Hankyu Sanbangai.
There is also a Kiddyland here (don’t worry, this is not the only photo – will do a photo tour soon!)
We had dinner at this place (Tendon Asahi).
Yodobashi has a really huge store right next to the JR Osaka station. This street is so busy there is a pedestrian bridge, underneath are many hole-in-the-wall food outlets.
There is also Daimaru department store next to the station – here is the clock sculpture at the entrance.
Canon advertisement for the IXY 20IS – we ended up buying this Camera! It’s a really nice compact camera that takes great pictures.
Hankyuu Department Store.
The Nakai Guitar Shop – note the Hello Kitty guitar on the lower right.
The big red ferris wheel is called HEP 5.
It was getting dark when we decided to head back to the hotel. We spotted a pachinko parlour on the way.
Full set of photos:
