Osaka day 4

 Day 4 in osaka was scheduled to be the Osaka Epass day. We availed of the epass since just seeing 2 attractions will allow us to save already. We wanted to see the Umeda sky building observatory, the koji kibutani tenken art museum, visit the pokemon center, the hep five ferris wheel and mall, then check out the Osaka Castle and ride the Osaka jo gozabune boat ride around the castle.

The Umeda sky building observatory has these standees and a fence for engraved padlocks. The padlocks have to be ordered online before you arrive. Also, you get to see all around the city via the open air viewing area. If you go here, you might want to just skip the tsutenkaku tower unless you want to check out the slider. 

This is basically the view from the observatory. Again, if you dont want to do the slider (worth 1000 yen) then just go here and save the 1000 yen entrance in the Tsutenkaku tower. It is good to visit the tower surrounding area though. There are a lot of food and the Tennoji Zoo is nearby. See the Day 5 blog for this. 

We didnt go to the koji kibutani tenken art museum since we were running late. The epass was only good for a day and we wanted to reach the Osaka castle on time. Also, this was the only day we allocated for the northern part of osaka. We walked over to the Pokemon center nearby for some gifts, gacha, and to play the new version of tretta.

On the way, we went to the nearby mall's food court and had a really good tempura meal.

They served it in batches so the food was always piping hot. 

The new tretta has an oval shaped playing chip instead of the square ones.

Pokemon center was great. It had a lot of the pokemon stuff plus other stores.

We managed to reach the entrance to the Osaka Castle some time before it closed. Walking around the castle to reach the Golden Boat ride along the moat was over 1 kilometer. It was really tiring. The queue for the entry to the castle was long. The elevator was broken so everyone had to take the stairs. A lot of stairs.

By the time we reached the boat area, the last trip was about to leave and the counter said that it was fully booked. Being the hopeful bunch we were, we stayed near the dock and begged the crew to let us get the last 4 seats. They were nice enough to do so. It was a half moon ride around the castle. It wasnt bad considering that it was part of the pass.

We were too tired to walk back so we paid 300 yen to ride the train back to the entrance. We found a crepe place there and had our fill of the japanese crepes.

The Osaka Epass was worth it as long as you set your schedule well and plan ahead.