Japan 2025, July 18

Most nights I've getting back to the hotel at about 6pm for some relaxing, but then it's usually 8pm before I'm done with my routine. This is a rough summary of my last night in Osaka but also pretty similar on most other nights.

• Unpacking
• Charging computer, phone, and watch
• Eating dinner
• Check bank account transactions, daily steps, emails, mobile data, shares, transport card balance , etc.
• Download TV shows
• Evening running sometimes
• Write daily notes
• Instagram update sometimes
• Delete obsolete emails, travel documents, etc.
• Research plans and timeline for tomorrow
• Getting ready for tomorrow - bag, clothes, tickets, etc.
• Packing if leaving the hotel the next day
• Laundry sometimes
• Finding something to watch on computer
• Shower etc.

It looked like I'd have about 2.5 hours between breakfast and getting to Umeda station, so I had just enough time for running and packing up. The wedges were back at breakfast, they alternated every second day which potato gems which aren't nearly as good.

For my last Osaka run I went back to the better Yodo River east route. Yesterday despite my feet issues since walking around USJ in wet socks, my legs actually felt the freshest in a long time. But today my legs were back to being tired again, and 10 kilometres in the heat and humidity was a challenge.

After getting the run finished I completed the hotel check-out and walked back to Umeda subway again. Since I had about 30 minutes to waste I got a quick snack and drink before boarding the train, which only showed up a couple of minutes before it was due. I'd heard mixed reports and mostly just general confusion about luggage rules on the many different shinkansen services. I did a rough measure of my suitcase and it looked well under the requirement to put in the overheard racks, and there was no issue in the end.

The first stop in Kyoto came along very quickly, only taking about 15 minutes. The next stop was my destination Nagoya, and this was about another 30 minutes. The signs and directions coming out of Nagoya station weren't easy to follow, I took the south exit but ended up walking in a mostly north direction before checking my GPS location. I also needed to be on the opposite side of the station, but I was soon back on track and walking south east. The walk to the hotel was a bit under 15 minutes, and I was able to drop off my suitcase before check-in.

My backpack for the day still had a heavy computer, and I remembered to include a hat, sunglasses, and sunscreen. Within seconds of leaving the hotel there was an unexpected burst of rain that wasn't on the forecast, and I'd left my umbrella behind at the hotel. There was a small undercover area nearby though, and I just had to wait it out for five minutes.

Not far down the street towards Nagoya station there was the first entrance of many entrances to a major underground passage, which links several buildings and more than one train station. Eventually I made it to the Nagoya subway station to travel two stops until Sakae, only to find another maze at the other end.

I got out to the street level in the middle of Hisaya Odori Park as quickly as possible, and was right in front of the big Nagoya TV tower. There is a great set of parks that runs the whole way down the middle of two major parallel roads in this part of the city. After some photos I forgot to go and see what was inside the tower, so I'll have to come back tomorrow. Instead I walked away towards Sunshine Sakae, which had a small Ferris wheel on the side of the building, but otherwise not much inside.

Turning back and on the opposite side of the park was Oasis 21 which is a large bus station, but also has basement level restaurants and shops. At ground level I first found the popular Nagoya sign, and then walked up to the top of a UFO shaped observation deck for another view of the TV tower nearby. It's official name is Spaceship Aqua (it has some water at the top too) and photos online suggest both light up at night. My hotel is a bit too far away to see even the much taller TV tower, as there's other building blocking the view.

The underground area had a lot of specialty shops like Disney, Ghibli, Harry Potter, and whatever the local baseball team is. This underground area was also connected all the way through to the original Central Park underground area where I got off the train at Sakae station. Heading back for the subway I picked up some items at a bakery but ended up at a different underground station instead. The two subway lines run almost parallel to each other, and both have a station about the same distance from my hotel, so it didn't matter.

I made it back to hotel for check-in by about 3:30pm. Towards the end of my exploring I had some left foot plantar pain for the first time so far, maybe carrying a heavy backpack didn't help. Overall the hotel room was a bit more spacious, with a similar size double bed, and a combined bathroom, shower, and toilet. There was also a small fridge but no freezer compartment.

The complimentary hotel wifi was a bit slow, but you could register as an Accor hotels member to get a higher speed. Just across the road was a Family Mart and a 7-eleven a bit further down from that. A couple of downsides was that my room was very close to the lifts, as often seems to happen, and also what looked like a busy road, with another ramp road on top of it.

Since I got more done than I planned on the first afternoon I decided not go out again anywhere else. However I did head out for some food and found the closest CoCo Ichibanya curry house, which is actually open 24 hours. There was a sign on the window said they had English menu, although their menu system is not that complicated anyway. I had to scan a QR code to load a website but my eSIM mobile data dropped out again, as it has occasionally been doing. Finally it started worked again so I could order, I wasn't particularly hungry but ordered a vegetable curry plus some fries and drink. It was a bit of a surprise you could only pay cash, but I still had 2,000 yen left after spending 1,000 yen on an ICOCA card top up, so it was just enough. In exchange I got my first handful of random coins denominations.

Heading back to the hotel I stopped at Family Mart, selling the same range of drinks as Osaka. They only had self service checkouts operating and I couldn't see an English menu option anywhere. I managed to get the attention of the girl using the next machine and see showed me what to press to be able to begin scanning. The backup plan would have been painfully use Google apps to translate each screen.

Back at the hotel I tried to see if I could cast from my computer to the TV but it wasn't finding any devices, maybe because I had a VPN enabled. Checking in on my eSIM data usage I've been managing to use a bit under 500 mb of mobile data per day, so that should last the whole 15 days at this stage.

Public transport = 660 yen with Nagoya and Osaka subway

Steps = 18,804 with 10 kilometres running