Kids Day in Osaka – Day 40

For our final full day in Osaka the kids felt it was their turn to choose. And so we headed off to Round 1 Stadium, a large entertainment complex that has 10-pin bowling, darts, indoor sports, arcade machines and karaoke. Karaoke was also one of the to-do things on my list, and so I agreed with the choice.

We started with darts, which you hire by the half hour.  The board is a plastic board rather than cork and the darts having plastic tips rather than metal.  It is also electronic, so it registers your dart and tracks the score for you.  It was the kids first go at darts, and so they crept over the line closer to the board and had a great time.

It was time for lunch, so we headed out to find something, but after being unable to agree on something that would suit everyone, we settled on sushi and I lead us in the hunt for a sushi train (seeing Osaka is where the sushi train – or conveyer belt sushi – started).  But after 10 minutes walking without finding one Carter took over and proudly lead us straight to a sushi bar. Rather than a sushi train it was a sushi bar, where you sit at the counter and the single chef makes your order in front of you.  The kids ordered cucumber maki (rolls) while Tryphena and I shared some nigiri sushi and a sashimi tasting plate. The food and service were great, even though Tryphena and I remember walking past this restaurant a few days earlier and noticing the chef smoking while he was making the food.  I guess that is normal enough for Japan.

Fed, we headed back to Round 1 Stadium for Karaoke.  Rooms are booked by the hour and are cheap to hire but require you to purchase one food item per person.  We queued up a mix of 90s music for Mum and Dad and more recent tunes and movie tunes for the Kids.  We even had time for some Beauty and the Beast tracks for Lewis.

With Karaoke finished it was time for ice cream and then off to visit the Umeda Sky Building and grab dinner.  The Umeda Sky Building is a 173-meter-tall building consisting of two towers that are connected by a “Floating Garden Observatory” on the 39th floor.  The floating garden is a circular observatory the feels to be floating between the two towers, and has an observation deck inside and then an open-air deck above.  The observatory offers great views of the city and is one of Osaka’s key landmarks.  A unique feature is you rise the final few levels via escalator from one tower up into the observatory.

It was quite a different experience to Harukas 300 observatory, being a lot smaller and busier and so pushy to get good viewing points, but was enjoyable none the less. And the night views over the city were equally impressive.

 

For dinner we wanted to grab something near the train station before heading home, but being less familiar with this part of time we wandered around a little and settling on a narrow lane arcade underneath the train station that was filled with smaller restaurants and counter style food stands.  After Carter leading the way at lunch, Lewis was to lead the way for dinner, happy to find something ‘Japanese’ to suit mum and dad while being suitable for Carter. He ably found a Japanese style diner, that served hamburgers (Japanese hamburgers are the hamburger patty without any bun and usually server with rice) that suited the kids and curries and other Japanese style dishes.  It was a nice dinner, with the only downside it was a smoking restaurant.

After the main meal Carter lead us back to a dessert bar he had spotted on the way, and if we didn’t already smell like smoke we certainly did after dessert.  The dessert was actually quite nice, but it was in a small, dark, upstairs cafe straight out of the 70’s and again was smoking.  It also appeared that most people came for coffee and dessert, and then smoked their way through a packet or two.  We enjoyed the dessert as best we could, and laughed as they brought the kids a black coffee each that came with their dessert.  We finished it quickly while trying not to breath and then headed home. Still with the taste of cigarettes the following morning.