AirBnB apartment exit day has arrived and we are making the giant move, all of five stops on the Japan subway using the Tanamachi line from Sembayashi-omiya to Umeda. Unfortunately we were unable to extend our stay here and will relocate today.

Day 47 – April 19th, 2014

All packed and cleaned up (a little) we adios our Sembayashi pad.

Packed up and moving out of our tiny AirBnB place in Sembayashi-omiya

“Saying goodbye to our friends Meiko & Nishimori was tough”

And make our way past the sushi shop for the last time and stop to say goodbye, Mieko handed us packs of sushi and sweets to take with us for lunch. We say goodbye to Nishimori at the shop and Meiko walks with us right to the subway ticket entry before we say goodbye again, we are all very sad.

I hate saying goodbye, such wonderful people Mieko & Nishimori

“leaving Sembayashi-omiya with tears in our eyes”

We have been treated like royalty here and Mieko & Nishimori have looked after as if we had known each other for years, we never felt like strangers, we are so grateful to them and many others that have left such a wonderful impression on us. Saying goodbye is always tough who would have thought that we would be leaving Sembayashi-omiya with tears in our eyes…

Down with the lift and onto the subway towards Umeda, this time with all our gear, it’s only a few stops and it takes just a few minutes. Getting on was easy with the help we had, next came the tough part, and by the time we get to the hotel all the luggage is feeling very heavy.

“Sushi lunch courtesy of Mieko & Nishimori at the hotel”

Thankfully we are able to off load our bags at the hotel, even though check in is 3pm here, it’s seems like check-in’s are getting latter all the time. The hotel concierge covers the luggage with a net and we slump into the couch and enjoy our sushi so much as we are very hungry.

The sushi is wonderful as per usual and the sweet puff pastry filled with bean paste is yummy too, there are 6 pieces and we save four for later. Thanks to our sushi friends you have made our stay so good.

Sushi lunch courtesy of Mieko & Nishimori, you can see the bags stored

With a few hours to kill before we can check-in we head out traveling by subway to the biggest Ferris wheel in the world, sorry it’s now one of the worlds largest-scale Ferris wheels.

Another Japan subway

“We take the subway to Tempozan Giant Ferris Wheel Osaka”

Unfortunately when we get there I notice from a distance nobody in the pods and also it’s not turning, as we arrive at the base we read that the Tempozan Giant Ferris Wheel is under refurbishment and will reopen next week on the 22nd. Instead, we stop and have coffee at Half Moon Cafe which incidentally made really very nice coffee.

Tempozan Giant Ferris Wheel Osaka

“Sitting in the Mother Moon Cafe enjoying our flat whites”

The coffees came with great crema and we spend time watching some street performers, we could see the Kaiyukan Aquarium and decided that after our coffee break we would visit the aquarium which happens to be the biggest in the world.

Mother Moon Cafe and street performers near the Aquarium

I have written the blog entry about our visit to Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan in a separate post due to so many nice photos.