With the Tokyo part of our trip over (see part 1), we now had six days in Osaka filled with local sightseeing and trips to nearby areas.

Despite the rainy weather, our first day included walking along Tenjinbashi-suji shopping street as well as seeing the Tenmangu shrine and the House and Living Museum. We also managed to squeeze in a trip to Osaka Aquarium that afternoon. We spent a day in Kyoto to visit Gion and the Higashiyama District along with a train ride south to the Fushimi Inari Shrine. Another day we travelled to Iga-Ueno and visited Iga Ninja Museum, a personal favourite of mine and worth the long trip out into the country. On our final free day, we went to Nara to see Todaiji Temple with the largest bronze Buddha statue and other shrines within Nara Park. Other highlights included a day at Universal Studios where we had a caricature drawn of us and the wonderful Yakiniku Rokko in Shinsaibashi with all its tasty barbecue meat.

At the start of May, our wait was finally over. Last year, we had booked our flights for a second trip back to Japan, giving ourselves time to research what we wanted to see while patiently waiting as many friends and colleagues went before us. But now it was our turn to head over for a 2 week (and a bit) holiday in the land of the rising sun.

We landed in Tokyo during the evening and travelled to our hotel with excitement. Over the next 10 days, we explored new areas such as Sunshine City and Otome Road in Ikebukuro, the Sword Museum hidden in the Shinjuku suburbs as well as the Warehouse District and Candy Alley. We spent nearly a whole day in Nakano Broadway searching for figurines, saw a show at the Robot Restaurant, visited the Imperial Palace and an took a much awaited trip to the Ghibli Museum. We were also lucky enough to spend a day at the Sumo tournament and saw a evening performance of Kabuki. This was all on top of visiting some of our favourite places like Harajuku, Shibuya, Asakusa and of course Akihabara. Before we knew it our time in Tokyo was over and we had bought two extra bags filled to the brim with souvenirs. But now we had catch the shinkansen across the country to Osaka. My birthday happened to fall on the same day so as a treat we ate Disney chocolates during the ride and later that night discovered pOundhouse and had some delicious cake.