We left Tokyo today and are in Osaka now but we started with breakfast at Hoshino Coffee. It’s a good thing I took a picture of my sister’s morning set because I failed to ake a picture of my own. Oh well, it had some more things on it but it was mostly the same.

Mariko wasn’t feeling 100% so I got us a taxi to Tokyo Station. Google was telling me I either had to take a taxi or the Yamanote line which weren’t great options. The subways require walking down a bunch of stairs which is awkward if you have suitcases and the Yamanote line would take about 40 minutes. The taxi didn’t cost THAT much so I’m glad I opted for it. The young driver zipped in and out of traffic without frightening us too much.

I bought my ekiben (more on that later) and we walked a long ways to find the ekitag. What a mess. Tokyo station is shaped like a horseshoe and of course I went to the wrong end. We had to rush a little to make it to our seats.

I got chicken namban since I like it, and the only issue is that it’s a little messy.

I see the Brit YouTuber complaining about ekiben but I think they’re wrong. It’s all personal preference, though.

I tried to take a picture of Mt Fuji but of course we’re going 186 mph and so you have to snap a lot of photos to try to get a good one. I was not too successful today.

We made it to Osaka without much trouble, checked into the hotel, and then wandered around. It’s warmer here than Tokyo and we went to see the new Green Front park. It’s not quite completed. We also went to Toki to get out usual snack of matcha shiratama (mochi balls in sweet matcha and bean paste).

We tried to go to Katsukura for a tonkatsu dinner but it wasn’t where it used to be! We stood in line at Grill Ron and had the mix fry set. It’s worth the wait and the line moves pretty fast.

And that’s it for today.