Teamlab Botanical Garden - Osaka

The previous post in this series is here..

Right after checking in at the Tokyo Inn in Osaka Namba, we went to the room, dropped our luggage and came down in 20 minutes. We had booked tickets at 7PM to see the light show at the Teamlab Botanical garden. It was supposed to be a short train ride but we were still new to the train business in Japan. You come 20 seconds late and the train is gone! These guys are very very very very punctual.

Also the same train station has many entrances and exits and if you don’t listen to your smart kids and haven’t figured out Japanese coins, buying tickets can take time at every machine.

We did barely manage our ride to this place and walked a good 20 minutes to the entrance of this Ngai botanical garden. We thought we were late but turns out everyone gets a 7PM ticket for night light show. There were 200 people ahead of us in the line. We joined the moving line and walked through the light show.

It was fantastic! Thoroughly enjoyed it. Here are the pictures..

After the light show our jet lag started to show. So we walked back to the train station. It was a beautiful and pleasant evening. We took the train back to Osaka Namba. There was still leftover food from what we had packed. So we ate that and went to sleep.

A video clip of the Team lab visit..

The next morning we had to wake up early for breakfast and catch a train. Every day was going to be packed after this..

Japan for the first time

Last year there was a graduation trip planned. Jr. was finishing her masters at UCI. My in-laws were visiting for the graduation and the plan was to go to two national parks in Colorado. My dad passed away. The trip was cancelled. We did manage to literally come back after the rituals were done and go straight for the graduation ceremony.

This spring we decided to do that grad trip. Unfortunately the little one could not join us. She was interviewing for jobs and was trying to finish her 4 year school in 3 years.

My BFF wanted to go on a trip together and we combined everything. So six of us went on a week long adventure to Japan. My friend has traveled to Japan a dozen times in his early Intel years but had selective memories of only Tokyo. A lot of stuff was new to him as well.

Most of the planning was done by Jr. , San and my friend. I gave a few inputs using copilot and found a few gotchas in the plan and found two Viator tours to save us a day. Other than that my contribution was a big zero. Did play photographer for the entire trip.

We covered Osaka, Hiroshima, Kyoto, Tokyo, Mt. Fuji all in that week. We were welcomed to Japan with an amazing view of Mt. Fuji from the plane. All the passengers came to the windows on the right and that must have made it difficult for the pilot as the weight shifted!

A short highlights video..

As soon as we landed in Osaka airport, Jr. told us to get the SUICA app and cards loaded to our phone. We did not listen to her. To this day we regret not taking her advice. We had enough Yen, we told her!

We took a train from the Osaka airport to the Osaka Namba area. Quickly checked into the Tokyo Inn at the Osaka Namba. There were kiosks to check in. It was interesting that the staff just watched as we were asked to scan passports and credit cards etc.

After a quick freshening up, we came back down for our first sightseeing within a few hours of landing. Did I mention this trip was planned rather meticulously?