22 Days in Japan – Kobe: From Waterfront to Mountain Top

22 Days in Japan – Kobe: From Waterfront to Mountain Top

[Music] Hi everyone, welcome back to the channel. We are the No-Fly Zone Nomads. We are a retired couple of Canadian Gen Xers who are slow traveling the world without stepping foot into an airport. Today we’re continuing on with our tour of Japan. Uh we’ve already had a quick stop in Hakadore. Then we went to uh Osaka. Then we went to Coobe which is what we’re going to talk about today. Uh coming up after this video will be our stops in uh Kyoto. No Hiroshima. Hiroshima then Kyoto then Tokyo then Kawasaki and then we leave from Yokohama again. Then we leave from Yokohama again. So uh 25 days in country and it’s uh so far so good. It’s been amazing. So where are we right now? Well, when we last left off we were in Osaka hopping on a regional train to Coobe. Um, wasn’t a high speed this time, didn’t need to be. It was amazing, actually. It was a little more rickety and not as smooth, but about a 30 minute trip. Very comfortable overall. Uh, it cost about five bucks or so to do the trip. Um, we got into Coobe. Uh, when we first got to the hotel, again, 3:00 is the check-in for all hotels. So, uh, while they don’t really bend on that rule, they’re always very happy to take your bags from you and let you get off on your way. You’re in a new city, so actually it’s kind of nice not just go up to the room and to get out and explore. And explore we did. Uh, we head out headed out to check out the hood. And of course, within two blocks of us or a block of us, uh, we had one of the, uh, covered shopping areas. It was one of the many, many in the area. Uh, I I’d mentioned to them on the last, uh, video. They’re actually called Shodai. I hope I’m pronouncing that right. Um, and yeah, it’s a network of these things that run across the cities. Uh, Coobe is a bit different in that they pretty much all run east west because Coobe is situated between the water and the mountains. So everything it’s a very long the part we’re in uh we ventured to is uh was very very long and thin. So um everything is running east west which makes it super super easy. Um another wonderful experience to have everything you could ever want in one of these covered malls. Uh we stopped there for lunch cuz again we checked in around that time. Uh had my first again we’re in Coobe so I got to have some of the coobe beef. So I had my first Coobe beef burger which was fabulous. Recommended highly. Uh it’s you will see shops for uh that uh that delicacy all over the all over the city. So very easy check in again. And when when we got back to the hotel um again uh you don’t really have to pick up the bags. They were already up in the room for us which was fabulous. Yeah the uh hotel was good. It was called the Kendo. Um, great location. We were able to walk to it from the train station in about 5 minutes. Um, and the sidewalks are always great, so it’s not a problem to roll your bags along. Um when we got there, when we went back to check in, um it and we saw the room, it reminded us of why we had booked it was because it had this sort of long window seat. Uh oh, like a a long couch that we could both sit at, which was nice. Um and a little slide in table. So again, these rooms are fairly small, but the bed was there. It’s it’s always two twin beds pushed together, which is the same as a queen or a king. Um, and then it had this great seating area with this little Yeah, like I said, it’s like almost like a TV tray, uh, but but wood and it was really nice. Um, again, not much storage for clothing, but that was fine. Uh, it’s pretty typical. Um, bathroom was exactly the same, just a different layout. Um, it’s almost like they’re these plastic floored pods they create and they slide them into hotel rooms cuz they’re all pretty much the same. another magical Japanese toilet, which honestly it’s Yeah, they’re they’re quite the thing. Uh if they don’t have music, they have another feature. Um anyway, uh yeah, no, we really like the hotel. So, another thing about Japanese hotels, not something we’re taking part in, um but a lot of people do, is on. So, this one um had two different our car our access cards were different colors cuz there was a men’s one and a women’s one because it let you into the men’s or the women’s onsen. So far, all of our hotels except the one we’re right in right now have had onens. So, for anyone who’s unfamiliar, an onsen is naked bathing with strangers. Um Iceland has it too. Uh here they’re basically like big hot tubs. Um there’s a whole procedure about how uh you have to bathe a certain way before you get in. No bathing suits are allowed. It’s a very traditional Japanese um bathing ritual that um and they that’s why they always provide u pants and and top pajama sets basically and they’re linen and they’re quite nice um in every hotel that has nonsense because that’s what you put on with the slippers that they also provide. You go up, use the onen, you come back. Um, and then they change, give you fresh pajamas every day. So, yeah, it’s a it’s a very different than hotels we’re used to, but it’s lovely. So, then that night, so while we had been in the in the covered market area, we noticed down the side streets that it looked like that’s where the Chinatown was, uh, because we could see the red lanterns hanging and and a bunch of food stalls. So, we decided that night that we’d go out and and eat in Chinatown from the street vendors. So, um it was, you know, Chinatowns are beautiful. They always have a beautiful gate um that you walk through. And then we just decided to kind of walk to the end of it and see what everybody was selling and then work our way back and start buying some food. So, when we got to the very end of it, the last stall was a woman shredding uh duck and making these little peeking duck wraps that were absolutely delicious with uh crispy skin in them. And yeah, that was probably my favorite thing we ate. And then we had a few other things which we had like a steamed pork bun and um bow buns with pork belly in them. Not my favorite, but it was You liked it. Um Keith had some There’s a lot of fried chicken in in Japan. It’s a thing. So, it was almost like um chunks of bite-sized chunks are bigger than uh of fried chicken on a stick. And well, yeah, you liked it. Some of the uh chicken can be different. It can be a little bit fattier, right? So, it’s not it’s uh it’s not all this is the dark meat section, this is the white meat section. It’s chicken and it’s fried and you’re going to love it. You’re going to get what you’re going to get. Just Yeah. If you’re if you’ve got any kind of issues with uh texture or consistency, uh yeah, there’s there might be a challenge. I took a bite and went, “That’s yours. That’s yours.” Yeah. And I got a whole bunch of it all to myself, which was fabulous cuz uh I’m all just about flavor. Yeah. We’ve I’ve been trying to be brave with some food things because I had am quite particular with textures. Um, but that’s probably actually the only thing that I’ve bitten into and went, “Nope, I’m not going to eat that.” So, I’m the same with creme brulee. I can’t do it. That’s just I won’t tell you what. Yeah. Anyway, never mind. Never mind. Uh, so that was an awesome night. Uh, uh, got some walking street food in Chinatown. Um, yeah, we checked off. It’s funny again with places where you check in then you sort of you don’t go right into the hotel, you sort of uh get out of the city. We’ve done your travel day sort of right off. It’s only a half a day in a city, but the last few and uh and the one we’re in right now, um the first day has been amazing. We’ve gotten so much done that we weren’t expecting. Uh they’re very very walkable cities. Uh we thought we wouldn’t be getting to this some of these things till the next day. So, uh yeah, take every advantage when you land. Um but for our next day, we’re pretty adventurous. We uh went for a walk. We um went down to in Coobe there’s this beautiful harbor area, harbor front. Uh again, it’s very long narrow. So the harbor is sort of the mountains are about one and a half clicks behind you and the water is one and a half clicks in front of you. Um so we went down there. Uh beautiful huge open area parks as we talked about before. They give every it’s amazing how much space they give. Another one of these ports that is it’s very functional. Uh there’s a lot of uh uh there’s cruise ships coming in. There are uh cargo ships uh being unloaded and worked on. Uh walking around one of the corner. There was a submarine that was sitting there. I don’t know if it was a museum or it was functional. Uh it looked pretty huge. It was huge. It looked pretty serious to me. It didn’t look like there was a gate to buy tickets to get on it. So I will say I don’t know. Maybe it was function. So we went around that. There’s a whole bunch of different There’s a thing called Harborland. There is a there’s a massive hotel. Harborland is sort of just a uh um I don’t even know what it was. It’s sort of a play area for kids. Uhhuh. Outdoor, but again, there seemed to be a lot of wedding venues down there too. There were wedding hotels. There were there were these these spaces that Yeah, that is a huge business. As you know, I was saying Andrew like I think weddings are a pretty big business here. Yes, they are everywhere in the world, but here it’s like there are entire then there was an entire wedding venue like a wedding there’s a wedding hotel there’s a wedding convention center there’s a we saw two weddings going on and they had in like halls that we could see them through the windows and then there was a hotel attached to where yeah it was really interesting like they were and they were very obvious what they were obviously they were all white and very ornate and uh called wedding hotels um yeah I’ve never seen anything like that before. So, that was again this wonderful, you know, learning how this how this actually all works around here. Um, uh, the other thing that’s down in the harbor, uh, uh, again, it’s one of these ones you can sort of wake go out on a pier and come all the way back. We got how many kilometers did that? 13. That was a just walking a short waterfront walk. Uh, between all the out and backs on the peers is like 13k. Uh, one of the peers going out as a big stadium for the the basketball team, the uh, Coobe Stors. Go Stors. Um uh and then made our way back to the uh underground. So uh uh sorry the shopping district of uh in Coobe. But this time we um as we were walking through these shopping areas uh the covered spots, we saw an escalator going down to the gourmet food court part of uh Japan that we were not attuned to at the moment. So uh Andrea, tell us about what that was like. Yeah, we had seen a uh we were just looking for something someplace to eat and we saw a a lit up sign that just said gourmet food hall basically and there was every stall down there has a little picture that they’ve chosen of whatever their specialty is. And so yeah, we went down and walked around and we were a little overwhelmed because there’s so much stuff and you have you don’t know what a lot of it is and there are places with lineups and anyway uh so we ended up choosing a place that’s actually a chain and it’s um I can’t remember you’ll put up what the name of it is. Uh it was called uh Kamakura. Kamakura soup soup with noodles. Soup with noodles is is what it says in English underneath. So, it’s another one of these. Um, you go in, there’s a vending machine, a ticket machine. Basically, you it has English. Um, you tell it what you want, you tell it the quantity you want, you can get beer, you can get whatever you want from it. And then there was a a man that sort of stopped us and oh, just cuz there were no seats. That’s what it was. So, the order goes to the kitchen and then you just kind of wait until seats open up. So he’s constantly clearing tables and directing people to where to go. And then um yeah, it was like you had ramen and you had Oh, and we ordered some yoza and I had fried rice cuz I wasn’t sure what I wanted and it was like the best fried rice I’d ever had in my life. It was I was shocked. Like I wasn’t expecting much from it, but it had just little bits of pork and egg and it was perfect. Um, so yeah, so that’s what we did and then we ended up going back to the hotel, I think, after that. Yep. Yep. We made it, but we were very full. We ordered a lot of I ordered way too much food and it was uh it was excellent. It was good. Uh, and we went back to the hotel that night and um yeah, like again, too much food. So sort of skipped dinner that night. We sort of relied on the local convenience stores again. Family Mart’s seven-levens are and Lawson and Lawson. I mean, every street has at least one, possibly two on them. I mean, every short block has one or two of these. So, they’re not like shops maybe back home. These they have full food sections. They’re they’re grocery stores. Alcohol aisle is rather spectacular. Uh they have absolutely everything. So, uh we thought we Yeah, we’ll try some some of their dinner uh from the aisles. And it was great. I can’t remember what exactly we had, but I remember it was good. And it’s insanely cheap. Yeah. Um so that was great. Um and then the next day the weather wasn’t that great. Um it was pretty rainy. What did we get up to? We decided that we really wouldn’t do much that day because we were tired after that 13k and we did that 13k in a very short amount of time really. But um yeah, my legs were done. So, we decided that um we and again because we had this really nice seating area in our hotel um we decided that we would just stay in the room for most of the day. Um we had some editing of videos to do and just um getting in touch with people at home and so yeah, so we stayed in the room and then we did it was it was pretty gross out. Uh it was raining pretty hard and so but at one point we did decide to go and find some lunch and we again we walked around in this underground and it’s just again it was just overwhelming like I don’t know what a lot of this is and it didn’t look like the same place from the previous day. Well, we ended up going down a different escalator. I think that was the other thing, right? So, we were in a new section of it and at first we were like in like a clothing section like cuz it’s it’s huge. It’s like a huge underground mall underneath the covered mall. And anyway, we ended up finding we went around the corner and we found this place called Hoyan, which was a Vietnamese restaurant. And so, a lot of these restaurants have sets they call them. And so it’s a it’s a set meal of a couple of things and sometimes it comes with a drink or a soup or a whatever. So Keith ordered he had his first Boni sandwich and um it was a set with some fur chicken. We weren’t sure what he was saying. We thought he was saying chicken feet but I was in it wasn’t chicken feet. I was she’s she was I can’t watch this. Yeah, I’m I’m not having that one. But anyway, the guy the young man was very nice. He was from Vietnam. We had a lovely chat with him and he was very helpful because I could not figure out what I wanted and I just kept say I just said like I’d like something with noodles and he’s like And I’m like sure and then he’s like beef, seafood or pork and so we chose I chose seafood and um Keith ate the seafood that I don’t really like like clams. Um which was fine. And the the again the pork Yeah, there was some texture. a weird ball of I don’t know if it was pork or chicken or I don’t think it was fish. Um there were two or three of them floating around. So he’s great that I can just hand that stuff off to him cuz he’ll eat anything. So it worked out well. Um but yeah, that was that was really fun. Um just to have something different. And then that seemed to be the theme of the day because we went back hung out again in the hotel room and then that night Oh, and so this was actually interesting. I I kind of thought we might order in food. So, I got looking to see if Uber Eats is even a thing in Japan, and it is. And the nice thing about it is it’s in English. So, it’s easier to find food when you can read about it in English. Um, it’s kind of half English, half Japanese, but you can translate it. So, I just got looking at sort of what was in our area because I was thinking we’d order something. And then I saw this Mexican restaurant, which was interesting. Um, but it was really highly rated and what they had looked really great. which is called taco. I actually we’ll have to look. Um the sign just said taco on it, but I’m not It did have a different name, I think. Um but anyway, we ended up uh it the rain had stopped by then and so we ended up just walking. It was only a couple blocks away and we’re it’s down this little back alley, tiny little place, like two tables of four and a bar. And um you just saw a little lit up sign said taco out front, so you knew you were in the right place. But anyway, again, like some of the these restaurants we’ve been finding um this place was great. Like a uh we had a couple of margaritas that were really good. Um guac and chips and then three street tacos each and then another round of margaritas cuz they were really good. And then we shared a dessert that was like churros. A churro with some ice cream in a sundae was delicious. and everything came to around $60. So, where we’re from, one margarita is at least $15. If it’s not top shelf, it’s even if it’s top shelf, it’s even more. Um, so yeah. So, for the price of of less than of what just the margaritas would have cost us at home to have two each, we had a full meal with guac and chips and dessert. So, it was and it was some of the best Mexican food I’ve actually had. It was amazing. And then there will al be some pictures going up. It was probably the coolest. So cool. It’s like a movie set. It was like the the walls were just the plain concrete. It was like it was eating it’s like a Mexican food the original Blade Runner, right? If you’re like that kind of that it was a little, you know, dark and dripping outside still from all the rain. Uh these this sort of little little little grimy neon uh lights over the over the bar. um guy at the bar having a cigarette and reading his paper and waiting for his tacos to show up, living his best life. It’s like it was not it was a very not that made it better, but it was it was just the vibe of this place was just the music was amazing. And again, these two kids, they looked like they were 12 years old running it. She was doing the cooking. He was dealing with people like us. Um, there were women with little dogs in there eating, taking pictures of their little dogs and it was just Yeah, it was kind of a surreal Yeah, it was like you walk into a movie. Super fun. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah, we were and for a while we were the only two in there and um but again like the the service no matter where you go is amazing. Like they just that’s what they’re about in in restaurants is just making sure you have a great experience. So, um, but the atmosphere in this place was very cool. We really enjoyed it. So, that was a great night. Uh, and then, uh, we made up for that sort of rainy, uh, underground dining, uh, day, uh, by heading to, uh, an amazing, um, attraction that Andrew had found. Uh, it’s just a herb garden. Go herb garden, which to me, let’s go to the herb garden. It’s like, I know. I wasn’t sure you knew you out of your mind. Uh, I think you only went because you wanted to see me on the ropeway and see me terrified her and herbs means there may be food possibly some of there. Uh, anyway, so and to get to it, there’s a ropeway and a ropeway is a gondola. Uh, and one of us really really hates gondilas. Uh, and one of us really likes watching someone who doesn’t mind gondas get on a gondola. Um, so we again, uh, it was just not too far north of, uh, did we take a No, we walked train. Yeah, we walked to the train station and a series of escalators because again, now we’re in the foothills and we’re going up the mountain and this the herb garden is at the top of this mountainous area. Uh, spoiler alert, the views were epic. So, we took this on gondola standards, very small gondola. We were never really that high, but you’re up going up the steam mountain. So, if you’re looking out the back of it, you’re a million feet in the air. If you look on the front of it, you’re only about 30 ft off the trees. Um, uh, I didn’t like it. She didn’t like it at all, but as you’ll see in in some of the videos, the views were absolutely spect that the ride alone was was worth every single penny. Um, and then you get to the top. Um, and it’s a German it’s a German castle, actually. Yeah, it’s like a Yeah, I Yeah, it’s like a It’s like a German um not really a castle, but like it would be like a grand house of some kind. Like uh it would be It looks just like something you’d see in Germany. And it was full-on Christmas market. So, they have different u themes, let’s say, uh throughout the year at this herb garden. And it was Christmas market with all of the umbrellas over the tables were red and green. There were there were traditional little market stalls selling all sorts of things. We didn’t really go into it because again we don’t have room to buy anything so we don’t shop. It was pretty busy that day. It was Yeah. It was the first It was the very first day of the market. That’s right. Yeah. So it was uh chalk block full of people. Yeah. And there’s an outdoor um you know again with these umbrellas uh food area and bar. And then it was sort of also um a museum um on herbalism and how uh how they extract essential oils from herbs. There was a broom that was just two giant lit up tables of basically every essential oil just so you could smell the ones you like. Um there were different um blends that you could sample like you know if you wanted to know which herbs to put together uh for sleep or for revitalization or and then there were a few it looked like there were a few sort of workshops um one where you could make your own sache. It smelled awesome. Uh, and then there was another one where there or there was a part of it. It was uh part museum as well because it showed like an old copper um evaporator where how you get the the oils out and different glass mechanisms and things. It was very cool. Um, and it smelled amazing. Um, and even just little carts of of herbs outside. So, it was like all of the ones in this one are grown for fragrance. All of these are culinary. So you could sort of, you know, like I mean obviously for the culinary there was sage and there was rosemary and parsley and things like that. Um but the place just smelled beautiful and that was just we didn’t realize that basically where we got off at the top um you meander your way down this thing and there’s different gardens and the gardens were absolutely it’s like a botanical garden basically. It’s it’s huge. Um there’s everything from beautiful trees to manicured. Um and it looked like it was I don’t know if was it there were volunteers that were people were working there were folks everywhere working on something because again everything that’s there is what’s being served up in the restaurant and is going into the bottle. So this is all they grow the lettuce and they grow all the vegetables and herbs for the food that’s at the and actually at the top there was a a fancier restaurant where you could do like a three course brunch sort of thing um and everything was was geared towards what they grow there. Um and then yeah we meandered our way down. There was a set of three sort of glass um green houses um that one had a fancy tea house in it and one was sort of this big tropical garden. Um one seemed to be more of like an Instagrammy place where you could take your picture um and people were doing that and yeah so then they had that beautiful terrace and just an outside little cafe that we ended up grabbing something at. And the view, I mean, you’re really high up in my opinion um over Coobe and um but just absolutely gorgeous like and it was a perfect blue sky, sunny day, probably 18° and yeah, it was wonderful and it was kind of broken into a couple different areas. So there’s the there’s the tram ride up. You can also, if you’re crazy, you can walk up all the way to the top and a lot of people do. And I don’t know if there’s a charge for going up if you’re walking up. You’re what you’re paying to get into the the garden is again the tram ride up, but I think you can just walk up because it looked to be a lot of locals that just pretty steep. Yeah. But again, there were people that were fully geared up with, you know, the poles and the whole thing that looked like they were just on doing their exercise uh deal, which is good on them. That’s a that’s a heck of a workout. Um, but there’s the ride up, but if you you can also walk. Uh, and as Andrew said, uh, but even if you take the gondola up, you sort of walk halfway down because then the the second part of of the whole place is again is all the tiered gardens going down because you start at the top and work way down. Um, and again, there’s perfectly smooth flat rocks. Then there are stairs every, no pun intended, step of the way, there’s either stairs or a ramp. So, it’s very steep but smooth. Incredible. But there there were areas of again, you could see these tiered gardens. There were big flat sections that they just put out a bunch of hammocks. You just sit there for like and again, you’re there as long as you want. You can you can see people just hanging out, reading the newspaper, uh having a coffee. Uh that’s where that’s sort of their community park. Um which was amazing. Uh then there were the buildings on site as we talked about. There was that sort of German feel uh with the market, with the the terraces. There was the green houses which were amazing. Um yeah, so every there’s all these different aspects. Something was going to uh be your jam on this trip. So we again we weren’t expect you know how long I spent in herb garden. We spent a long time four hours I think there was beautiful. It was absolutely stunning. It was also nice to get out of the city like we’ve you know we’ve been in cities since we got here and cities are fun. and there’s lots to do in them. But again, it’s like it’s a lot of walking on concrete. It’s a lot of um now we’re starting to figure out using metro more just to save our legs, mind especially. Uh but I mean, even on days we don’t walk far, we’re still putting in at least 7 km and and on concrete and it, you know, we’re we’re going to need to invest in some different shoes eventually because they’re going to wear out pretty quick. But it’s fun and it was just it was just nice to be somewhere in nature and see beautiful plants and and and we and we’ve started that experience on our journeys now where again it was a bit go go go. It’s you know we’re retired nomads, right? So we’re not on vacation. This is we kind of are right now. We we were that’s that’s what I’m getting to is that we were sort of zipping around. This is we’d be walking and like yeah we we’re as we’re as drawn to park benches now as we are to attractions and when we see a park bench it’s like want to have some sun there’s a park bench and we will just sit for a little bit and it’s just and again this place was amazing because you’re sitting overlooking the whole city and again to to talking about the views when you’re up at the terraces coo is you know fairly uh shallow and very wide so when you were looking at a view you can see Osaka from this this hilltop in in Coobe And so the entire city of Coobe is all in front of you see almost the entire thing which was it’s nice to see on in one shot one of these new cities that were that are sorry new to us. Um yeah that was just a breathtaking uh unexpected and uh but we should probably be expecting that more often. This this country has some amazing things to offer and um we’re it feels like we’re just getting started. Um, and to that end, we’re going to wrap up this video, uh, before we get started on our next trip. So, uh, the following day, we we checked out, we took the highspeed train to where we’re at now. Is that correct? We are here in Hiroshima. We’re recording these at different times, so I’m not even sure if I’m here right now. Uh, we’re in Hiroshima right now. Uh, another amazing high-speed, super efficient, fast, uh, uh, lovely, clean, quiet train, uh, into the city. Um, Oh, right. That’s the one that we didn’t do reserved seats on. Oh, right. So, that was our first time. So, we This was only our second bullet train, but we decided to try the unreserved seating, non-reserved seating, um, because it saves a bit of money and it but it’s interesting in that you’re not you don’t have a ticket on a specific train. you can get on any train that’s going in the direction you’re going um to the city you’re going to. Um but in what we’ve discovered in in the signage is that whatever the next train that’s coming is the one at the top and then the one after it is was the one we wanted because we wanted the the one that was it called? I can’t remember. The the yellow one that doesn’t stop everywhere, right? Um it’s the express train. Nomi, something like that. Yeah, probably that one. I’ll put it up here. Yeah. So, we decided we were going to take that one just cuz it doesn’t have as many stops. And um basically with the non-reserved seat, you just it’s only usually car one and two. Um I think on some it’s up to three that are for those seats. And basically as the train is pulling in, you’re going to have a look and see if it looks like there’s any seats on it and get on and pick what you can take whatever seats open. Um, now it’s a bit risky because uh these trains like the changeover of off, people getting off, people getting on is really quick. Like I don’t even know if it’s 2 minutes. No, it it is the it is the opposite of what happens in Canada when it’s like please stay in your seat until that and everyone’s people are still jumping up if you know those you know those people. Uh sometimes I do that on these trains. It’s like we’re coming to a stop. Get ready. Get out of your seat. Get to the front. Yeah, two minutes. About 3 minutes out, they start an announcement that says, “Please gather your belongings. Please get ready to get off the train.” And so, yeah, so the minute that announcement happens, you grab your bags, you get in the aisle, and you start moving towards an exit because it is not a lot of time for everybody to get off and on. Now, we were saying that um if you didn’t have a lot of luggage, uh you could probably step on, have a look, step off if you wanted to wait for a train that had better seating or we were lucky to get seats together. There was a chance we wouldn’t, but um now this was during the week, so we probably had a pretty good chance of sitting together. The next train we’re taking, which will also be a shinken, will be on a weekend, so we’ll see. Uh we may decide to go with reserved seating instead. you pay a little bit more for reserve seating, but at least you know you’re getting a seat. Um, and then you’re on a specific train. So, both worked fine. And on this on this train, it was never completely full. There was always seats available. There was never Yeah. People are getting off. It’s just if you’re traveling with two or three of you and you want to sit together. I mean, the trains are set up. There’s three chairs on the aisle and two chairs. So, in the in the how long was it? I can’t remember. It was an hour and 10 minutes. with all the stops, nobody who got on didn’t easily find a seat. Most people got on and got a and they all got anyone who’s traveling with a partner all got sit with a partner. So, it wasn’t an issue at all. Some people got on and they were by themselves in a row of three. So, um again, we’ll we’ll check in on that uh uh uh fact uh when we take our next one on a busier day, but and we’ll leave the next video for when we actually get off the train where we’re at right now in Hiroshima and what that looks like. Um, anything that you wanted to say as to wrap up? No, CO was great. I mean, we really enjoyed it. Again, you know, every city is different and every city has um its own culture, its own food. Um, but the consistent thing is the Japanese people are amazing and uh it’s all clean and organized and efficient and yeah, we’re really liking it. Looking forward to it. So, a couple more cities ahead of us. So, thanks for watching to this point. Uh, hope you stay tuned in for the next one. Again, if you want to find out what we’re doing at any given moment, uh Facebook and Instagram, uh Nofly Zone Nomads, all one word, um is where you’re going to find us. And uh like, subscribe, and share if you did. Um and comments, please. Love reading them. Um keeps us going. So, till next time. Bye. Bye. Bye.

Kobe was an unknown going in … but blew our minds and stole our hearts 🙂
A walkable city, with short treks between ocean and mountain, with incredible sights, food, and spaces in between!

1:25 Pre-check-in excursion to Shotengai
2:45 hotel room walkthrough and onsen
5:30 Chinatown street food
8:15 Kobe Waterfront
11:00 Underground food centre
12:50 7/11’s are great!
13:35 Rainy day … but tasty food!
16:09 Finding the COOLEST taco place
19:35 Gondola to Herb Garden!
28:18 Booking a bullet train to Hiroshima

We are retired GenX Canadians who are setting off to slow-travel the world without setting foot in an airport. Join us on our journey and share in our adventure!

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