Category: Land of the Rising Sun – Japan

Nishiki Market(錦市場, Nishiki Ichiba) was in fact our last minute decision that we made after our visit to Shiga. We had this as a backup in case we left Shiga early. Off we went to Nishiki Market…

It’s packed! The market closes at 6pm. If you like this type of place, I would recommend you to stay here for at least 4 hours! We left when it was almost closing time and it started to rain.

So much to see here. The sight and sound can be pretty interesting. There’s also plenty of food samples to try. It’s really a foodie heaven and the place is very instagrammable.

You can find all things matcha hahahaha… Spoil for choices!

Our tea break… The sashimi was great! So satisfying!

We just wandered around and came across Nishiki-Tenmangu Shrine. Many people in there. Really love how the lanterns lighted up the place.

I’m glad that we visited this market because this is the one and only market that we managed to visit during our trip. Do check out my day 5 travel vlog here if you want to experience the sight and sound of the place:

Our trip was to set foot on each prefecture of Kansai. When we came across Shiga, it was hard to make decision because there isn’t anything nearby with easy access. Almost all you need to take different mode of transport and travel time can be long. Since we only have one day, we decided to just go to the public park called Otsu Nagisa Lakeside Park where we will get to see the largest freshwater lake in Japan, Lake Biwa. It covers a large area of the city, so no matter which side of Shiga you’re at, you will definitely get to experience the lake, the only different is the kind of environment you will be in when you take a glimpse and experience the lake.

So… Our plan was to locate the nearest station near the lake, doesn’t matter where, as long that we can be at the lake. After much research, this park is the easiest to reach without needing other mode of transport. The official website did mention that it is just 10 minutes walk from JR Biwako Line Otsu Station but some how it took us longer… Maybe because of the heat and we were trying to navigate the place. However, based on Google map, we had to come to this small station called the Keihan Railway Shimanoseki Station to reach our destination.

It wasn’t that straight forward, we still need to walk quite a fair bit. It was already noon and we decided to grab lunch along the way. Luckily we came Seibu Otsu Store(2 Chome-3-1 Nionohama, Otsu, Shiga 520-0801, Japan) while we were on the way to the park. We need to get out of the heat and find food. The photo is not Seibu Otsu Store, it’s just some buildings opposite the Keihan Railway Shimanoseki Station station.

Otsu Nagisa Lakeside Park is a public park. It was quite windy when we were there. I was thinking of going near the water to touch the water but at the end I did not because I chickened out hahaha…

It’s a big lake indeed. I can’t really find much info on this lake. Well… Let’s just put it as a waterfront or public park where locals will spend their time here enjoying the breeze and the view. Saw people fish here too.

I figured those are the hotels and attractions nearer to the city where many tourists will be hanging around. We didn’t see any foreigners at this park.

It’s just so quiet.

We didn’t spend too long of our time here. We had achieved our objective, Shiga, done! Since the sky was turning grey, we decided to make a move to Kyoto to visit the Nishiki Market before it closes. This will be in my next post or you can check out my day 5 travel vlog here…

One of the Kansai prefecture is Wakayama. It’s quite easy to get there but does require a fair bit of time to reach there. You need to allocate at least 2 hours to be safe if you are using the public transport especially with the train as you need to take consideration of walking time to your station(s), waiting time for the subway and train depending on your starting point in Osaka. However, it is fairly easy as it is the same direction to Kansai International Airport and the train will be clearly marked with the name, Wakayama, once you are at Namba Station. You can take Nankai Line Express.

We departed from out hotel at around 10am and reached there around 12pm. In fact, we were not very sure where we should be going because there were too many places to visit there. My goodness! So many awesome places there from onsen to seaside to orchard to hiking trails and so much more! Check out https://en.visitwakayama.jp and you will be spoiled for choices. So we decided to just settled with Wakayama Castle as it is the nearest to the station and the easiest to go since we could only do half-day trip. Do spend more days here, maybe 3 to 4 days if you want to visit those places further away in Wakayama.

This is the castle we visited.

Wakayama Castle in Wakayama, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan, sits at the mouth of the Kii River. Originally ÅŒta castle, home of the Saiga Ikki, it was captured by Toyotomi Hideyoshi in 1585, during the Siege of Negoro-ji; many monks from Negoro-ji sought refuge in ÅŒta, which was soon destroyed by flood. (Source: Wikipedia)

Left: We were silly enough to not see the main entrance and went further away from it and came across the back entrance. We didn’t use this entrance because it said that you might invite misfortune.

Right: So we walked further again until the carpark entrance and climbed this staircase with sounds of crickets in the background.

Once we were up at the castle ground, we could see view of the city but these birds on the trees attracted me. I zoomed in to take photos of them. Many of them flying around and rest on top of the trees.

Left: The view of the castle from the viewing spot.

Right: A key attraction in Wakayama Castle is Ohashi Rouka aka Ohashi Roka.

We went in Ohashi Roka and I kicked the plank, ouch! I didn’t realize the planks on the floor were not flat but has small steps and the slop is around 11 degree angle, so it is to prevent slipping. You need to take off your shoes. If you want to see how is the inside looks like, do check out my video at the end of the post.

This is Momijidani Garden, it’s just next to the bridge. I can imagine how beautiful it will be when autumn comes. From green to orange, red, and yellow. WOW!

We didn’t visit the the inside of the castle because we had other plan. If you want to visit the interior of the castle, you will need spend more time here, do come early so that you won’t reach Osaka too late in the evening or unless you want to have a full day here and go back to Osaka late in the evening.

The opening hours of the castle is 9am-5pm.

Here’s my Day 4 video, you will see more views of the castle and hope that you can subscribe to my channel too.