11/6 - an evening in Kobe

After our post-Himeji Castle lunch, we made our way back to the train station and hopped onto a Sanyo Electric Railway car.  The car didn't leave right away, so I had a chance to wander and take a few photos of the train.  Again, we made sure we were on one of the express trains.  We didn't want to waste our time on the local service train that stopped at the almost three dozen stops between Himeji and Kobe.

We took the trip back to Kobe and slept half of the way there.  The sun was still beating down and we had to draw down the curtains.  Luckily in Japan, most transit comes with some sort of shade or curtains that you can draw in order to block the sun from shining right in your eyes.

We arrived back in Kobe and made our way to the unique neighbourhood of Kitano [北野].  Kitano is well-known for its collection of European-style buildings.  Kobe was one of the early contact ports between foreigners and the Japanese.  So many of the foreign powers had residences and buildings for their representatives.

The neighbourhood was a quick jaunt up from Shin-Kobe station, but we were looking for a particular part of Kitano.  We were looking for small circular plaza overlooking Kobe and in front of an infamouse European-style building, sometimes known as the Weathervain Home because of the weather vain on top.  I think it also goes by a few other names, as well.

As dusk fell, we finally found it after winding up the hill's many little pedstrian alleyways.  It had a nice few of Kobe, but not a very expansive one.  A few people were just sitting around enjoying the warm autumn weather.  We found another one of those stamp stations common to Japan's tourist sites and collected our Kitano stamp.

We wandered more around the old foreign residences, but many were now closed for the day.  So there was no way to see the insides of one of these unique buildings.  Giving up on spending more time in Kitano, we started heading back down the hill to Shin-Kobe Station.

Our next stop was to head to Kobe's waterfront area, sometimes known as Harborland.  At least that was the name of the subway station we got off at.  From the subway station, we had wind our way under a highway overpass and several shopping malls before actually reaching the water.  It must have taken at least 15 minutes from the station to the water.

Kobe has some beautiful buildings along the water.  One is the Kobe Tower which stands like a giant elongated Japanese drum covered in a neon weaving of red lights.  In the shadow of the tower is the Kobe Maritime Museum.  Its giant lattice structure is lit up in a fluorescent green that stands in contrast to the adjacent Kobe Tower's red.  Further down the pier from the tower and museum is the large curvilinear building of the Oriental Hotel in Merikan Park.  These three buildings are quite easily some of the most recognizable buildings in Kobe.

 

We wandered a little more in the Mosaic Gardens shopping area to see if we could find some Kobe beef to have for dinner.  There was a place that had Kobe beef, but only as a part of their ramen meals.  It wasn't a full-blown Kobe beef restaurant.  We were looking for the real deal.  As we walked around, we came across a boardwalk amusement area complete with giant colour-changing ferris wheel and a double-decker merry-go-round.  Also, there was a strange little gazebo where you and a partner were encouraged to shake hand with your right hands and grab onto a fixed stick with your left hand.  Once you shake hands, it looks like the gazebo lights up in a variety of different colours.

We were getting hungry by this point and we hadn't found what we were looking for.  We made our way back to Kobe's transport hub of Sannomiya [三ノ宮].  Our feet were starting to tire of schlepping around looking for Kobe beef.  We settled on a quick dining outfit known as Yayoiken.  It was complete with a vending machine to order and pay for your food after you sat down.  Or you could do it in the other order if you so choose.  I had a tonkatsu meal while N had a croquette meal of some sort.  (I'm getting bad at remembering what we ate).  It was a quick meal and we were about ready to head back to Osaka.

However, we came across a busy little window underneath the overhead train station.  There was a long line up for this tiny little window. It looked like they were selling gyoza and buns.  I am a gyoza freak.  N knows this very well.  So we lined up and bought a box of gyoza and some pork buns to snack on later back in Osaka.  The place was called Ikkanrou.  We later found out that it was a fairly famous food institution in Kobe.  Good stuff.  We didn't miss out on some of the local specialties, then.  Unfortunately, the gyoza was cold by the time we got back into the hotel in Osaka.