Osaka - Kyoto 3 : The Days, the Activities, and the Places

So like I mentioned in the previous post, we went to Japan for 14 - days : many days spent in Osaka, 3 days in Kyoto and 1 day in Nara. How did we planned out the days? We actually planned the night before, every night after dinner we'll have a small gathering to discuss the plan for the next day. It's a bit hard to schedule it properly because we don't know how long we will take on each places, or how far each places were located, so we just have a rough idea of what we are going to do. That way it won't be like a rush tour, we were trying not to do the tour hopping thing, instead, we waited for the right moment to let everyone finish up what they wanted to do (or tried to-lah, at least).

Susah betul jadi planner and trying to make everyone happy =.='

Here's our rough schedule :

• Day 1 : Arrival, check-in at Namba near Dotonbori
• Day 2 : Kyoto ( Day 1 Kansai Thru Pass ) 
• Gion-Shijo
• Arashiyama
• Day 3 : Osaka
• Tennoji Zoo (supposed to be our resting day after the extreme 12 km one-shot, Kyoto exploration the day before so I suggested we spend the day at the zoo) 
• Shiseiki Alley
• Day 4 : Exploring Osaka ( Day 1 Osaka Amazing Pass )
• Osaka Castle, 
• Museum of History
• Museum of Housing & Living
• Ferris wheel ride at HEP5
• Joypolice ride *not recommended
• The top of Tsutenkaku Tower for a sunset view
• Day 5 : Exploring Osaka ( Day 2 Osaka Amazing Pass ) 
• Osaka Science Museum
• Kaiyukan Aquarium
• Tempozan Pier and Marketplace
• Tempozan Ferris Wheel ride
• Day 6 : A whole day with Ishijima Sensei in Namba
• Day 7 : Resting day, but we explored Dotonbori at night, we found Mithilia restaurant at Dotonbori for dinner
• Day 8 : Kyoto ( Day 2 Kansai Thru Pass) 
• Nishiki Market
• Fushimi Inari + hiked to the top of Mount Inari
• Day 9 : Check out day, we spent the day waiting for our other Airbnb check-in time because the bag was super heavy - we found the Honolu Ramen near Namba City - highly recommended
• Day 10 : Nara 
• Deer Park,
• Kohfukuji Temple
• Yoshikien Garden 
• we found Naramichi Jinnayah halal ramen *not recommended
• Day 11 : Expo' 70, Bampaku-kinen Koen & Expo' City (Osaka Unlimited Pass)- we found Soba Dining - recommended
• Day 12 : Exploring Kyoto one final time (Osaka-Kyoto Keihan Pass) 
• Shimogamo Shrine
• Kyoto Imperial Castle
• Kyoto Manga Museum
• Day 13 : Check-out day, exploring Namba and slept at the airport - dinner at U-don, KIX - highly recommended :D
• Day 14 : Flight home

Images were shared in my Instagram multiple images by days during my stay. I don't really feel happy sharing images in this blog anymore, knowing the ugly auto-compression Blogger uses that I don't like. 

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So as you can see, our days were packed with activities and each place wasn't near to one another. We had to do a lot of walking. 123km in 14-days means we walked around 8-10km per days, almost every day. By evening, our feet usually ached/sprained so we had to soak our feet in an icy-cold water bucket to let it heal faster for the next day activity. It was that tough, I soaked at least 3-4 times in those 2 weeks. We usually walked for the whole day, with a short rest for lite lunch and tea-time and train rides. Kesian ma :D I already told her, we are a bit hard-core in exploring but she insisted in following so sometimes she complained - we let her rest in several resting spots (like cafes with wifi) so she'll get the heat and wifi and she'll be happy (lol).

The reason I tried to put all activities as much as we can is because honestly, I have a lot of places in mind that I want to go to in this world and I'm not sure when I'll reach this part of Japan again. So I really wanted to cram every single things inside, plus this was a family trip so I hardly got my silent moments where I can reach out to the solidarity of new places. The feeling was different than all my previous trips, but the experience was still nice :)