The hare and the tortoise …

A short ride into Osaka – the hills were pretty in the north glowing in the sun – the first sunny day we’ve had for a while.

There are lots of canal/river crossings they are man-made perhaps for the water management from the hills to the sea. They have been attractively constructed with fitness tracks and gardens either side.

There were carp kites strung across some of the canals – a japanese tradition as part of Golden Week.

A perfect day on the bike and so thought the rest of the population … not only the usual everyday use bikes we saw a generous number of road bikes with riders all in their lycra kit on the road.

We are still comfortable on the paths amongst the pedestrians, however, we were embarrassed today to be beat by a jogger. We played leapfrog for many kilometres – dodging walkers and getting red ‘don’t walk’ signs at crossings. He finally got the better and disappeared.

It may be Golden Week or the weather but the joggers were everywhere as well this morning.

One township blended into another – shops and apartments. Approaching Osaka the buildings got taller and more dense. We went into the train station for information … wow people everywhere … the food court under the station was amazingly busy with people queuing for their favourite lunch spot. We, on the other hand were quite happy with a purchase at a bakery.

Having enough of the dense population we headed to our accommodation. That was an experience in itself!! We found the ‘hostel’ and were accosted by a middle eastern man who was running a halal shop adjoining the ‘apartment’ he was very confronting asking if we had paid and our room number. We were his ‘brother and sister’ when we said we like spicy food. He tried to do a deal of supplying us with a Biryani rice for our dinner. Things weren’t so sincere when we said we were okay for dinner tonight. A number of conversations with ‘his brother’ on the phone and we paid. Oh well you get that sometimes ….

We had dinner down the road at a Pakastani restaurant- John had chicken biryani.