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The original was posted on /r/japantravel by /u/MarvellousCrocodile on 2024-12-14 05:56:13+00:00.

Trip Report: 7D6N Osaka-Fukuoka

This was my second visit to Japan but was my first solo trip. I didn’t know any Japanese. I was nervous and excited at the same time. The trip turned out to be very enjoyable overall despite some hiccups (I almost lost my passport on one day). Below is my trip report. Will definitely do another one next year, probably for longer duration and will probably learn some basic conversational Japanese too.

Day 1 (Osaka)

• Reached Osaka at 10:30am, cleared immigration for 1 hour, took another hour to get JR pass and IC card (the queues were quite long).
• Took Nankai Rapid Train to Namba, it was good. Took me awhile a figure out where my hotel is because Namba is so big (more like a Shinjuku version of Osaka).
• Checked in hotel and went for super late lunch at random shop at Namba.
• Went to get my Osaka metro pass, took me awhile to find the place too.
• Walked around Dontonburi & Shinsaibashi
• By 5pm, I nearly crashed due to lack of sleep from night flight so I went back to hotel for a nap and wanted to call it a day, but then I happened to see some clips of Xmas light-up in Mido-suji on TikTok. In the end, I went out again at 7pm, to stroll the streets to admire the trees and leaves.
• Came back around 9pm to wash up and sleep

Day 2 (Osaka)

• Got up at 6:30am and realised how short the day was in winter in Japan (basically 7am-5pm), had my favourite breakfast in convenience store (random Onigiri and black coffee)
• Visit a few parks (Nakanoshima, Minamitenma, Old Fujita House Gardens). I only planned to visit Nakanoshima but they are side by side long the river so I ended up walking along the whole stretch. Beautiful foliage sceneries, I took a lot of photos and some videos.
• I had bought some food from Don Donki and had lunch in the one of the parks, quite a new experience to me.
• Headed to Tennoji Park, there was a Xmas fair with lots of food and decorations), continue strolling, enjoying the beautiful foliage.
• Watched Tsutenkaku tower from nearby market and had late lunch in random shop there.
• Headed to Umeda Sky Building. From Umeda metro station, there was apparently a short-cut walkway to the building but somehow Google Map suggested for me to take a detour long the highway (lol), new experience walking in winter wind along high way though.
• Visited Umeda Sky Building, the transparent elevator, caught the sunset on Umeda rooftop then visited the Koji Kinutani Tenku Art museum.
• Back to Namba for dinner, visit Ghibli shop, and walking around looking for Eki Stamps. Took me awhile to search and found out that the Namba stamp is in tourist information centre, but I reached the centre at 8:01pm and it closed at 8:00pm lol. Disappointed, I took a few train rides to collect 2 stamps from Osaka station, lol.
• Back to hotel, wash up and sleep

Day 3 (Osaka - Fukuoka)

• Got up, breakfast with Onigiri & black coffee again (I’m kinda addicted to this combo), packed up and checked out, heading to Fukuoka
• I took 8:40am JR train from Shin Osaka to Hakata (Fukuoka) using Sanyo-Sanin region pass
• I stayed at an APA hotel by Gion Station (followed one of the video on Youtube of a solo traveller), put luggage at concierge and headed to Maizuru Parks
• Visited Maizuru and Fukuoka Castle Ruins, the foliage was much more beautiful in Fukuoka than Osaka, tbh, I was at awe (I live in Singapore and there was no such thing there)
• Came back to hotel to check in, re-organise my backpack and headed to Ohori Park
• The park was huge, seeing people cycling along the lake kinda made me want to rent a bike too. I missed the entrance time to Japanese garden (close at 4pm), so I was just strolling in the park and again admiring the beautiful scenery
• After sunset, I took random strolls in the streets of Daimyo, surprisingly there were not a lot of restaurants there and all the menu were in Japanese characters (I can’t read Japanese). I was relying on Chinese characters to guess the menu and instructions in ordering machine, lol. Had an interesting dinner, it’s called Bikkuri-tei Honke (based on Google Lens)
• Back to hotel, rest, wash up and sleep

Day 4 (Fukuoka)

• Got up, had Sukiyaki for breakfast and came back to a horror that my passport is not in my bag. But I still decided to go for the Klook day tour that I bought and figure out the passport thing later. In the back of my mind, I was kinda prepared to extend my stay in Fukuoka if needed, to re-do my passport.
• It was a good tour, cost saving on the transport. Visited Dazaifu, Frog Temple, Yufuin Village and Kirin Lake. I was also one of the lucky draw customer who got the free freshly made daifuku at some specialty shop near Dazaifu.
• Probably affected by the passport, my mind was a little dazed, I forgot my phone charging cable (for power bank use) and cash, so didn’t manage to take a lot of photos and didn’t get a try a lot of food neither, what a pity.
• Came back to hotel to the notification that my passport is at concierge (apparently it was dropped on the corridor after I checked in lols). I was super relieved.
• Went to Nakasu Yatai by the river, ate ramen, gyoza and had Japanese plum wine to relax, then visited Canal City for fountain light show and bought Ghibli stuffs again…
• Back to hotel, rest, wash up and sleep

Day 5 (Fukuoka)

• Breakfast at Lawson, with Onigiri and black coffee again (I’m seriously addicted)
• Headed to Nanzoin Temple and had lunch at nearby shop
• Spent my afternoon trying to find bike rental but failed. I couldn’t register Charichari because they don’t have Singapore number code in the list, tried my mom’s Vietnamese phone number and it didn’t work too. Found a physical rental store in the basement of Hakata station but it required 3-day in advance booking and there was no English instructions (only Japanese and Korean)
• I went to Teamlab Fukuoka, a minor hiccup happened on the bus. As I boarded the bus, I saw the girl in front of me not tapping her IC card, so I thought you only need to tap when alight, and I didn’t tap in. When I got out, my IC card of course showed errors, the bus captain only spoke Japanese, and I couldn’t understand a single thing he said. At first, I took out my cash to pay, but he shook his head. After a few seconds of staring at him and listening to his Japanese, I heard an English word “station”, so I made a guess that he asked what station I got on, and I replied “Gion-machi”. Thanks goodness, it was correct, he keyed in the station name in his machine and I was able to tap out with my IC card. I didn’t know how to say sorry in Japanese, so I just bowed and got off. From then on, I always remembered to tap twice on the bus, tap in and tap out, lol.
• I played for 1.5 hours at Teamlab, somehow they allowed me to play two rounds across all rooms.
• Ate sushi for dinner in nearby shopping malls, the selection of sushi were very interesting
• Back to hotel, rest, wash up and sleep

Day 6 (Fukuoka)

• My usual breakfast at Lawson
• Visited Tenjin Park, there was Xmas decoration but it wasn’t opened in morning
• I spent the rest of the day at Fukuoka Zoo & Botanic Gardens. It was a huge complex with beautiful animals and sceneries.
• Dinner at Tenjin, tried out big size Tonkatsu, super delicious.
• Went for some shopping of Japanese snacks

Day 7 (Osaka)

• Checked out from hotel and took JR train to Namba, Osaka
• Put luggage at coin locker and headed for lunch and some more snacks shopping
• Took Nankai Rapid to Kansai Airport, need to take another shuttle bus to Terminal 2 (which is very small), and you need to walk out to the plane (no bus) and they scanned the boarding pass at the building door to the plane (this was new to me). I was flying with Peach Airline, it was ultra-budget, first time trying this airline, so that explains.

A few interesting observations I had: (1) There are so many korean tourists, keep hearing korean almost everywhere I went, so at times I was able to know what’s happening by listening to the korean (I know conversational korean) (2) Restaurants serve a cup of cold water even during cold weather, no option of warm water, interestingly.