I was a lot busier than I expected yesterday and didn't end up coming back home till late last night. But off to Day 11 of my Asia 2023 trip!
The last day in Asakusa has arrived. We booked an earlier train back when we got our JR passes in Harajuku, but opted to skip that and board a later Shinkansen to Nagoya. Fortunately, we were able to place our large baggage behind our seat (new rules on the Shinkansen for large bags) in an unreserved car.
After arriving in Nagoya, we first headed to our hotel to drop off our luggage. It was still too early to check in, but they stored our bags for us in their back room. With no heavy luggage to hold us back, we proceeded back to the train station for our destination for the day.
Ghibli Park is a relatively quick ride from Nagoya station. They built the park on the grounds of the 2005 Expo in Aichi. I was disappointed with the Ghibli Museum back in 2019, so I had high hopes for this park. For one, it was a lot grander than the museum. We were only able to book tickets for the warehouse; not the forest nor the Hill of Youth. From what I read, it seemed like the biggest attraction was the park anyway, so we weren't missing much.
Like the museum, the warehouse was filled with tourists. They had some interesting exhibitions, including a vast forest that I'm assuming was from My Neighbour Totoro. There's also a screen room that had a short film playing every 15-20 mins or so. The film in question was Looking for a Home (Yadosagashi). I initially thought it was about camping, but I managed to find an article on Wikipedia explaining what the story is about. I have to say it's a lot better than Boro the Caterpillar that I saw in 2019.
What was not worth waiting for was the exhibition section of the museum. The line stretched for what seemed like half a mile. We were curious to see why people were lining up, so we decided to wait in line as well. Just after an hour of waiting, we finally got inside to see... mannequins and sets from the various films. Honestly, I didn't think it was worth the wait, but since I apparently had a case of FOMO, I made sure to spend quite a bit of time checking out the exhibits.
Once we left the park, we headed towards a quiet shopping street in Nagoya to find a café that served various chestnut desserts like the Mont Blanc Sweet we had in Asakusa. The café was relatively quiet, but the atmosphere was pleasant. We ordered two separate desserts, with both tasted quite good. After we finished, we left and headed back to our hotel to check-in.
Dinner was at a seafood joint close to our hotel. There were a variety of dishes to try. Even though I'm not a huge fan of seafood, it was an enjoyable meal. Feeling full, we headed back to our hotel to rest for the night since we would be heading to Osaka the next morning.
A lot of traveling today, but it was nice getting to explore Nagoya a bit more with the dessert café, and the park. If you ever get the chance, and you're a bit of a Ghibli fan, I would recommend checking out the park. I believe it's a lot better than the museum in Tokyo.
I forgot which section of the park this is from, but I really liked the scenario outside the window.
No comments:
Post a Comment