Nearly 24h Stopover in Osaka ...

...

no earthquake, tsunami, nuclear reactor accident so I'm still alive ;) I hope Japan is

now prepared for Claudia's and my arrival in February, after we planed it two times

going there in the past and every time a disaster happened right before.

What to do if you only have the forenoon? I knew there is one of the biggest Aquariums

in the world located at the harbor in Osaka. I booked an accommodation very close

to the Airport and left my bags there during my trip to the Kaiyukan Aquarium.

Once you understand the subway plan, it's very easy going there, even if you

don't understand japaneses.

It took me 80 minutes one way and as I had already overslept, I only had two hours

at the Kaiyukan left, before I had to pick up my bags and going to the airport.

Good that I bought the entry ticket together with the railway ticket before, otherwise I

had spend there approximately another 45minutes, because it was "Family Day" and

crowded all over the place. Nobody told me that ;)

So straight to the entrance, skipping the queue and I was in.

I will make it short. Never been to an Aquarium like this before and I mean this in a

negative way.

Sure it was nice to see some GT's, Whale Sharks, Japanese Bullhead Sharks, ..., 

touching some Rays (felt like a mixture between fish and shark), but the whole facility

was build more like one long floor where they wanted to avoid, that you went back to have a

look on some of the exhibits again. For the most species they have, they only display a

picture, the Japanese and English Name and the taxonomy. They do not provide any other

single detail.

You take a long elevator and walk down in circles through the hole facility. In

the middle you have the big pacific tank and on the other side some smaller tanks

with different animals, mostly grouped by continent

You walk down the floor in one direction till you where on level -1, take a small

elevator again and pretty much, that's it.

What I expected, was not only the third or forth biggest tank in the world, I

expected way more information about nearly everything. And more about taking care

about our environment and what impact our lifestyle has to the sea.

They had a small part with that at the end, but nearly everyone was skipping that,

because it was not on the walking path anymore... really sad