Our mid afternoon segment of our first day was spent exploring the Kitano-cho area. This district shows up as a suggested place of visitation for visitors to Kobe as it features well-preserved European-styled residences that were built during the Meiji period. To get to this district, we headed from the hotel back to Sannomiya station. And maybe it’s a woman thing, but Ling couldn’t get her bearings again LOL.
- Ling trying to get her bearings outside Sannomiya Station.
- Proceeds to ask high-school girls for directions, who point us the wrong way.
Fortunately, men continue to have a more reliable sense of direction, so I got us back on track. The walk from Sannomiya station up to the district is about 10-15 minutes and on an inclined slope. About half of it is at about 8 degrees, but near the foot of Mt. Rokko, the slope inclination increases dramatically to as much as 30 degrees.
- Even Starbucks has taken over one of those houses.
- One nicely done-up house – which was padlocked at the gate.
- The house at Kitano-Cho Plaza.
Many of these well-preserved houses have been turned into commercial establishments. Some are small museums, others seem to be rentable towards photographic endeavors.
- The Kitano Tourist Information Center.
- Kitano Tenman Shrine requiring admission fees. We didn’t go in.
My feelings of Kitano-Cho are pretty mixed. While the houses are without doubt very nice looking, nearly everyone of them we saw involved some sort of admission fee. Sort of reminded us of the Bali experience where the whole place felt terrifically commercialized. Our final stop for the first day was Sannomiya – in the next post.:)
That’s the coziest Starbucks I’ve ever seen!