Well on Monday I took a 1-hr train ride out to Himeji. While there I got to see the Himeji Castle, tour through an outer building (the main tower is going through reconstruction), see most of the grounds, and have a thoroughly peaceful walk through the Kokoen Garden near the castle.
Then Tuesday was my day trip to Kobe. In general, the tourism wasn't too terribly exciting. But the Maritime Museum/Kawasaki Good Times Museum were really cool! Maybe that's just because all of the history of ships and then engines and whatnot they displayed were very interesting to me, along with a few exhibits about containers/cranes and shipping in general.
I also visited the Kobe Port Tower. Which seemed to be taking the couples theme that Namsan had, but it wasn't quite as popular.
This morning I got up relatively early to head to Osaka Castle. It was nice, but didn't have nearly as much charm as Himeji Castle. I also visited Shitennoji which, while quite interesting, would have been a lot more interesting with a guide telling me what each of the buildings were and what all of the good luck things being sold were.
Then after a cool-down and rest at the hostel, I checked out Tsutenkaku Tower and visited Dotonbori for the last time.
The tower was all right, but in glad I got. Student discount. Even then, I'm not sure the few views were worth the ¥500 I paid.
It's crazy how much I'm touring here, but prices are so much higher than in Korea. It makes me sad because it calls for less shopping from me. The cost of living in Osaka seems to be higher than it needs to be, but maybe that's just me being frugal.