Travel Diary #2: Central Japan Day 5 (1/2)

2nd last day in Central Japan and we were at Osaka.

For the 5th day, we were staying in Osaka for the whole day. Half of it would be free and easy trip at either Universal Studios Japan (USJ) or Spa World. The choice of destination between those 2 had already been decided a month before the trip. There's no way we could change the destination as the fee had been paid to the travel agency. Hence, we decided to go to Spa World.

Before we headed to 2 different destinations, we had our breakfast at the Sheraton Miyako Hotel.

The view outside the hotel room.

Steamed rice, steamed vegetables, hash potatoes, mackerel, salad, miso soup and apple juice.

Omelette. Pick your favorite ingredients and pass it to the chef. A card will be given to you and once it is ready, pass the card back and you can eat your own omelette.

I have chosen ham, cheese and sauteed onions.

After breakfast, we packed our luggage inside the room and prepared to leave. As we entered the bus, there was something different as compared to the previous sightseeing bus we have boarded for the last 4 days.

A screen with a game controller inside the bus?!

I forgot to write about what happened to our sightseeing bus aka 6688. Last night when we arrived in Osaka, 6688 had to be sent for servicing (?). Therefore, another bus would be taking us around Osaka.

The bus first stopped at USJ for a while. In our tour group, 3 families went for USJ. The others would be going to Spa World. We went down the bus for a short while to go to the washroom and also take pictures of USJ.

Look at the crowd outside the entrance.

It was a Thursday morning and there were a lot of visitors queuing up to enter the theme park. Fortunately, we prevented another Disneysea's incident where we could have a hard time finding something to eat and ride there.

We boarded the bus and headed to Spa World.

Our new sightseeing bus aka 1865.

The entrance to Spa World.

Inside Spa World, the 2nd level will be paying the entrance fee and it is done through a machine.

Different passes are available from the machine.

As we entered, we were given a wristband. The wristband serves as a wallet, meaning that all purchases made inside Spa World would be using the wristband instead of cash. Before leaving Spa World, return the wristband inside the machine and pay whatever you have ordered or rented.

Wristband

Return the wristband here before leaving and pay for the food that you've ordered or clothes rental.

Before going to enjoy the spa, we must be barefooted. All shoes would be placed inside the locker and it costs 100 yen. Thought it would be a waste of money? Wrong! 100 yen would be returned to you as you open the locker regardless how many times you use. Apart from shoes locker, another locker where you place your clothes and other belongings at the 4th and 6th floors does the same thing. 4th and 6th floors are theme spas, namely European and Asian spas respectively.

Apart from theme spas, there's also amusement pool with slides and panoramic bath at the 8th floor. Men, women, boys and girls can enter the 8th floor but not the theme spas. Although the theme spas are separated into 2 zones, they are separated into men and boys, and women and girls. Depends on the management, the men and boys would be using the European spa while the women and girls would be using the Asian spa for a month before swopping those 2. For our case, my father, younger brother and I went to the 4th floor while my mother went to the 6th floor as we visited in June.

After changing our clothes to swimming costumes at respective floors, we went up to the 8th floor. Take the lift from the 4th floor or 6th floor will lead you to the 8th floor.

The amusement pool looks all right to me, nothing to wow about. However, the structure of the slides look rusty and has not been properly maintained for a long time. Furthermore, you need to pay to enjoy the slides. Might as well go to the nearby swimming pool and enjoy the slide for free.

3rd floor is where you can enjoy stone spas from different countries. In order to visit the 3rd floor, you have to go to the 2nd floor to rent the clothes. Rental costs 600 yen (or 800 yen) plus a refundable deposit of 3,000 yen.

After changing the clothes, we headed to the World Stone Spa to let our sweat run down. There are different rooms of different countries to choose from such as Korea, Russia, Turkey and also Egypt. We first entered the Korea room and it was above 50 degrees inside. It was a quiet room and all you could do was to lie down on the stones and sleep. It was a great experience as there were music playing while you sleep but it didn't last long as the room was closed for maintenance at 1.00pm JT (Japan Time).

Another room that I would recommend is to visit the Egypt room. Of all the rooms inside World Stone Spa, Egypt room has the highest temperature of above 60 degrees. Unlike other rooms, talking is allowed inside Egypt room and there's also television for you to watch shows. As I entered the room, the sweat ran down quickly after a few minutes.

We headed back to the 4th floor to have the onsen and went to the 3rd floor to have a light snack.

The Spa World experience ended after returning the wristband and paying the fees. We boarded the bus and headed back to USJ to pick up the rest of the members.

Part 2 of Central Japan Day 5 is next.