Osaka trip - Day 4

The weather report said it was going to rain, so the plan to go hiking to the suspension bridge got changed to going to an aquarium. The Kaiyukan in Osaka is one of the world's largest aquariums that houses whale sharks. One of the downsides of going to an aquarium on a weekday is that you can come across a bunch of kids on school field trips. There were a bunch of tourists, too. I regretted not bringing a light jacket with me. The a/c in the aquarium was kinda chilly for me.

We went through a tunnel where we could see pretty fishies swimming along. This aquarium didn't offer dolphin shows but there were balls in the tank that the dolphins were dragging and tossing around.

We went through a tunnel that was like an underwater tunnel where we could see pretty fishies swimming all around us. It was a pretty cool sight. We saw otters and seals zooming by chasing fish. Penguins never fail to be entertaining. There was one picking up pieces of ice and depositing it in its nest. Then it went to pick up another one, just to end up dropping it. I had to tear myself away so I wouldn't end up watching the penguins all day long. The coral was magnificent. So colorful, as were the tropical fishies. There was this huge moray eel looking menacing in the coral.

The big tank housed whale sharks, a variety or rays, sunfish, several types of sharks, groupers, to name a few. Sunfish look so funky. All head and no body, as if something ate half of the body. It looked like it didn't have a care in the world.

Maybe because it's sprawling and there are dolphin tank outside, but the Churaumi Aquarium seemed bigger to me than the Kaiyukan.

There was a mall next to the aquarium where we had lunch. We got drawn into a family restaurant by the chocolate mint parfait advertised on a poster. The food wasn't bad. My buddy had grilled chicken and I had cut steak. Instead of the parfait, we decides to get a chocolate mint frappe to go so we could take it with us as we browsed around the mall. This mall also had souvenir shops, so I picked up something to take to the office and a few things to bring home with me. There was also a Legoland, so my buddy took pics to send to a friend who's a huge Lego fan. We even saw a penguin made out of Legos.

When we got back to the hotel, my buddy wanted to book a massage session. He asked if I wanted one, too, but I was starting to feel funny, so I declined. Besides, we wouldn't have been able to book a couples massage til past 11pm. That was a huge nope. He booked the session for 7pm so I took a nap til then. I left the room to do the laundry while he got his massage (there's a laundry room with a washing machine/dryer). The machine said it'd take about 2 hours to wash and dry the clothes, so I went down to the coffee shop in the lobby. I could feel the fever rising while I was in the coffee shop. I was feeling sluggish but didn't have a headache. My buddy texted that the massage session was over, so I stopped by the reception desk to ask for a couple of ice packs before I went back to the room and straight to bed. The plan was for us to try the Hawaiian buffet at the hotel restaurant, but I didn't have an appetite so I told my buddy to go ahead without me. The laundry should be done by the time he comes back from dinner.

At first, I thought the fever was from tight shoulders and fatigue since I've been carrying around a backpack and walking all day long the past few day. But it looked like I picked up a bug since my throat started getting sore. My buddy got a bit worried, but left me alone to sleep. He brought back the laundry, which wasn't completely dry, so he hung the laundry all around the room and bathroom so they'll be dry by the time we start packing in the morning.