Oniisanbomber's Blog

Japan Trip – March 2025 – Part 4 (Kobe)

30th of May, 2025

It is time for us to go to Kobe!

Most tourists will likely skip Himeji and Kobe on their first and second Japan trip. If it is your first Japan trip, you will likely end up doing the Golden Route. Land in Tokyo, then take the Shinkansen to Shin-Osaka, then from there explore Kyoto and Nara.

And that is great! It’s a wonderful itinerary. I myself have done that exact trip two times already. These four cities are the most significant cultural touchstones of Japan. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that these four cities form the foundation of what it means to be Japanese.

However, after your second Japan trip, I wanted to do something else. I skipped Himeji and Kobe until my 8th Japan trip because I did a lot of other side quests first.

A list:

Tokyo

Kyoto

Osaka

Nara

Fukuoka

Hiroshima (which includes the famous Itsukushima, the floating shrine)

Nagasaki

Okayama

Takamatsu

Kagoshima

Hakuba

Sapporo

Otaru

Hiroshima is full of American tourists. I suppose that is due to historical reasons.

Nagasaki has decidedly fewer tourists. It might be because Nagasaki is quite far off the beaten path and at that time, there was no Shinkansen connection.

Anyway, let’s get back to Himeji and Kobe.

Kobe is a trading port just outside of Osaka, and it is said to be a stronghold of Chinese gangsters in Japan. There is the famous Chinatown and also a Sun Yat Sen memorial museum (the father of modern republican China).

There are two ways to go from Himeji to Kobe.

You can simply go to Himeji station and take the Tokaido-Sanyo line to Kobe. But that is boring. Why take the JR when you can take the local line?

I was surprised that there is another train station completely separated from the JR Himeji Station just outside the main square.

It is called the Sanyo-Himeji Station (confusing, I know).

This line doesn’t operate any high-speed trains. It doesn’t have anything to do with the behemoth that is the JR company.

The Sanyo-Himeji Station is home to the San-you Dentesu line. A little old-fashioned line that runs along the coast and is also much slower.

Upon entering the station, there are attendants who can speak Japanese, English and Chinese to help you out if you’re lost (because it seems every foreigner has trouble reading Japanese train station information boards).

Source: Google Map

Once on the train, you will see that all the seats are backwards. That is because you can grab a handle on the top of the seat and simply push the backrest to the other side to change directions. It’s such a simple and practical solution.

The San-you Dentesu line will take you through some sleepy local towns. Most tourists go to Himeji Station to get to Kobe and Osaka because that will save you around 30 minutes to a full hour of time.

That’s why on the San-you Dentesu line, you will be surrounded mostly by locals. Local high school kids taking the train home to the next town. Housewives going shopping. A mother and her baby going somewhere.

The line also goes right along the ocean, so make sure to get a seat on the correct side to enjoy the view.

After arriving in Kobe, you will be going directly into the subway system.

The subway system itself is no different from that in Tokyo, except that I find it a bit cleaner and far less crowded.

My first stop: Kobe Nunobiki Herb Gardens.

It’s a little flower garden on top of a hill – and it’s not worth your time anytime that is not summer. Seriously, it feels like it’s an attraction only for locals and for young couples going on a date. In March, there is nothing to see there. Because most flowers don’t bloom in March.

I’ll attach some pictures, but it was a bit of a waste of time.

After having explored everything I could, I was starting to get hungry and was also almost out of water. I began to make my way down.

I skipped the Sorakuen Garden because I’ve seen so many gardens already, but above all, I was starving. It was time to get some Kobe beef.

After some searching, I ended up getting Kobe beef at a teppanyaki place. If you’re interested in knowing where it is, let me know in the comments.

On a side note, there are MANY restaurants that serve Kobe beef. From what I remember, a 150g A5 cut costs around 30,000 yen at a restaurant. I didn’t want to spend that much money on a single meal, so I went with a much cheaper cut.

But overall it was soft, buttery and delicious.

If you can speak even just a bit of Japanese, it will be helpful because outside of the big three cities, the general English level among service staff declines.

After that I went to explore a famous shrine: Ikuta Jinja.

And after that I went to Chinatown.

From Chinatown I took a circle route bus to Kitano – the former area where foreigners lived. All the world powers of that time had a building/embassy or office located in Kobe as it was a major trading town. I wandered around a bit, but did not go into any of the buildings because it felt like I had seen things like that in Hokkaido before, and it just wasn’t worth the entry fee to go inside and look at an old house.

But! Outside of the English house there is a famous cafe that serves award-winning soft serve ice cream. I tried it (400 yen if I remember correctly) and it really was something else.

After that I got some Kobe beef croquettes and took the express train back to Himeji because I was dead tired.

A few other side notes.

I went into a small free-of-charge Kobe beef museum, and according to the museum, the majority of ALL beef in Japan (wagyu, Kobe, Hyogo etc.) all come from a single bull cow that was imported more than a century ago.

What a bull!

And another thing. Do not take the express train around 5 pm, which is rush hour. It is so crowded that you will have trouble breathing.

Next time: Hokkaido road trip!

– Oniisanbomber