I had a hard time figuring out where I wanted to go in Japan, as I had a decent ammount of time but no rail pass, so figuring out how to get around for cheap as well as where to go was constantly a challenge.  I decided that I wanted to go to Kobe and have Kobe beef, but didn’t think it was worth a full overnight day there.  So I found a night bus from Kobe to Hiroshima and so I took an early train from Nara to Kobe and spent about 12 hours there, which was plenty of time to see the sites and have my beef.  Every place I read about getting kobe beef, said to go at lunch because the portions were about the same size but the price was much cheaper.  So I researched what had the best value steak lunch and I ended up deciding on Steakland which was downtown Kobe.  I arrived on the train at 11am and headed straight for the restaurant.

The lunch I decided on included a few sides, coffee/tea and a juice as well as 150g of Kobe beef for around $30.

The meat was cooked in front of us and was perfect when it came off the grill.  I took a bunch of pictures and then dug in.

It was honestly the most juicy, easy to eat piece of beef I have ever had.  It was so soft and so flavorful, I couldn’t comprehend how it was done.  I have had several expensive steaks in my life, but none of them compare to what I had just put in my mouth.  Contrary to my typical eating style, I ate these in very small portions at a very slow pace as to enjoy every morsel of flavor available.

Once I was finished the steak, I headed into the street and saw a McDonalds across the street.  For whatever reason I thought it would be funny to contrast the best beef I have ever had, with some of the worst and so i went to Mcdonalds and ordered myself a value menu hamburger to enjoy post steak.

As expected it was not very good and I left feeling very content with the days choices.  After leaving McDonalds, I headed to the train station and headed a bit out of town to a Sake brewery as Kobe is apparently well known for their Sake production and there was a brewery and museum just down the road.  I arrived at the Hakutsuru Sake brewery and tried to walk my way through the self guided tour, but the english was not very good and it did not do a great job of explaining the process, despite the wax figures and other demonstrations they attempted to portray.  They did have a lot of old equipment and tools on display which was interesting.  I did have to go back later and watch a youtube video on how Sake was brewed, but this place was still pretty cool.

They also had a dress up area!

At the end they had free samples available which allowed you to try the different kinds of Sake they had on offer.  I found out that the major difference is how much the rice is polished before being used.  The more polish means the more of the centre core of the rice is used and the less outside extras.  The more it is polished, the more refined the flavor and the more it costs, since there is less material and more work involved.  I was told that despite higher polish, some people prefer Sakes with less polish and some people prefer more.

After finishing up at the factory, I jumped back on the train and headed back into town.  There were several other Sake breweries in that area, but unfortunately on that day they were all closed.  I headed down to the waterfront park to walk around and see what there was to see.  There was a nice view of Kobe tower,

as well as a cool Kobe sign which I had to get my picture with!

The views of the waterfront were also pretty good from this vantage point!

After leaving the waterfront park, I headed into the city and explored some of the shopping streets as well as a temple in the middle of the city and then headed to China town which had lot’s of chinese food and small tastings of kobe beef available.  For some reasons there were also a lot of spidermans.

After wandering, I headed towards one of the two breweries in town to see what they had to offer.  The first one was called Starboard brewing and it was a nano brewery with a small restaurant and bar on the second floor of an out of the way building.

I got a flight of 6, 3 of the beers being from on site.  They were ok, but nothing special although I did get a free snifter with the logo on it as a gift from the owner.  I manged to find a place for it in my luggage so wasn’t too worried about the extra bulk.

The next brewery was across town a little bit and was in a little bit better set up.  There was a bar and seating area with the brewery in the back.  This one was called In Tha Door brewing and the place was full of records. The bartender was spinning tracks but I was the only one in there.  I ordered a beer and enjoyed the tunes, but I wasn’t getting a great vibe from the place.

I had two pints and then decided to continue my journey.  The odd thing about this place was that they had a $3 sitting fee which is fairly common in many places in Japan, but was a little odd since I was the only one in there and craft beer is still growing in Japan and needs a little bit of help still.

I still had a bunch of time to kill and needed something to eat, so I decided to cruise the back alleyways of Kobe in order to find a local establishment with cheap/good looking food.

As I was wandering , I noticed a place with few people inside and an old couple behind the cooking counter.  There was something about this place that made me want to stop in, so i did.  There was one Japanese lady sitting at the bar and a table of businessmen sitting in the corner, but other than that the place was pretty empty.

There was a couple behind the counter doing all of the cooking and I would assume they were easily in their 70’s.  I sat down, ordered a beer and then asked them for their house specificity.

They made me a delicious noodle dish and then through the help of one of the other patrons carried on a nice conversation about what I was up to and stuff.

The gentleman than asked me if i wanted some Japanese “drink” I never saw what it actually was, but it seemed to be warmed and mixed with water.  The businessmen in the corner ordered a pancake dish called okonomiyaki and the lady made it a little bit bigger and then sliced off me a little bit for me to try.

I ended up hanging out there for some time, but eventually needed to find the bus stop and get to the night bus.  I got a nice photo with them before leaving!

I went in search of the bus stop and when I found it realized it was directly next door to the first brewery of the evening, although by that time it had closed.  I sat in the waiting area for a few minutes and then set off towards Kyoto.