Kobe travel info

It's hard to get lost in Kobe. Uphill is the mountains, downhill is the sea. Mount Rokko walls the city in from behind, so a twenty-minute walk down the slope takes you past nearly everything: the old Western merchants' houses of Kitano at the top, the shopping streets of Sannomiya below them, then the Motomachi arcades and Nankinmachi Chinatown, and finally Meriken Park and the red Port Tower at the water's edge.

Foreign traders arrived when the port opened in 1868 and they left their mark on daily life. Kobe takes its bread and cakes seriously and has more neighbourhood coffee shops than seems reasonable. In the evening Kobe beef sizzles on teppan grills, and okonomiyaki joints out in Nagata serve sobameshi, noodles and rice fried together on the griddle. After dark the Harborland Ferris wheel and Port Tower light up, and from the viewpoints on the mountain the whole city glitters.

It's under half an hour by train from Umeda in Osaka, so plenty of people come for the day, but you need to stay the night to see the lights. Half an hour by bus over the mountain is Arima, a hot-spring town more than a thousand years old. From Kansai Airport you can even arrive by boat, straight across the bay.

Kansai International Airport (KIX)

• Kobe–Kansai Airport Bay Shuttle (fast ferry) + Port Liner: About 30 min by boat + about 18 min on the Port Liner to Sannomiya · One way ¥1,880 (the Port Liner set ticket costs the same) · Return ¥3,060 (valid 120 days) · Same-day return ¥2,510 · Child one way ¥940
• Airport Limousine Bus to Kobe Sannomiya: About 65 minutes nonstop from Terminal 1 to Sannomiya · ¥2,200 one way (child ¥1,100) · ¥3,700 return (valid 30 days)
• JR via Osaka (change to the Special Rapid): About 90 minutes to Sannomiya · Charged automatically on an IC card (check at the station)

Kobe Airport (UKB)

• Port Liner (driverless transit): About 18 minutes to Sannomiya · ¥340 (child ¥170), same on IC cards
• Taxi: About 20–25 minutes to Sannomiya · Around ¥3,000 (check on the day)

• Visa: Visa-free for many passports; check yours
• Getting there by air: Fly into Kansai (KIX); about 1 hr to Kobe
• Time zone: UTC+9, no daylight saving
• Currency: Yen; stalls may be cash-only
• Paying: Cards widely OK; one IC card for transit
• Power: 100V Type A; bring an adapter
• Language: Japanese, bilingual signs
• Internet: No restrictions; an eSIM is enough
• Emergencies: Police 110, ambulance/fire 119
• Best time: Spring blossoms, Oct–Nov