The Oooooh, Ahhhhhh Tour. I am not typically a fan of organized tours. I have found them to be restrictive and not very interesting. In order to see some of the more interesting sights in the time period that we had alotted ourselves in Hakodate we opted to take a chance. We were not disappointed. After checking out of the onsen we soon boarded a nice bus that was to be our transportation for the five4 hour tour. I was even more reluctant initialy to sit for five hours but we actually did move about quite a bit.We visited a number of sights that held some degree of significance for some reason or other. Some of the most notable include the old British Consulate, a building that served as a community center sponsored by Hakodate patrons and a tower that over looked a beautiful park full of Cherry Blooms which were well in bloom. As the guide described many of the details of the various sights the ooh's and ahh's got louder and louder. I sometimes fell into the practice even though I was a little bit delayed because yasu had to do the translation for me. The entire party with the exception of me was japanese sleaking. I still got the jist of most of the important things....I think.
As the day wound down we were all getting tired. There was alot of moving around during the day. We had a room for the night in a hotel that was to be one of the smallest I have ever stayed in. We were not to be in the room for long so it really did not hatter too much. We checked in and were able to squeeze the bags in the room with us. It was a good thing we did not pack using suitcases. That would have been a real challenge. Exhausted, we took a quick nap before dinner. When we went out for dinner we discovered the temperature dropped significantly. We were going to go walking around twon after dinner but neither one of us packed clothes that were made for the colder weather. We went back to the room and crashed early. We had planned to visit the morning fish market anyway. We set the clock for six am.
After a good nights sleep we were wide wake and ready to hit the streets. We caught a taxi and were downtown at the daily fish market by seven am.. Mind you, we had a train to catch back to Sapporo at 9:30. That gave us about two hours to walk around and get someting to eat. After seeing the lines to get into various restaurants we opted to get in line sooner rather than later and it was a good thing that we did. After standing in line for almost an hour we started to worry that we might not be able to wait. But then a rush of people left the place and we were able to get two seats at a table. We ended up sharing the table with two different couples. Obviously the place was famous for its menu. Lots of fresh shellfish, squid, uni, and roe was on the menu. I could not resist a bowl of rice topped with uni, roe and scallops. Yasu had the squid. It was a filling breakfast washed down with an ice cold beer. By the time we finished we had to head to the train staion. We boarded and soon after sitting down, Yasu crashed. He slept for most of the trip. I on the other hand could not, after all, I am still not sure I have adjusted to this time zone yet. Byt he time I am used to it, I will be back home in Boston.
Our third and final hotel was by far much closer in quality to the first place we stayed. The rooms in the Keio Plaza Hotel in Sapporo were fabulous. large, comfortable and full of amenities. It was also located in a great part of town. We had one night to stay and then a whole day to travel the city before boarding the flight back to Tokyo. The day we arrived the weather was a bit too hot for me to be ver comfortable. We palnned what we would do the next day and then decided to head out for dinner. The place was a nice small restaurant the showcased lamb, venison and innards, all of which were cooked by us on a smaller charcol fired grill. We were stuffed by the time we push away fro the table. Walking seemed like the best option. It took almost an hour but it was a nice walk. We passed streets packed with young folks hanging around and some who looked like they were working. Host and hostess clubs, and bars and clubs. It reminded me alot of Kabuki-cho near Shinjuku.
Since the hotel had a nice deep tub....we took advantage of that for the last time too. Again, we had planned to ge up early. The hotel served breakfast from 6 am till 10. Because we wanted to see alot we made it to breakfast at 7 am. There was a great spread from american style food to japanese. Now that we were sufficiently stuffed, we packed our bags up and checked out of the hotel, leaving our bags at the train station so that we would have easy access for the train trip to the airport.
As it turned out, Sapporo has a connection to both Boston and UMass. The first building we visited was the clock tower. The clock was installed over one hundred twenty years ago has is said to have never missed tolling the hour in all of that ime. The clock was built in Boston by the Howard Clock Company. IT was installed in a building that was used by one of the first agricultrual colleges in Japan. The college had a relationship with UMass Amherst because tehre were a number of faculty who travelled to Sapporo to teach and eventually became administrators at the college. From there we went to the TV tower and saw great views of the city from on high. By this time of the day it was getting cold outside. There was one other place that I wanted to visit...the Sapporo beer factory. We walked to the factory only to find out that it was a shopping mall. We stayeda while to warm up. The actual brewery was not too far away. We hopped in a cab and made it to the real deal.
There was a self guided tor that ended in the tasting room. Hmmm, I had to make the sacrifice and taste some beer. It hit the spot but by this time lunch was calling. We had seen all we wanted to so we made it to the train station to grab a bite to eat. Miso ramen hit the spot. Though we had a few hours, we did decide to get the train to the airport. We got in early so we just bellied up to a sushi bar and get our fill of some more very fresh fish before flying back to Haneda. By the time we landed we were both exhausted but had to force ourselves to stay awake. The train ride back to Yasu's space took close to an hour and a half. The trip, while only three nights was packed full of fun and activity. We slept long and sound.
The last few days here are going to go by fast.
Craig
No comments:
Post a Comment