Hokkaido, here I come! (Been there, Done that)

  

So finally I got myself back to Singapore sound and safe. Although the trip was pretty tiring, but it was fun and rewarding. We spent 2 nights at Taiwan and 5 nights at Hokkaido. In total we have 27 tour members in the group which can be considered a big group. Half of them are senior citizens and while others are mostly in the 30's. I am fortunate that to meet all very friendly tour members. Most of them are veteran travelers. In fact they were very on time for meeting all the planned schedules. Our tour guide, Teresa, who is a very helpful person. Here are my summary of our trip.

Day one: Depart from Penang airport to Taiwan. We stayed over night at Tao Yuan to catch the next flight in the next morning. During that night, we went to stores around the hotel. I did saw a lot of sexy 槟榔妹 along the road. :P

Day two: After having good night rest, we proceeded to airport for next flight to Hokkaido. It took about 4 hours to reach Chitose. Our tour guide at Japan was waiting for us. He introduced him as the Gen 2 Chinese descendants. His name is Harimoto.

(日本导游，我们叫他张先生) 

 

 

 

 

 














 

 

 

The first stop was the Sapporo Beer factory which is Japan's first beer brewery. We toured around their high tech factory which only employed less than 20 people. I have 2 glasses of beer which have different brews. One of the brews can only be found in Hokkaido. It is called Sapporo Classic. After the beer factory tour, we proceeded to our hotel at Lake Toya as the day get darken around 430pm. On that night, we have Japanese buffet. All sorts of seafood was served. One of the famous attraction in Hokkaido is the Japanese SPA. As you know, we have to get totally naked in the pool. At first I was a bit shy. But once I get into the hot spring pool, the 46C water made me feel so relax. I enjoyed every moment in the pool. :)

Julie in Yukata outfit. This outfit is worn after bathing.

 

Day 3: After the breakfast, we proceed to bear ranch which is next to mt. Showa Shinzan.  As the climate change, the bears are getting harder and harder to get their natural preys. According to the Harimoto, each year in Hokkaido, at least some people will get killed or hurt by the bears.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Gummy Bear

 

On the next stop, we visited the Aborigin Ainu village at Shiro city. Ainu folks are the natives of Hokkaido. They used to be hunters and fishermen.

 

 

 

 

Picture with Ainu folks

After watching their cultural performance, we went for the most expensive meal that we ever have. :) We ordered one live crab and one scallop on top of our provided meal. The total extra cost was about 170 USD. :O 

 

 

 

 

 

Hokkaido crab which was on our menu

 

After having our scrumptious meal, we proceed to Tokachikawa. After long hours of bus ride thru Hitaka highland, we finally arrived at Daichi hot spring resort. Our tour guide asked us to wear the yukata for dinner. Again, this was a wonderful dinner. Sashimi and sushi were on the table again.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of course, we won't miss the hot spring SPA at that night. I actually enjoyed the outdoor hot spring pool. Even the temperature at outdoor was around 5C, when you soaked yourself under 46C hot spring water, the feeling was really speechless. One of the thing that fascinated me was the hotel toilet, the most high tech toilet I have ever encounter. You have all the automated washing features for your personal business. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hi-tech "toy let"

Day 4:  We headed to river side which just next to the hotel. The were a lot of migratory ducks hunting for their food. We were given some bread to feed those birds. After the bird watching, next stop was the Swan Garden Ikeda Wine factory. After tasting the wine, we stopped over at Kushiro to have our BBQ lunch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

BBQ

After having our BBQ, and lots of ice cream, our next stop was the Kushiro Marsh National park to have bird watching. Japanese cranes are migratory birds whose have black and white feather with crown-like red spot on its heads. I wasn't able to take any good picture of them as they were too far away from us. After another 45mins bus ride going thru mountainous area, we finally reached the volcano lake called Lake Mashu. The last eruption of this volcano was about 1000 years ago.

 

 

 

 

 

Lake Mashu

Our final destination of the day was Mt. Iwo which is a sulfide mountain. The gas releasing from the ground just smelled like rotten eggs. We stayed there briefly as the sky already turned dark. The bus went thru several tunnels at the mountainous area. Finally we reached the Lake Akan hot spring resort. This hotel has most unique hot spring pool as it is located at the top of the roof. From the pool, you can really see the magnificent scenery of Lake Akan. It was too bad that I couldn't get any pictures taken as no camera was allowed in the pool area. As usual, we had our buffet dinner the hotel and followed by the hot spring bath.

 

 

 

 

Marimo - some kind of algae lives in Lake Akan. They can grow to the size of a baseball.

 

Day 5: We left the hotel in the early morning after having our breakfast. The first stop was the Abashiri prison. Then we went to tour around the Abashiri Prison museum. This meseum was constructed based on the original design. Next stop was the Abashiri Ryu-Hyo-Kaqn Ice Glaciers Hall which we experienced the sub zero temperature thru their simulated air conditional room. Again, we have seafood for lunch at the restaurant there. We left for the Fox farm at Kitami after having our lunch. The foxes were freely roaming in the farm and they were rear for their skins.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yummy! (Going to have my lunch!)

The final stop of the day was Ginga and Rysusei Falls. It was snowing in that area. The falls wasn't frozen yet. I took a few shots of the area before the day getting darker.

 

 

 

 

 

The river near Ginga falls.

 

We took our rest and dinner in Grand hotel at Asahikawa. This was the last night that we stay in hotel which has hot spring facility. Of course, we fully utilized the facility.

Day 6: After having good night sleep, we left for sake factory. The factory
produces different type of sake. Probably you have seen the brand of 男山 at here. Mr. Harimoto dressed himself up as wine worker. He was so happy to pretend as wine worker. :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After drinking the fine wine, we left for Otaru city. On arriving Otaru, we were ready for our buffet lunch. :) The food was fantastic. Sushi, shasimi, and ice cream were on my list.

 

 

 

 

We spent about an hour at the restaurant.

 

After lunch, we just walked over to the Otaru canal next to the restaurant. Otaru canal used to be central part of the city's busy harbor in the first half of the 20th centry. Now it has transformed to tourist attraction which has restaurants and shops.

 

 

 

 

 

Otaru canal.

 

Then we proceeded to Otaru Music Box Museum. There you will find all kinds of musical boxes. Of course those musical boxes come with handsome price tags. Julie bought herself a simple musical box.

 

 

 

 

 

Inside Otaru Music Box Museum

 

We tour around the shops and went to a cafe. At this cafe, you can bring back the coffee cup once you are done. They even allow free flow of coffee. There were different type of glass designs that you can choose from.

 

 

 

 

Different type of coffee cups. Hello kitty cups, Anyone?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nice coffee with nice cup.

 

 

After having our coffee, we tour around the shops along the street. We bought a slice honey dew which costs 200 yen at one of the shops. The honeydew was really sweet. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hurry! Last one!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's so sweet.

 

 

Whenever you are roaming in Hokkaido, you will always find ice cream shops on the street. Julie and I shared a big cone of ice cream which made from Hokkaido's milk. The taste was quite different from the ice cream I ever had before. It was so rich with milk.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Julie with her 400-yen ice cream

 

Enough with all the food, we left for Sapporo. On arriving to Sapporo, we went to roam around Susukino underground shopping center. The shopping center is connected with subway.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fuji apple

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Honeydew

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Julie at Susukino district.

 

For those who like shopping, Susukino is the place to go. After spending about an hour there(some of our group members thought wasn't enough time for time to shop), we had our Shabu shabu(hot pot) in a restaurant. With our stomach full, we took rest at Royton hotel. This was the last night at Japan, so we were busy packing our stuff. :)

Day 7: It was the last day at Hokkaido. The flight was schedule to take off at 230pm. We still have sometime to tour around Sapporo city. After taking our breakfast, we went to visit Hokkaido former government office. It was converted to museum for public viewing. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Scenery outside former government office.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ginkgo tree

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next stop was at the Chitose Salmon Aquarium. We were told that the salmon fish will swim back to the river from the sea during the autumn season to breed. After their breeding, the salmon will die. Of course, we have no lucky to see the salmon at all as it was late autumn. Well, even we didn't see salmon, there were some cute dogs on the park walking with their owners.

 

 

 

 

 

Harimoto, Julie and Teresa.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyone knows what breed is it?

 

Before catching our next flight to Taiwan, we had our lunch at shopping outlet next to the airport. I slept all the way on the plane. It took about 4 hours to reach Taiwan. During the night, we went to Tao Yuan night market. At there we had our dinner. We were too tired to travel and we went back to hotel and took early rest.

Day 8: Depart from Taiwan and back to Penang.

P/S: I got to know from Julie that one of the tour member actually showed ghost in the transit hotel that the last night we stayed at Taiwan. The couple moved to Teresa's room after his wife saw a ghostly image sitting on the bed.