Hokkaido

A big part of the trip was riding the trains. I'm guessing no Japanese person in their right mind would have taken three trains over 12 hours when they could have easily flown from Kyoto to Hokkaido, but we rode a couple Shinkhansen bullet trains and then the slower train in Hokkaido. The Shinkhansen goes 176 mph! The tunnel to Hokkaido is some 40km long.

We went to Noboribetsu and stayed at the Dai-Ichi Takimotokan Hotel. In 1991 when I was a student in Japan, I went up to Noboribetsu and got a day pass to use the Dai-Ichi's onsen, which are quite incredible. Over a dozen hot spring pools of different minerals, indoor and outdoor. And that's just the women's side. This was our major splurge for the trip and it was still only some $250/night. Two nights and as much time in the hot springs as we wanted. This was our room, and it was pretty similar to the Wayfarer with the futons on the tatami mats.

The view out the window was of Hell Valley:

They have kaiseki dinners that you can eat in your rooms but I didn't get them because they were expensive and we weren't sure we'd get there in time to eat dinner the first night. I was bummed because they had a hairy crab kaiseki which would have been tasty. Instead we went to the live seafood restaurant Onsen Ichiba and ate live shrimp and clams. The live shrimp were much larger than the live shrimp I'd previously eaten. You couldn't rip their heads off with your fingers. It was pretty hard to eat.

The rest of the meal:

The incredible never-ending breakfast buffet of Japanese, Asian, and western food. The boys are wearing the hotel yukatas. People wore these all over the hotel but also in the town.

We had a nice walk up Hell Valley.  You can see the steam coming from the vents. Would have been fun to cook eggs over them.

There was a great footbridge where you can soak your feet in the hot spring water. It was so civilized. They have mats hanging from a hook that you can sit on.

I had read about KaniTaro, an old disheveled restaurant run by an old man turned hoarder. We had to go get our 500Y hairy crab bento lunch so we walked a few miles to get there (bus service being scarce in this area). The amount of kani was miniscule but it was only 500Y. Later when we paid for an actual hairy crab, did we understand what a bargain we were getting here. The owner was absolutely delightful - a really sweet old man. We wished we could have paid him more. (You can't tip in Japan - in fact people will think you made a mistake and run after you with the money)

We went to Sapporo, the biggest city in Hokkaido. We spent a whole day at Moerenuma Park which was designed by the artist Noguchi. We loved it, so aesthetic and fun. The kiddie playgrounds are dangerous though! Clearly designed by an architect, not a playground designer!

This fountain is on a schedule. Go see it when it's doing a show. It's impressive!

We stayed at the Vessel Inn (nothing particularly noteworthy about it) in Susukino, the "entertainment" district of Sapporo. That meant we were near the red light district:

This "depato" (department stores are a big thing here) is called Mega-Donkey! Depatos usually have grocery stores in the basement and can have really good food (like the sushi in the Daimaru in Kyoto) but Mega-Donkey was pretty disappointing. 

There are nearby ski resorts in teh hills surrounding Sapporo. We took a ropeway and then mini cable car up Mt Moiwa. It was a nice view:

Sapporo has a fish market called the Curb market that had all kinds of crab including hairy crab. The hairy crab is pretty expensive ($40). The market was closed by the time we got there at 3:30p but there was one open restaurant and I had a magnificent crab, uni, scallop donburi:

Leo and I also had a great time playing the taiko drum game. We saw some real experts playing this game. Super fun. Wish I had one at home!