Day 6
Thursday
1
Hotel provided breakfast in a cute black square metal basket left in front of our room.
Soups in 3 thermos with 3 breads and 3 bottles of juice.
And three espresso coffee bags.
Very Japanese.
Soup was really nice.
After breakfast we left hotel for another day of adventure sometime after 8 am.
It was brightly sun shiny at Sapporo.
We soon were on the motor way out of a busy city against the main traffic stream
towards westnorth ways.
We passed Otaru soon but took a longer time than expected to arrive at Shakotan.
Which was only 100 km away from Sapporo.
In Hokkaido I found it took longer to travel by car than in Australia.
There were numerous tunnels on the way which slowed down our progress.
Also so many road works were being done and I caught sight of a woker waving a flag manually
standing on the side road guiding drivers into a converged lane.
Being used to seeing heavier-set workers in here they looked smaller in neatly-worn blackish blue
uniforms and white helmets.
How could they do that all day long I wondered!
Later I spotted a frame on which a flag was moving left to right automatically in the hand of
cartoon worker which indicating that lane blocked.
It made me feel less concerned about those workers who had to guide drivers by waving flags.
Finally we arrived at Cape Kamui around 10:30am.
Huge car park was almost empty.
As we got out of our car strong wind attacked us as if trying to knock us down.
We walked to find a gate towards the tip of Cape Kamui was shut.
Probably because of ominously strong winds.
Most of all I was pissed off with the sign that meant 'women were forbbiden'.
It's easy to be forgetful how life had been harder for women and how women had been treated
unfairly.
So we walked around on the well managed paths as much as we could.
I was very much disappointed that we couldn't walk long enough.
No access to the light house, nor good enough walks.
On top of that suddenly we realized we had companies.
A big group of tourists with guides arrived.
It ruined our peaceful time too.
Later I watched photos Eddie took there which simply contained stark beauties in the wild.
By looking at them, invigorating winds I felt there suddenly infiltrated into my memory
which softened my disappointments and regrets I got from there.
Our plan was to have lunch at Otaru but it's already approaching midday.
We stopped at a restaurant in Misaki on the way to Otaru.
They have a vending machine on which we had to select our menu and insert money.
Like buying drinks or simple snacks.
It was a strange idea for me to buy meals like that at a proprer restaurant.
I wan't sure if people could use a credit card there.
Luckily I had enough cash to buy meals for three of us.
It was true cash was more commonly used in Japan.
Eddie chose Kai Sendon which was a dish of sea urchin with rice.
Me and Suze carefully chose ours as sashimi with rice and miso.
In many cases vegetable portion in Japanese food was way below my standard.
But aknowledging that it was quite a good meal and we enjoyed it.
2
We drove on after lunch to arrive at Otaru.
Otaru was of course a very popular traveller's destination famous for Music Box Museum
and Canal.
Eddie didn't want to go for Music Box Museum which was fine with me.
We were dying for coffee in the first place so straight went to a fancy looking cafe where we
had coffees with cakes.
We walked along the city towards the Canal.
I noticed the view of Canal from T.V was somewhat exaggerated.
However it was such a nice feeling strolling with warmer sun glowing down on us
and sharing infectious tourists' high spirits filled the air.
I saw a lot of old buildings belonged to last centuries either big or small.
Formal or private.
Old and modern mixed harmoniously.
It was one warm memorable autumn afternoon.
When it was still bright in the afternoon we decided to come back to Sapporo.
Admittedly it was a regrett that only that amount of short time only devoted for one place was never enough.
3
At Sapporo I wanted to exchange money for more Japanese cash.
Suze found one currency exchange place near Odori Park.
For some reason there were only 2 money exchange places in Sapporo
except exchange machines at shopping malls.
We left our car at our hotel and walked to Odori Park.
It was in our itinerary anyway.
I imagined a small park at the heart of busy downtown Sapporo.
Surprisingly the park was huge with 13 blocks spreading 1.5km and covering 78,901 square metres
separated with pedestrain crossings in between.
While we were looking around the park(only 3 blocks in fact) the sun was about to set already.
A touristy day was as short as anyone else's.
We were starting feeling pleasantly tired and hungry as city lights were glowing alive.
As night fell so did the temperature.
Hokkaido's night felt colder.
I decided not to visit the money exchange place which seemed too much hassel by then.
We ended up having Italian food for dinner.
The Italian restaurant we chose was very big occupying almost the entire floor.
No one else was there while we were eating and finished our meal.
I was not sure why.
It's not that food was not good.
Maybe no tourist wanted a pasta when you came to Hokkaido.
Or it's more a bar style food place where people came a bit later.
Who knows.
Oddly the waiter said we had to order drinks for everyone.
I never ordered any drinks except water in anywhere.
As I rarely drank anything else except water and coffee.
I suddenly recalled a Japanese T.V show we watched in order to learn what it was like in Japan
before this trip.
Two westerners came to a tavern called Izakaya on one episode.
Restaurant people were complaining to Japanese regular customers that these people
didn't order two luquors(only one) and they sprayed salt or any other seasonings on their ordered food,
about whch the cook found it very offensive cos he considered it a challenge for his food's quality
or taste.
It was impressive to see their exasperated (understandably) but very rigid(inflexible) attitude towards two strangers.
Apparently a huge cultural difference!
It reminded me of another more familiar cutlure I grew up with in which people disliked varieties and forced all to have
unified opinions.
I conceded and ordered a cold juice for me as well as two drinks for two of them.
I only finished half of it not to mention it.
Later when we were outside on the street I realized the price we paid was a bit dearer than our calculation
based on the menu.
I didn't bother to go back and check.
But it remained as one slight bad memory for Hokkaido to me.
4
We came back to hotel and tried to take showers in turns.
Suze was the first and she came out of bathroom telling us that there was no cold water running.
We tried to talk to the hotel reception and they didn't know when they could fix it.
Later hotel suggested we go to a nearby onsen with our own expense and then it would
be reimbursed by them later.
It was a pain in the neck to go out with toiletteries to an unknown place for a shower
in the middle of cold night.
We were stalling considering what to do.
But luckily it was not too long before we were informed all problems fixed.
All in all staying at this tiny clean modern style hotel in Sapporo was comfortable and pleasant but
we were having a problem each day even though it turned out all good eventually.
I decided to upload money into my travel cash card using my mobile app instead of physically
exchanging money.
These days I realized more often than not you'd better get over gadget and technology
allergies especially when travelling.