As expected, I did not feel 100% this morning. After rooting around my suitcase I could only fine one clean shirt so decided it was time to do laundry.

Remember all the bad things I was saying about this faux fancy hotel? They have the all-in-one washer/dryers that never wash nor dry properly. Note how the laundry room also has a dehumidifier in it to boost the effectiveness of the dryer? I decided to just go to a coin laundry.

It was a bit of a walk to the first decent coin laundry according to teh Googs but the front desk told me about a much closer capsule hotel that lets anyone use the washing machines. Not only do capsule hotels cater to the younger budget-minded travelers, but they also have the down-and-out who can’t afford real apartments. So I spent a couple of hours in the corner of the capsule hotel guarding my clothes while they washed and dried. Not that anyone would want them but better safe than sorry.

I figured this would be my “down day” and I needed to get my train tickets for this half of my trip. I found lunch at Mos Burger and got the tickets (plus the ticket to the airport for my side-trip to Wakkanai).

I figured this might be a good day to wander around the downtown area and maybe Hokkaido University. I made it to the Hokkaido University campus and had to use the bathroom. I wandered into the first inviting building and it turned out to be the school museum. I found out that they do a lot here and even have a Nobel Laureate in Chemistry (organoborate chemistry).

I even had a soft ice cream on the way out.

On the way back to the hotel I checked out the three buildings I was told were “must see.” The former municipal building was having a pet/human fair and I didn’t really check that out.

The clock tower, while historic, wasn’t much to look at.

And of course I was at the tower yesterday for the beer garden (but not today).

I even found the Benson bubbler donated by Portand to Sapporo (out of service right now).

OK, now it’s time to find dinner. I think I’m going to look for this restaurant my sister sent me on Instagram that has omurice. Will update later. (Well, I figure both of you who might see this are probably asleep right now anyway.)

Update:
That was disappointing. I took a half-hour walk down dark streets to the Sapporo Factory, only to find it a mishmash of buildings that were hard to navigate.

When I did finally find the food area, there was no obvious store with omurice. I made a pest of myself asking restaurants if they made the omurice that was shown on instagram.

After striking out and being told that it was probably the previous restaurant at a particular spot (the tables looked the same) I decided to have some Indian food.

It was unremarkable at best as it was kind of bland. The naan was great, though. It was probably better than my second choice.

I made several poor decisions today. First, I thought I should leave the onsen early because WHAT THE HELL WAS I THINKING? I missed the mochi-making at 9AM because I had to get in a taxi at 8AM to catch my train. That means I had to get up at 6AM, start packing (the electronics take some time to pack), take another onsen bath, eat breakfast, and andiamo. Breakfast wasn’t inconsequential and I was a few minute late for the taxi. The driver was kinda surly so screw that guy.

I slept most of the way on the train because I was tired. I got to Sapporo with not much difficulty but my hotel isn’t close to the train station, it’s on a shopping arcade near the drinking area of Susukino. There’s a row of hotels down here. Somehow I got screwed by booking.com because I have never paid so much for a hotel in Japan (outside of onsens that include dinner and breakfast). $1000 for five nights! And the room isn’t really that fancy! I was so pissed that I called my sister to complain.

I think my reasoning was that if I paid that much, I’d get a nice big relaxing room. Nope.

Here’s what they think a desk is:

Nice Ikea furniture. No sofa like some of the cheaper places I stayed in earlier.

And here’s my view from my non-opening window:

I was mad, but I figured there must be SOMETHING going on making the hotels scarce. There’s a month-long Oktoberfest fairly close by in Odori park and the first thing I did was order a plate of meat and a Sapporo beer.

Can you see what time it is? It’s not even 11AM and I’m drinking. Well, I get chatty when I drink and I went into the information booth where the woman was a beer fan. She told me there was a beer garden at one end of the festival, and I could drink a special Sapporo beer IN A GLASS at the opposite end. Oh, and North Island Beer had a booth and she’d met Tagaya-san, the North Island brewer who came to Portland for OBF. I called the factory to see if he was going to be around but it turns out there’s a beer festival in Saitama and he was there!

Anyway, here’s the special festival Peach Weizen.

I can’t get away from Portland beer: Migration is pouring here!

I had the festival lager and now I’m three beers in.

I walked the length of the festival to have the Sapporo beer that’s made with hops that were developed here but grow better in the US, so they grow them in Washington and ship them back. (That’s four.)

Now it was time to get back to the North Island booth so I could talk to the president’s wife and ask her about Tagaya-san, etc. But on the way back, in the section that has booths from different Japanese cities, an older woman from Asahikawa said, “Drink our Asahikawa beer!” I also had a pork and cheese (I think) bun. (That’s five.)

So I made it to North Island’s booth and had their sampler: a Pilsner, a Weizen, a Brown ale, and a Stout. At this point I didn’t have the sense to take a picture before I drank them.

And also, at this point, about seven to nine beers in (the samplers were smaller), I had a brilliant idea! (OK, not so brilliant.) But I wasn’t so drunk that I don’t remember installing the Japan Taxi app to make this happen:

The next tour was at 4:30 (in 40 minutes) but since I was alone, they stuck me in an earlier tour at 4PM.

The original recipe beer, on the left, still had yeast left and tasted more like a craft beer. (I had another of those after this. Is that 11?)

I never felt THAT drunk. I knew I’d pay for the all-day drinking but I didn’t know where to get dinner except for the North Island taproom two blocks away.

I had their IPA, and a beer from the guest tap from an old brewer from North Island. (I had the sense to have small pours of 12 & 13).

The salmon fish and chips were very tasty there.

After that, I made it back to the hotel (it wasn’t that late) and took a shower in the room. There’s a big bath downstairs but I didn’t have the energy. I hit the hay at 9PM. I’ll probably feel it tomorrow.

It was time to pack my bags in Hakodate and take the train to my first onsen of the trip in Noboribetsu. But first it was breakfast in the hotel. Yesterday I had the ramen. Today I went to the omelet bar.

The trains in Hokkaido aren’t electric trains. They’re diesel. OK, technically they’re probably diesel-electric. In any case it does make it feel like we’re in the middle of nowhere.

The train from Hakodate to Noboribetsu only took a couple of hours so I arrived around noon. I had to take a bus from the train station up into the mountains to get to the onsen. I think Google told me it would take an hour and a half to walk up there? There really wasn’t much to see on the way up.

As soon as I arrived, I noticed the area was full of Chinese tourists and smelled like farts. Truthfully “FULL” isn’t quite right: there weren’t the gangs of tourists in northern Japan that are all over Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka, etc. I had misgivings about the ryokan, but it was great. I gave them my bags and then asked about the local beer. I guess the 7-Eleven was remodeling so it didn’t have the Onidensetsu Beer from Noboribetsu even though it’s just down the hill a bit. I decided to go to the source, a brewery halfway down the hill back towards the train station. It was suggested to me by the woman at the tourism bureau that I take a taxi back. She said there’s no crosswalk and people in Hokkaido drive FAST. I figured I would be in a much better mood after a couple of beers anyway. The fart smell and the small groupings of Asian tourists were getting to me.

Onidensetsu Beer is made by a confectionary shop and they have a restaurant upstairs. Luckily, I made it in before the blackhole between lunch and dinner when restaurants in Japan inevitably close.

The brewery is right next to the gift shop where they sell Japanese sweets.

Amazingly they had a taster flight. Most places just have pints and nothing else. I had the tasters of their three beers and then a couple more of the Kin-Oni (Gold Devil) because when else am I going to find this? (Turns out they have it at the Watering Hole in Tokyo, a place I go to every trip to Japan.)

 

Here’s the first of two Kin Oni.

After that it was back to the onsen to check in. They told me that dinner would be busy and asked if I could have dinner at 5PM. I’m OK with early dinner but I asked if I’d have time to see Jigokudani, one of the many places named Jigokudani (Hell Valley) in Japan. They said it’s only a 10 minute walk. So once again, off I went. The room was a nice onsen room.

The first thing I saw was a 15′ tall animatronic devil that was just about to do his thing. He said he was the king of the devils and was pretty placid until it hit 3PM and the music started.

His face changes and he waves his arms around a bit. I can’t remember what all he said, but there’s a speech in Japanese.

Then it was onto Hell Valley. There’s lots more than the couple of pictures here. Surprisingly, I think I saw my first group of Korean tourists here.

There’s also a nice (hilly) walk through the woods to get from the valley to the hot lake.

There’s even a continuously bubbling geyser next to a hotel in town.

I didn’t make it back in time to take a bath before dinner. The food was pretty good, but I picked the fish instead of pork. My cousin told me later that the fish, hokke, is supposed to be tough, dry, and difficult to eat. I guess I picked an early dinnertime because I was the first one down there.

After that it was a trip to the onsen bath (no shower in the room) and I spent the rest of the evening using up the data on my SIM card watching Rick and Morty. Ah the joys of Japanese Netflix.

Oh, and my Bose Sleepbuds are broken.

I think I may have mentioned that I gave myself a day to just do nothing and this is the place where you can do nothing. Also, it was raining. Yesterday it was fairly warm at 80°+ but not that humid, and today it was cold and rainy. I asked someone about this and they said its usually pretty cool here and the weather yesterday was a fluke. Here’s an example from the afternoon.

I had breakfast in the hotel because I figured this is a relaxation stop, right?

Also, I think the food here is mainly fish but I overdid the fish in Sendai and I wanted to cut back a bit.

I went north today, toward the five-sided fort Goryokaku. Well, I thought iI was going north-ish towards the park but I was actually pretty darn lost. Remember what I said about liking to wander around Japan? I think I should say I like walking around Tokyo because it’s so dense that there’s all sorts of things to see no matter where you go. Here in Hakata I saw house after house interspersed with some abandoned schools and warehouses. Once in a while there’d be a drug store or a grocery store, but mostly it was houses. I dunno but that was pretty darn dull. The weather was mostly on-and-off drizzle and when I was moving around it was just a bit too warm for my long sleeved shirt. But it was just on the edge.

In any case, I finally got to the area I was looking for and I really just wanted to sit down. Fortunately there was a Mister Donut there and I spent some time just sitting and drinking coffee. The sweet potato donut was a little too sweet, I think.

I never did make it into the fort, but I did go to the observation tower nearby. A couple of Aussies going by told me to definitely go up, and luckily it was fairly clear when I did.

When I bought the ticket to go up they gave me a piece of paper that needed three stamps to get a prize. The first stamp was paying to go up the tower. The second was to buy something to eat like, say, a delicious gelato.

The third and final stamp was to buy something from the gift shop. I wandered around the shop for quite some time for two reasons. First, I was looking for something cheap. Second, IT STARTED POURING DOWN RAIN.

I bought a little trinket to finish out the stamp card and for my trouble I got a plastic paper protector with a picture from the War of Hakodate of 150 years ago.

Did I go straight back? Did I just jump in a taxi? No, that wouldn’t be foolish enough. I went walking out in the pouring rain to find a Daiso (the ¥100 store) to buy some more cable ties.

It was kind of fun because the Daiso was in an old-school department store with old lady clothes. It even had a Bunkyodo bookstore. I tried to take a bus back to the station but I waited half an hour and it never came. I finally took a taxi rather than walk any farther (further?) in the rain. I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening watching Rick and Morty, though I did make a return trip to Lucky Pierrot. This time I got the 2nd most popular item, an egg burger (a burger with a fried egg on it) and it was excellent. And what’s with all the guarana drinks in Hokkaido anyway?

THat’s it for today, and pretty much it for Hakodate. Tomorrow I’m off to Noboribetsu.

Oh, and I liked the Onuma Alt much more than the IPA.

I told my sister I think I’m eating my weight in mayonnaise. Most of the things I get at the combini seems to have mayo in it. I hid inside today until it was time to leave because it’s supposed to be 90°F today and the humidity is on top of that. Holy cow. Anyway, I got breakfast at the combini and took it onto the shinkansen. Just wandering around in the morning looking for a combini made me sweat quite a bit.

I guess Ichinoseki is similar to the shinkansen stop near my grandmother’s because there was no one getting on the train. And the green car was mostly empty. (There was one lady hiding in there.)

I switched Shinkansen trains at Morioka and the next train was much more full. Everyone was headed to Hokkaido. I didn’t take any pictures of the ride or of the trains. Lots of people were taking pictures of the Hokkaido trains and the signs that said, “Welcome to Hokkaido.” I even slept through the announcements about passing through the $7B Seikan Tunnel under the Tsugaru Strait.

I got to Hakodate and realized I’d booked a stay at a Sheraton. I think I figured I needed a break after all the random hotels beforehand. Well, the random hotels weren’t so bad.

I’m wasn’t that impressed by Hakodate. There’s really not all that much here. There’s the history of foreigners initially coming here, but it’s like going to Kobe but removing three-quarters of the stuff. I mean, here’s a bunch of people standing at the top of a hill taking pictures down hill of almost nothing.

I went to the red brick buildings, and as the tourist information person said, that was like Yokohama but MUCH SMALLER.

I tried to go to the Lucky Pierrot (suggested by a co-worker) at the red brick buildings but it was packed. Funny thing is, two blocks away I found another Lucky Pierrot and there was no one in line. I was completely underwhelmed by the chicken sandwich which was my co-worker’s favorite.

And underwhelmed by the hamburger. I also miscalculated and they were huge; I didn’t finish them.

You know who else didn’t finish his sandwich? This Filipino kid who got the Surprise sandwich.

I went exploring the Motomachi area and it was also underwhelming and I finally made it to the ropeway to the top of Mt. Hakodate. I had to ask: can you walk up instead? They told me it would take an hour and it did not.

It was hot, the trail got small at times, and it was quite a ways up. 1096ft to the top, and I started at sea level.

I even took a bad selfie looking directly into the sun.

I didn’t feel like walking back down so I took the ropeway.

After my hike up the hill I felt better about everything and I still had to see the “oldest concrete telephone pole in Japan.” That really tells you how much nothing there is here when they advertise stuff like that on every tourist map in town.

Hakodate beer was on the way back, but I was thwarted for a little bit.

The brewery is inside the restaurant and the bar faces the tanks.

The beer was unremarkable.

I decided just to go to the bar and have an Onuma beer for dinner, but the bar is only open Thu-Sat and it’s Tuesday. So off to the combini again. The onigiri are Sea Chicken and Mayo (my favorite) and Bacon and Egg. I can’t even remember what I thought of the Bacon and Egg now. I also got the Seven-Eleven karaage chicken to compare with the Lawson fiasco and it was much better. Probably more than I needed. Oh, and since Onuma beer is being advertised everywhere and is also in the Seven-Eleven, I got an IPA. It’s not that great.

Honestly, I think I’d rather be in Ichinoseki, but the weird thing is, it’s not as humid here. In fact, Wikipedia makes mention of the high humidity in the areas I was just in. Ah well, I’m just being picky. I’m having fun and I don’t need to rate the cities I’m in.

If there’s a theme to today, it’s I have no sense but especially regarding the weather. Man was it hot. I think I took a screenshot before where it said, “It’s 85°F and it feels like 96°F,” and it was the same today. And this isn’t the sort of heat I’m used to; it’s incredibly humid in Japan. I was soaked and I bought a new quick-drying towel to take with me that I forgot (so my not-fast-drying towel is slowly drying right now) and I wore long pants all day.

The pants almost made sense at the start of the day. I started out in Sendai where the edge of the typhoon was hitting and it was raining pretty hard so I decided to put on my long pants.

I took my sweet time since my train wasn’t until 9:40 and I got panicky when I saw how late it was getting. It wasn’t getting late, it just SEEMED late. I went back to the same tapas restaurant for breakfast and the weekday vs weekend routine was a little different. Coffee was all-you-can drink and was as unspectacular as you’d expect. Also, I tried something new.

The rain here is actually warm, and it was even hotter when I got to Ichinoseki. Even the raindrops felt warm. I remembered fairly quickly that the energy in the typhoon as to do with a the temperature differential and after the typhoon it’s pretty darn hot.

There isn’t a whole lot going on in Ichinoseki, but there were a couple of things I wanted to see as well as a brewery that I definitely wanted to visit. There are goals and stretch goals – I went directly to the brewery. It was warm and humid on the way to the brewery and it was raining a little. Fortunately the typhoon didn’t really hit the northern part of Japan and it was just a short rain. The typhoon, however, decimated parts of Chiba Prefecture next to Tokyo.

That’s Iwatekura beer at Sekinoichi Sake. There was a time that it was almost impossible for Japanese breweries to start up without some sort of “in” like being part of a Sake brewery and that’s the case with Iwatekura beer. I met the president when he came to the Oregon Brewers Festival.

I’d been messaging Satou-san, the owner of the brewery, but had no response. I went anyway and when I showed up they told me no tours without prior notice. I asked if I could say hello to Satou-san and he came out with a big smile and took me on a tour of the facilities.

There was a time when sake was going out of favor and he had to add a sake museum and restaurants to keep the business afloat. Satou-san told me that he’s running out of room for beer production and wanted to convert the banquet facility into more holding tanks, but he also said there weren’t enough large banquet facilities available in the area. The banquet facility is used for weddings as well as other events and is quite popular.

He took me to the restaurant and bought me a very unique lunch. The area of Ichinoseki is known for having hundreds of different kinds of mochi and here’s the selection I had for lunch. It was all excellent.

He mochi comes with a “game” where a stick is place in the bowls. If you find it in your first bowl, you’re going to be lucky today. If it’s in later bowls, that’s the day you’ll have good luck. I got it in my first bowl!

My stretch goal was to see the temples at Hiraizumi, and Satou-san drove me up there to his secondary restaurant/taproom which is a small shop among the souvenir stalls.

Satou-san made it to the Oregon Brewers Festival on the strength of his Sanshou Ale. Sanshou is a pepper used in Japanese cooking. Due to shipping delays, most of his Sanshou Ale didn’t arrive in time for the festival and I didn’t get to try it. It was on tap at the Brewers of Hiraizumi and I got to try it as well as a second lager mixed with matcha powder.

It was great seeing Satou-san and the rest of the visit was gravy. Well, some sort of hot primordial soup since it was so damn humid.

I’d suggest googling pictures of the golden Chusonji Temple in Hiraizumi because I wasn’t allowed to take pictures. It was pretty spectacular (and a slog up a long hill in the heat).

I got back to the station around 3PM and decided to ask the information booth if there was anything else I could see today. They sent me to Genbikei gorge where I was once again wondering why the hell I was wandering around in the heat, but it was worth seeing.

My Eagle Scout experience seems to have faded. I read the map thinking I was taking the 30-minute walking route but I took the 70-minute route around the area. Half of that was in the middle of nowhere, trying to get back to the river.

While on the whole there really isn’t much more than the small river gorge, this is also the place where they have the flying dango (a rope across the river delivers green tea and dango on a food zip-line), a shaky rope bridge, and a weird glass store/amusement park that looks abandoned or haunted. It’s open, and just a little dated.

I got back to the hotel and there’s really not much going on in this town of 30,000 people. Even though there’s a shinkansen station, there didn’t seem to be many restaurants. I decided hit up the Lawson conbini and eat in my room.

Yes those are the sandwiches that Anthony Bourdain raved about, and I’ve always liked them.

So that’s it for the day. I’m going to watch some more Rick and Morty and hit the hay.

I did my laundry yesterday, so I had had a free day in front of me. It was also going to be hot as hell so I didn’t want to do too much. Nevertheless, I knew I had to get out and about at least while the room was being cleaned.

I had the exact same breakfast as yesterday but I figure I might even get it a third time since I don’t know when I’m making it back to Sendai to eat at this place again. Weirder things have happened.

I went to the train ticket counter (a very tiny train ticket counter with only two windows) and got my train tickets for the next week or so. After that I went to the tourist counter and what they would suggest and besides all the places I’d already been they said Shiroishi Castle. Checked google but it didn’t show that much more around the castle other than a fox “museum” which I’m guessing is a zoo, and zoos make me sad. Plus, castles don’t have air conditioning. So I decided to just walk down the main shopping street of Sendai. I didn’t really go into any shops besides a Starbucks, but that was because I realized I hadn’t taken my medicine and I needed a glass of water and it would be much easier just to order a coffee and a tiny, tiny water than to try to swallow a bunch of pills while standing on a street corner.

The jazz festival was starting up about halfway through my walk, and the first group I saw had more performers than audience members. They weren’t hitting the high notes and when I confirmed they were singing gospel I kept moving.

I headed back soon after that and after a stop at the bookstore I went back to the hotel. I bought a book on Japanese phrases for the N1 JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test) because I figured more phrases would improve my conversation skills. Plus it would give me something to do if I just wanted to sit in the room or in a coffee shop.

About 1300 I started getting hungry and decided to try Hosoya’s Sandwich which I heard might be the oldest hamburger restaurant in Japan. It was a new adventure, in any case and I decided to brave the heat because I had a goal.

It didn’t take too long, and I got on a bus hoping it would take me to the right spot (google is awful with Japanese buses right now and thinks they run on the right-hand side of the road) and made it about 2PM. It looked suspiciously closed.

Sure enough, there was a sign on the door giving me the bad news.

Turns out they ran out around 1PM because of an unexpected order. At that point I was hangry and needed something. Since I had hamburger on the brain I went to the closest Mos Burger.

I guess the better jazz bands had much larger audiences. I saw tiny crowds for Dixieland, a band doing a cover of Earth, Wind, and Fire, a woman singing the king of inoffensive songs they play in boutiques, and an odd band with a shamisen player. This band was doing a cover of “Birdland” which annoyed me because:

1) I was hangry, and

2) I’d rather listen to a proper recording of it on my iPhone.

I had to walk between the crowd and the band to get to Mos Burger, and I didn’t care. The only other thing I really wanted was a lot more air conditioning in Mos Burger.

Next I decided I needed a sun hat (my mom was always telling me to wear a hat in the sun), a quick-drying towel to mop my sweaty brow, and a non-leather belt since my belt was staining my light-colored khaki shorts. Oh, and a non-leather wristband for my watch because the cheap leather one I had was staining my wrist and smelled funny. Stupid humid heat.

Back to the hotel with some snacks. I’m not sure what I did besides sit around for a while. By the way, those sweet corn sticks tasted just like sweet corn. I have to get that again.

I gave the front desk another chance to make a dinner suggestion. They gave me a coupon for a nearby fish place which was great, but it turned out to be a Japanese drinking restaurant where I expected all the plates to be small and expensive and I’d have to pay at least $50-80 to get out of there. I paced in front of the place for a while before I finally gave in and went in. The only part I was wrong about was the the plates were not small. I only spent about $50 and about halfway through I questioned whether I was going to be able to power through, but I did it.

Oysters steaming in the can. She said they were too small to fry, so I expected them to be tiny. Ha. Too small my ass. At least she came back to open the oysters for me.

It’s hard to see in this picture but I think there was enough salad for three or more people.

And that’s not all of it.

And this is the damage at the end, plus two beers.

Well, that’s it for another day. I’m supposed to be going to Ishinomaki tomorrow and I’m going to try to score a tour of a sake and beer factory. I met the president at the Oregon Beer Festival. I also found Rick and Morty is on Japanese Netflix so I should probably stop typing and start finally watching that. No more beer for the night.

I didn’t sleep great last night but it also wasn’t awful. I keep waking up before I want to get up. I had to meet the group of company presidents at 9AM and I was up by 6. Even then I thought I was going to be late, like I was for dinner with them. I was able to squeeze in a “morning set” at a tapas place on the way to their hotel.

I was in time to go to Matsushima with the presidents. This group was the travel committee, and the full group of suppliers goes on trips every other year with 30 more presidents. I found this out when the senior member of the group said it was time to choose the next destination and whoever spoke up would be more likely to get their choice. They had a two-day trip/meeting and their business seemed to be concluded in 5 minutes. Of course there was the business of having a good time.

It looks like I only took one picture of Matsushima’s islands.

There were a couple of reasons for that. One was it was kind of foggy out and there are lots of better pictures taken by professionals out there. The second is that I agree with my grandmother (my mom’s mom) who said, “Meh, the islands near Murozumi (part of Hikari-City, Yamaguchi Prefecture) are prettier.” I’ve translated that from the original Japanese.

We even took a boat ride out in the islands where there was a recording constantly describing the islands. One of the presidents (the youngest one, who spoke very good English) asked me, “What makes an island? These look like rocks,” and I tended to agree. How Japanese to name all these damn rocks with reasons for the naming.

We went to the fish marketplace (kind of a tourist trap) and had sushi for lunch. It certainly was tasty though.

On the way back we stopped at a chikuwa factory. Or was it kamaboko? Yeah, kamaboko. It was pretty tasty and is made from whitefish. The factory was a little odd as it also housed a couple of art museums, and a tanabata museum next door. Why? I don’t know.

We also stopped at the castle, which I went to a couple of days ago, for ten whole minutes. Then they dropped me and one of the presidents off at the train station and the rest went off to the airport to head back to Kansai.

I lucked out – it was more fun chatting with the presidents club on the way to see Matsushima than going by myself listening to economics podcasts.

I got back to the hotel around 4PM and I decided it was time for laundry! And then I went out looking for dinner at the station. It was kind of crowded because of the Sendai jazz festival and from a baseball game letting out. I found a place that wasn’t that crowded, probably because the beef needed more seasoning. But it wasn’t bad, and there were multiple people in mobility devices inside! Yay inclusion!

I also finally made it to the big bath downstairs, and figured a way to spend the money on my extra Suica cards!

And a happy pumpkin pudding to you too!

OK, another tough day. I felt a lot better after 9 hours of sleep and went to Yamadera just outside Yamagata city. There’s a 7Eleven right by the hotel and I got the same breakfast there that I got at Mini Stop yesterday and headed to the train station. Google decided it didn’t know how to get me to Yamadera but my small short-term memory remembered I wanted an 8:18 train. I asked the station attendant if memory was correct and he looked at me like I was a moron and told me to go to track 5. It’s only ~55 minutes from Sendai to Yamadera, which is about the time it takes to go from Osaka to Kyoto.

However, here’s proof I’m a moron:

No thunderstorms (I felt ONE drop in the evening) but it was HOT. Plus it’s HUMID. Who the hell goes up 1000 steps to a mountain temple when it’s over 90 degrees? (You probably know that idiot personally since there are only three people reading this blog and I know all three of you.)

I don’t know if you can see it, but about in the very middle of this picture, in the hill, is the temple I wanted to go see. Why, you might ask. I’m not really sure. At least I got a start in the morning.

So off I went. Here’s the start of the 1000 steps.

And here’s the first temple at the bottom:

Fortunately the first part was in the shade. And even more fortunately, I didn’t take pictures of every shrine and temple on the way up. There were a couple of Chinese tourists doing that for me and I’m sure you can find those on-the-line SOMEWHERE.

I was pretty overheated and sweaty by the time I got to the top and here’s a picture of the highest temple (a pair) you can get to. One is older, and one is newer and there’s lots of differences in the statues of deities between the two. I can go on and on, but you should either find me (both of you who read this far in this blog will have the chance) or just google it.

What I really wanted to do is to get to the highest temple, but I was told I’m 50 years too late for that. I just took a selfie at the highest point I could get to, an observation deck of sorts.

Keep in mind I wasn’t thinking clearly and didn’t take all the pictures on the first time up so I had to climb up to the “observation deck” twice.

I made it down and went into a temple I skipped on the way up. I paid ¥200 to go into the temple and luckily it was a bit cooler inside the temple. After that I staggered back to the station after getting a bit lost. I had to ask the locals for directions. I did have a small snack before the train came. A pear soft ice cream is all I could handle at the time.

If you look carefully you’ll note that the t-shirt should be a paler shade of blue but it’s SOAKED in sweat. I bet I lost 10 lbs in water weight. Maybe more.

Two stops back towards Sendai was…

I left out a bit. There was also a “30-minute walk” from the station to the Nikka Miyagiko Distillery that I bet was closer to 50 minutes. In the heat. With no shade.

I took the tour and the distillery was HUGE. Even though they’re taking a break from selling some of the whiskey, it’s probably 5-10 times the size of the Yamazaki distillery.

Look at the stills! That doesn’t include the two Coffey stills!

After the tour they only give you a few tastes, but you can buy a bunch more! Where in the world can you get a short pour of the 21-year-old Taketsuru for ¥500? Or the award winning 17-year-old Taketsuru for ¥400? I asked them to sell me double pours (closer to a shot).

I even had a ¥7000 taste of the limited edition Taketsuru that only had 300 bottles in the production run!

The bartender shift changed and Ross from Adelaide (via Scotland) was suggesting all sorts of interesting things.

You can see rehydrating with whiskey wasn’t helping me take pictures BEFORE I had the taste.

This is one of the three “flavors” of whiskeys they use to make the Taketsuru and was my last taste. Both of you who read this blog know I’m a talker, and when I drink I get even more chatty. A couple of older Japanese gentlemen came to my table and I started talking to them instead of the bartender. They told me they were on a tour and had an extra seat to get back to Sendai. One of the gentlemen offered me a ride back, which meant I didn’t have to walk back to the train station. In the heat. With no shade.

What I didn’t know is that the gentleman making the offer was the president of a company and the rest of the group were other company presidents who were his suppliers. Once a year they all met for an excursion. One last stop before heading to Sendai, they had fried tofu.

On the ride back they also asked if I wanted to join them for dinner though it would be dutch. I had no idea it would be so fancy. Actually I had a slight idea so I went to Uniqlo and bought myself a shirt with a collar (¥500 on the sale rack!) because all I brought were light gym t-shirts.

Dinner was ¥10,000, but it was worth it. Little morsels but so excellent.

The pictures don’t include the beer, wine, and dessert.

They invited me along tomorrow for a tour of Matsushima!

The jet lag I thought I avoided this trip kicked in last night. I woke up several times and 4:45AM, was about as late as I could sleep. I got at least 7 hours, so that was good. I spent some time messing with the janky WiFi again (much better at 4:45AM when no one else is on) and reading email. My goal was to get to the JR Rail Pass office before they opened and get on an early train to Sendai. I took a shower, packed up, and went around the corner to the convenience store (a Mini Stop) and picked up a quick breakfast.

I was the first one in line! I quickly filled out the paperwork so I wouldn’t lose my spot and got my Rail Pass before 8:35!

But the next train out was full and the following train stopped at ever station. The first fast train to Sendai wasn’t scheduled until 10:10AM so I had time to kill. I bought a newspaper and found a coffee shop inside the train gates. Since I was planning on sitting there for over and hour and a half I bought a second breakfast, which was as tasty as the first.

The train ride was uneventful and incredibly fast. The Wi-Fi on the train was less janky than the hotel, but still janky, and I ended up using my cell phone as a hot spot. The trip consisted of me killing the batteries in my laptop and my phone so I could check my email for whatever reason. Got to Sendai around 11:40AM.

I dropped off my bags at the hotel (check in wasn’t until the afternoon) and at noon I was ready to go exploring. I guess there’s only three big things to see in Sendai and you can to them with a one-day bus pass. I got to the bus right as they were leaving so I hopped on without the pass. I missed all the discounts the bus pass would’ve given me.

Sendai was a castle town built by a daimyo, Date Masamune. I don’t have to tell you this because everything in this area is about Date Masamune. The first stop was a 45-year-old re-creation of his mausoleum, which was bombed to bits during WWII. Like most re-creations, it’s not quite as interesting as the real thing.

There’s a whole lot more I didn’t take pictures of because: re-creation.

The second stop is where the castle was, which was also bombed to bits. It’s on top of a hill, as was the mausoleum, which meant there’s a lot of walking up hills here. The bus will drop you off at the bottom of the hill. There was a great view, but the castle is just a bunch of blocks in the ground where the foundation should’ve been.

The third stop I made was the shrine that Masamune Date built. I really like shrines, but this was just a shrine and preparations were being made for a festival that won’t happen until after I leave. I found out the shrine honors the deity of warfare as well. Woof.

I got back to the hotel and my room is very nice. Now this is what a hotel should be like. There’s a big public bath on the second floor and I absolutely love soaking in a giant pool of hot water. For dinner I went out to get a Sendai specialty, Maboyakisoba (which was ok at best), and that food plus the lack of sleep and I’m too tired to leave the room again. It’s all I can do to finish this post.

The “free” dessert (and the one small beer) didn’t help with my sleepiness.

So there you have it. I took a shower in the room instead of hitting the bath, and tomorrow I either have a big day climbing up to Yamadera in Yamagata (the mountain temple) or I’m heading to the seashore of Matsushima. The temperature in the mountains of Yamagata is supposed to be ~85°F (29.5°C) tomorrow, and ~95°F (35°C) the next day, so I probably have to do all the mountain stuff tomorrow or just not do it at all. We’ll see how I feel in the morning.

I scheduled a full day in Tokyo to get my fancy watch serviced,  a particular errand that I’ve been unable to perform for years. The problem with having a multi-thousand-dollar watch is that you’re supposed to pay hundreds every few years to have it “overhauled.” It’s best to have a Grand Seiko overhauled in Japan because they’re supposed to do a better job and Seiko Japan also performs a “complimentary” polish of the scratches on the case and wrist strap that the US repair shop is unable to do. It also takes about a month and you have to hand-deliver and pick up the watch in Tokyo. I’m usually not in Japan for a whole month. Since I’m in Japan for much longer this time, it was time to get the overhaul done. Probably more about watches than you ever wanted to know.

The plane from Portland arrived in Narita early so I was able to drop off the watch in on the day I arrived (yesterday). This gave me a full day to kill in Tokyo with very little planned. First, I went out in search of breakfast. (Actually, first I fought with the janky WiFi in the Green Hotel.) I entered the first coffee shop I saw (just at the corner) and bought a “morning set” and a coffee. They were great, by the way.

Then I went out and ran the only other errand I had: mailing presents to friends rather than hauling them around with me for two months before I saw them. Being Asian I have to bring presents for a lot of the people I’m visiting (especially relatives) and rather than carry them around the trick is to drop them in the Japan Post. You can try the excellent delivery services, but they require you to write the address in Japanese. Japan Post is used to getting international mail so you can just scribble addresses in English. Plus they were trying to sell me curry from APA Hotels at the Post Office.

After that I was lost, so I took my sister’s advice to go see a stationery store called Kakimori. As soon as I found it I went in through the open door and got kicked out because it was 40 minutes before they opened. And I couldn’t even look in the window because they were taking pictures of the front of the store. What I did see looked a little boring and not worth the trouble, but I read up on the store and they have lots of papers and options for you to create your own notebook. Cool for notebook nerds.

Getting there early gave me time to wander. I didn’t mind because I rarely come to this side of the Tokyo loop line and I like wandering around Japan. In fact, I don’t even mind being bored in Japan. I’m not at work and it’s very different than home.

I found the ink store that was part of Kakimori where you can mix your own fountain pen ink. It was a ways from Kakimori, and they also weren’t open until 11AM.

But close to the ink shop was chocolatier who had various varieties of coffee and hot chocolate! The chocolatier was definitely worth the walk, even if I didn’t go to Kakimori.

But I did go back to Kakimori and  then more wandering. No pictures from inside the store but if you’re curious there was a nice blog post about it from the Three Staples blog.

At some point my wanderings led me to a massage shop of the Raffine chain. Japanese massages are odd. You don’t disrobe (though you can change into sweats they provide) and they also drape a towel over you and massage you through the towel and your clothing. I got a 15 minute head and shoulder massage, had lunch, and went back for 40 minutes of leg and 40 minutes of back. The second set of massages was from a tiny woman who was incredibly strong and my legs still feel worked over.

Oh, and I had lunch at Wendy’s, part of my experiment to see if American fast food is better in Japan (mostly yes).

At dinner I broke a silly rule I used to have. The rule is to avoid places where you order by buying a ticket out of a vending machine. You then go in and hand the ticket to the wait staff and they deliver the food. It’s a stupid rule and I ate at a restaurant that I walked by last year. I asked a guy outside how it was and he said, “It’s great, and you can get refills on your rice.” (Of course he said that in Japanese.) It was better than I thought it would be for a ticket restaurant and realized the rule was stupid.

On the way home I stopped into Lawson to get some Japanese craft beer and nearby there was a dimly lit sign for the temple where Jigoro Kano invented/codified Judo! I didn’t take a picture because it was too dark, but now I know where it is!

Well that’s it for Tokyo for a while. I’m off to Sendai tomorrow.

Is blogging even a thing anymore? I think I had another question to write here but even though it’s only 8:30PM in Tokyo, it’s 4:30AM in Portland where I started out the day. I’ve almost been awake 24 hours and I’m fading fast.

But even though I had to put up with company elitism at the airport:

and an uncharacteristically rude Japanese person sitting next to me:

I made it to Japan.

The plane landed an hour early, but the lines at immigration were hideously long. It’s just more practice for standing in lines with lots of Chinese people, as I’m going to do at any touristy site in Japan.

Took the Keisei Liner into Ueno which is zippy and clean. I usually take the Narita Express to Shinjuku, but this trip is a special adventure.

I got into town early and was even able to drop off my watch for service at Seiko’s watch repair center. I had allocated a day in Tokyo to do that, but I had time to do it on my first day. The service center was right next to the National Theatre where they seemed to be having some sort of boy band show. There was a huge line of young women waiting to get in.

Seiko’s watch repair center is near Tokyo Station, and Tokyo Station isn’t too far from the Tokyo Tower. Actually when I think of Tokyo Tower I think of the Rise and Win Taproom and I finally made it in! I met the owner and a couple of his brewers when the came to Japan a few years back and I’m also going to visit the brewery later this trip.

Wow, that only took me two hours to post. WordPress is being a huge pain. And my usual headache that I seem to get after a flight to Japan seems to be kicking in. The saline nasal spray an the Neti pot didn’t seem to help. Oh well.

Just a few notes about the hotel. Ueno was historically a place with lots of hotels. I think I remember reading that the merchants stayed here in their travels through Japan. In any case, booking.com had a listing for the “Green Hotel” (which happens to be Pepto Bismol pink) and it’s rated quite highly. It’s quiet, not too far from Ueno, and clean. It’s also a bit odd. You take your shoes off before you go in (not that big a deal) and my room is on the ground floor, through a door behind the front desk, and through the kitchen.

The room is fine, clean, and pretty cheap. But it doesn’t feel like what I’m used to in a hotel. I’ll probably give it a good rating but it did have everything I needed. A warning though: the bathroom is incredibly tiny, so I wouldn’t suggest it for larger people (I’m only 5’9″ and 185 pounds and it’s tight in there.) Plus it’s the farthest thing from being fancy. Small, budget travelers will be fine here. Larger travelers and people who expect some level of fancy will probably not like it.