Day 3 in Hokkaido - 10 July 06
Time flies... especially when you are having fun!
Slept at almost 12am but was too tired to wake up to catch the World Cup Finals. Yeah!! Italy won!! but I think this caused many people to lose money.... :P
The first place we visited on our itinery today the Milky Way Falls & Shooting Star Falls at the Sounkyo Gorge.
The water from the Shooting Star Falls are running quite fast and spurting in different directions, like shooting stars, hence the name. The Milky Way Falls, however, had water flowing down in a very 'yew siew' manner.... hmmm... but i think the water should be quite fast too! cos when it reached the bottom, can feel the strong currents.
We only stayed there for 30mins. After which we set off to visit the Ice Pavilion. Brrrrrr...... can't imagine how cold -40 degrees celsius would be like?!?!?
At the Ice Pavilion, we were given a 'thick jacket' to protect ourselves from the extreme cold. The jacket was really THIN!!! Not thick at all, but it was really really useful as I didn't feel the cold at all!!! But my fingers were freezing when I took pictures without my gloves. Argh!! Wearing gloves made me felt so clumsy and I can't really feel my hands!!
The interior of the Ice Pavilion was already -20 degrees!!!!! There's a button at the -40 degrees section where the harsh wind would be blown in your direction once you hit the button, to experience the extreme weather at -40 degrees, which is the lowest temperature Hokkaido experienced during its bitter winter days!!! WAH!!! I remembered when I was in Korea, the -10 degrees already were a torture for me!! Can't imagine coming to Hokkaido during winter and had to brace myself for -40 degrees!! KILL ME!!!!
Later we went to this cosy corner to have a cup of hot tea and some biscuits. There were souvenirs on sale here. I bought 4 cute walrus that emits light for my 4 nieces here. So kawaii!!!
After that, we left for Otokoyama Sake Brewery Museum. The sake here was very famous and won lots of awards from all over the world!! There's a very nice garden outside the Brewery Museum. There was an exhibition area displaying all the ancient tools for brewing sake. WAH... damn clasic man!!! The best part was the 'subtle advertising' found in the olden days woodprinting pictures, you can notice the logo of the "男山" in these paintings!!! Brilliant!!!
We were given a small cup of sake to try. There's the bitter one, the sweet one and the hot one. We tried the sweet one of course!! Yucks.... I think I don't like the taste though it won many awards... I prefer Sapporo Beer anytime!! :P
There's this fountain at the Sake Brewery, where it was believed that if you drink from this 'fountain', you'll obtain longevity. A lot of people really bring SUPER BIG Containers to fill them up with the fountain water. We tried some too! Very cooling and fresh!! Does it mean I'll live 1 year longer?? HAHAHA
The garden was filled with lots of pretty flowers!!! We took quite a lot of photos here as the view was really very nice! ; )
Lunch was at Lavender Hill. When we walked into the restaurant, we saw a mini hairy crab on the tables and thought "WAH!! We can finally eat crabs!!" but to our disappointment, that was not our menu..... Ours was a bowl of noodles, a bowl of rice with scallop inside, some fresh scallops, a mini hot pot, and some salad with 1 slice of orange and 1 piece of Potato Croquette. Its delicious, but when we see those Japanese tourists sinking their teeth into the delicious crabs... we felt envious!! Hmmmmm
From Lavender Hill, we had to take a 2hour bus ride to Ishiya Chocolate Factory. YEAH!! Finally I am visiting the legendary Ishiya Chocolate Factory.
The Chocolate Factory was HUGE!! and the building was very "European" and PRETTY!!!!! There's a huge clock tower there, and we saw the majestic performance by the 'statues' on the buildings when the clock struck 4:30pm (almost closing time). There's singing chefs, chefs playing instruments and some animals rotating around the clock tower. So fun!!!
The aroma of the chocolates filled the air.... The 'processing' was done mainy by machines... Damn cool!!! There were some tea cups on display at Level 2. So pretty & exquisite!!!! There was a section where you can pay to go in to learn the baking process and make your own cakes!! So nice!! The sugar crafts were so pretty that you won't bear to eat them if you buy them!! They come in nice shapes and designs - piano, dolls, shoes, animals....
After that, there's the TOY MUSEUM!! The toys were really classic!! I was so excited to see Astro Boy standing outside the Toy Museum! : )
There's this garden outside where there were lots of mini houses! So pretty!!! I squeezed into one of the house. There were some mini furniture inside as well!! If only I had such toys like this when I was young ...
We bought 2 pieces of cake from the 'souvenir' shop. Oishi desu!! The packaging was so nice!!!
We would be staying at a Hot Spring Resort Hotel tonight as well. It's about the same as yesterday's room, but I think the toilet was slightly more spacious. We stayed in Rm 605. Dinner was served at 7:30pm. Its a set meal waiting for us!! and I saw CRABS!!! long legs!!! Yummy!!!!
Liao-san bought some firecrackers. We went to the open field in front of the resort hotel to play with the firecrackers. So fun!!! We could never do that in Singapore as the government thinks its dangerous.... What a lot of fun we missed!
Went to the public bath around 10:15pm to soak ourselves in the Onsen. WAH!! The temperature of the water damn HOT!!! Ouch ouch ouch!!! I can only tahan for 15mins. There were a few obasan in the onsen. They really paced their way through... going in... then coming out to take a rest by the shower area.... then rinsed themselves with hot water before they dip into the onsen again!!! No wonder they can stay there like forever!! I felt myself cooked like a lobster in the onsen!! Grrrrrrrr....
The Yukata we wore tonight was nicer than yesterday's! At least we don't look like patients of a hospital!
