31 Oct 2009 is our last day of our honeymoon trip. We got up and had our buffet breakfast, becuase Chris and I will travel long hours later on, we decided to eat more during breakfast. We caught a bus to the Hakodate Train Station, exchanged the express train U seat tickets and decided to go over to the fish market nearby while we are waiting for the express train. There were a lot of squid product, other seafood and fruit. I ended up buying some fruit; lunch and some last minute gifts before we board our express train to the Airport. We departed Hakodate at around 11am and arrived in Sapporo at around 2:50pm. We checked in our luggage and went directly to our boarding gate. I was a little upset because I was going to do some more last minute shopping at the airport and we went to the gate instead. So I spent some yens on chips and lollies instead.

That’s our honeymoon trip, it was good however Chris was unwell from Day 2, poor Chris…

We still got quite a bit of yen left so we definitely will be back to Japan in some stage!!

Chris and I caught a tram into town after our buffet breakfast. We first visited the landmark of Hakodate – Goryokaku Tower. The tower has the lookout which you can see 360° around Hakodate, it also shows the history of Hakodate and Toshizo Hijikata, and how they designed the fortress. Around the tower, there are parks within Goryokaku, there are plenty of red leaves there, very pretty!

After Goryokaku, Chris and I took a walk to the harbour area to have a look at some more buildings, which has converted into food markets and tourist attractions. We stopped by at this Japanese fast food chain called “Lucky Pierrot”, and had Chicken Burger and Curry Pork Rice, Chris’ favouite!

We then returned to the hotel for a rest and spent some time in on-sen. After the rest, it is time for our dinner again, Chris and I were worried that we will eat the same food as the night before, but we realised the dinner menu is new. Also, the waitness has “cool down” our dinner room, becuase we both found it very warm the night before, we actually finally can enjoy 23 degrees cool dining room!! The new menu includes: Starter (with tofu), sashimi bowl, beef shabu shabu, seafood bake in bun, crab legs with Japanese mayonnaise, little fried fish on rice, cooked vegies, deep fried crab claw and dumplings, and other weird dish which we do not what it was.

After dinner, we joined a night tour to experience the night view of Hakodate, which we have been told that it is one of the top three night view in the world. Since Chris and I already very familiar with one of the three top night view – Hong Kong, we were eager to compare which one is better. We were viewing on the lookout of the mountain and it was a very windy cold night, it made the already sick Chris sicker… poor Chris.

Noboribetsu is famous for ghost is because they have a hell valley there… it is where the onsen water comes from. The Hell Valley is a most go place for tourist, and so Chris and I went to check it out after our buffet breakfast at hotel 登別万世閣 . Unlike touring with a guide, we actually have time to walk around the valley. Most of the tours just dropped off the people and asked them to go back to the bus within 10-15 mintues, that’s one of the reasons why I dislike travelling with tour and cannot do what I want to do. When we got there we saw a lot of mainland Chinese taking photos and as I mentioned, they required to return to the bus within 10 minutes. Many of them have lined up for the toilet there (well, at least they queued!!) and some of them have spoken loudly to each other… Chris and I quickly ecsape the ”Chinese Zone” and we walked to the middle of the valley and be able to enjoy the scenery finally!

Chris and I caught a train to Hakodate at around 10:30am, the last city that we will visit in our honeymoon. Hakodate is one of the southest cities in Hokkaido, and it is famous for squid production. The train we caught was pretty full and even we can reverse seats (U seats), Chris and I cannot sit together. So I bought ice-cream to cheer us up!

After arriving to the Hakodate Train Station, we caught a bus to Yunokawa Onsen (湯の川温泉) and checked-in to our hotel – Yunokawa Prince Hotel Nagisatei (渚亭). We definitely will recommend this hotel as this is the best onsen hotel we have even stayed! (http://nagisatei.info/)

I have found and booked this hotel when I was in Australia. We booked the private outdoor bath plan (ocean view), 18m2 Japanese style room, including two meals each day for two nights at total rate of 67,200 yen. It is equivalent to $800 Australian dollars or $5,500 Hong Kong dollars. It was very expensive!! But let me tell you, it worth every single penny of it!

After we checked in, Chris and I went out for lunch. We have been told by the hotel receptionist that there is a famous ramon shop nearby. So we went off to fill up our tummies. I ordered a salt based ramen and Chris ordered an oil based ramen (just because my oil base ramen tasted better when we had ramen in Sapporo). But again, my ramen tasted better this time! Poor Chris.

After lunch, we went back to our hotel room for our very own private onsen. Chris loves this private onsen at the baloney because he won’t be stared at by some Japanese old men at the public onsen. And we can truely relax in the hot onsen and enjoy the view of sunset and the sound of the ocean.

At around 7pm, we went down to our private room for our Japanese dinner, which is included in the package. The food just kept coming until we can’t eat anymore. The service, quantity of food, art of placing the food and decoration were just excellent! The first night dinner included fruit flavoured sake starter; baked snail; sashimi bowl for two; crab legs with Japanese Mayonnaise; chicken & squid shabu shabu; Green leaf salad; grilled fish with mushrooms; lemon sobert and a non-idenified dish.

After dinner, our room has been setted and we decided to have more onsen time…

The fourth day was our day travelling to Noboribetsu, the place famous for Onsen and ghost. After Chris an I had our buffet style breakfast, we got our train ticket to Noboribetsu. The train ride took about an hour.

Noboribetsua has a  very old train station , there is no lift or escalator, very different to other Japanese city train station. Lucky my hubby is tall and strong and he took all our luggages in one go! We were early when we arrived at our hotel, so we can’t check in yet. We left our belongings at the hotel and went for a wonder. We decided to go to one of the theme parks there, it is Edo Theme Park! This park is setting on the old Japanese time, the Edo era. We went onto one of the show in the park, it is about a shogun visiting Geisha House. And one of the audience will become the shogun! Amongs all the audience, who one has volunteered so one of the actresses needs to pick one. Guess who has been picked??? My Chris! Haha… he joked that he finally got a chance to practice his acting skills. Another barriers was the language, as the acting is in Japanese, the actress needed to whisper the Japanese into Chris’ ear, so he can ‘repeat’ his line. Everyone was very impressed with Chris’ Japanese and acting skills. I had the most fun of all, taking video and pictures, seeing my hubby on stage acting like a shogun! 

After lunch we went onto another show – a Ninja show but no one was invited to be part of the show. The fighting scenes weren’t bad however we had no idea what they were speaking as there was no subtitle! After the Ninja show, Chris and I tried out our bowing and Ninja skills at the game counters. They were waste of money!

We left the theme park at around 5pm, and we made our way back to the hotel. I booked a western room with buffet dinner online when I was in Australia. The room wasn’t great but the onsen was good. They have indoor as well as outdoor. The outdoor was very very good.  I wish I can stay longer but you should only stay in the hot spring for 20 minutes at a time. The food at the buffet was so so, nothing outstanding.  After dinner we went out to walk on the Onsen street, bought some gifts and back to the hotel coz it was very cold outside! Remember I mentioned that Japanese scared of being cold? Well, when we return to our room, we discovered that the room was very warm and the adjusting panel can only choose from either warm, very warm or hot. We can’t open the window and we couldn’t sleep at night so we ended up switch off the heating system. That was the worse night ever.

Chris started feeling unwell from Day 3, had a bit of fever and sore throat. But he still going to tour Sapporo with me. We had a Chinese Style breakfast at the hotel, which included congee, chicken with mushroom and Chinese pickles. Firstly we took JR to Sapporo, we skipped all the shopping mall district and went to the Sapporo Clock Tower, one of the famous landmarks in Sapporo. Then we went to the Former Hokkaido Government Office Building, which has now converted into the museum showing the history of Sapporo.

The next attraction is the Odori Park and Sapporo TV Tower. The city area is very relaxing and the people are very friendly. Chris assisted a Japanese couple to take picture for them and we ended up chatting for 15 minutes. They were from Tokyo and they came to Sapporo for a break. Both of them had already retired and the lady had studied some Chinese before. We chatted in three languages – a little bit of Japanese, mainly English and a little bit of Chinese. They congratulated us when they found out we were here for honeymoon and we all took photos together!

Next we went to the Tanukikoji Shopping Arcade and looking for places for lunch! Since Chris has been sicked he wanted something soupy so we decided to look for ramen noodle house! This restaurant is located inside the Tanukikoji Shopping Arcade and it is famous for its oil based ramen.

After lunch we decided to go back to the hotel for a little rest, we went down to the underground shopping arcade on our way to the underground train station. We were tempted by the sweets shops located in one of the department stores basement area. There were cakes, chocolate, chestnut product, waffle  and all these good looking little sweets. We ended up purchased two sliced of cakes and a bag of donut like cakes.

After few hours rest, Chris and I caught the underground train back to Odori Park and walked to Susukino. Susukino is the centre of nightlife in Sapporo. Many people said if you never had the crab cuisine in Hokkaido, you really haven’t been to Hokkaido. So I decided to take Chris to experience the crab cuisine. Chris was a little worried that he will make a mess as he’s not a really crab eater. If you also have this issue, don’t worry, you will find it very easy to eat here in Japan. You don’t need to crack the shell yourself because it is all done for you. All you need to do is to take the meat out and eat, very very easy. Chris and I both ordered different crab dinner set and trust me, there were a LOT of crab – king long leg crab, queen long leg crab, hairy crab… we were so full after that meal!!