Japan May 2008 Day 3

Day 3- 2 May 2008

This is the view from my hotel room.. It's like a total jungle out there.. But there are cherry blossoms.. =)

And this is the hotel I stayed in.. Lemme translate it for you guys.. It says Noboribetsu Yumoto Hot Spring Hotel..

Went out for a morning stroll before breakfast to take pictures with the cherry blossoms from last night.. A Singaporean tourist from another tour took this for us.. Hehe.. This was the only full bloom cherry blossom tree..

And this is the streets of Noboribetsu.. Little town.. A small quiet village.. And that's the Singaporean tourist who took the picture for us..

And this is breakfast.. It's like a set thing with free flow of orange juice, fresh milk and tofu.. They even wanted to serve us rice.. Can you believe eating rice first thing in the morning? Haha.. Poor aunties have to wash so many bowls and plates..

Sent the luggage up the bus after that and continued with the trip.. Before we left the hotel, 4 of the staff supposedly the HOD came out to bid us farewell.. It was such a sincere goodbye and they bowed and waved us off and didn't even leave until our bus made a final turn out of the small town..

Our first stop of the day was this still active but currently sleeping volcano.. See the smoke coming out from behind?

There were also a few houses that were all overturned by an earthquake.. Those small little figures at the back..

There is little vegatation on top of the volcano as there were mainly only ashes on the top of the volcano..

Next up was Lake Toyako.. A very huge and calm lake.. That's a seagull there I think.. Haha..


That's Avril beside me.. I'm supposed to send her the pic.. Maybe I'll do that later.. Haha.. The bird calafares again..

Me and my grandma.. The bird is still there.. I wonder if it's a robot.. He's been there while everybody takes pictures..

I looked like I just shitted out the bird lah.. Haha..

Welcome to the Toyako Lake Picnic Site.. Admission is free but you gotta get thru the Cow Head & Horse Face first.. Haha..

Dunno who is this.. Some protector of the park I think.. Haha.. Took this pic for my brother who likes funny stuff..

Ah.. Cherry Blossoms again.. Haha..

That's my Grandma with another one of those statues.. She said the girl looked lonely so she went down to take a picture with it.. Haha..

Ah.. The sweet cherry blossoms again.. Haha..

A volcano village- Mt. Showa.. It's still an active volcano I think.. Oh well.. Say cheese volcano!

Look at the pretty pretty flowers.. I picked a correct time to come to Japan.. Haha.. It's spring there..


It was time to visit the bears.. This is a bear ranch that houses about 180 bears.. These are the oldest ones, 10 years old.. I'm feeding a cookie type of food for it.. This pic looks scary.. My left arm looks amputated lah..

This bear is actually calling us to throw food at him.. The bears are so cute lah.. You throw them an apple and they catch it accurately in their mouth..

Welcome to Mt. Showa's Bear Ranch.. Only apples and bear cookies are allowed..

Oh by the way, that's lunch.. There's some sort of "xia mi" rice with a huge scallop and a suki yaki hotpot.. And there's udon too.. So many things to eat lah.. Breakfast haven't even digest yet..

This is Fort Goryokaku, Japan's first western style stronghold. The star shaped fort was built in 1864 for the defense of Hokkaido against invasion.. Those are paper carp fishes hanging there.. Not ikan bilis lah..

There were cherry blossoms around the tower as well.. Haha.. So must take picture..

And this is the picture from the top of the tower.. The entire area is shaped like a star and the area includes a park with cherry blossoms..

Whoa.. That's the day view of Hakodate.. The houses are all short but very close knitted..

Picture time! Say cheese!

Hehe.. We went down to the park to take pictures with the cherry blossoms.. There were like so many of them lah but we didn't have time to walk about.. =(



I dunno why they call it a fort or a stronghold though.. It looks just like a star shaped tower to me..

Oh by the way, that's my bus.. It was meant for 40 people but the whole tour group only comprises of 20 people.. Haha.. Kanko means 观光..

And that's a tram travelling on the streets of Hakodate.. You pay a fixed fare like of 200 Yen so no matter you go 1 stop or 30 stops it's just 200 Yen..

明治 refers to the present Japanese Emperor.. Haha.. Alot of you may be thinking this was another historical site right? Wrong.. It was a shopping district inside it lah.. Haha.. Another impromtu attraction added in..

These are the streets around that area.. Another little town with lots of shopping to do inside each of the buildings..

And this is the sea bay surrounding it.. Hakodate Bay!

Danny said we must take a picture with this post box because it's even older than any of us.. 107 years I think..

That's dinner for today.. They use water to cook the food on that hot plate instead of butter.. So healthy eh.. And that's a honeydew there.. A very expensive honeydew.. You'll know why in my later entries..

After dinner, it was time for a ride on the Hakodate Cable Car.. The ride up and down takes only 3 mins each so it's like really fast and shaky.. I think they can squeeze in 52 or 58 people into the cable car..

Say cheese! You're on top of Mount Hakodate.. And the weather there is like freaking cold lah.. The wind just kept blowing and blowing..

Ok.. I took like so many pictures of the night view but only a few turn out right.. I even had to climb and hang for my life outside a barrier to get this pic because there were just too many people.. Anyway, the nightview is perfect.. Super wow! No wonder it's voted Number 3 in the world.. Number 1 is Italy and Number 2 is Hong Kong..

After another long day, it's time to return to the hotel.. Hokkaido Kokusai Hotel.. A very luxurious one.. The toilet was so big and the TV had Chinese channels like CCTV and English ones like CNN..

My grandma called some massage service into the room.. The guy is a blind masseuse but he was so professional.. I snapped this picture and went out to the 7-11 to buy instant noodles and milk.. Hehe..

Okie.. That's it for Day 3.. Stay tune for the rest..