Japan Spring Trip: Hokkaido - Day 3 (Apple Holiday)

In continuation of my previous blogpost on my Japan trip, here's what I did for day 3:

Early morning after breakfast, we left Rusutsu Resort after breakfast at the same place we had for dinner.

After almost a two-hour bus journey to Otaru, we caught some really nice landscapes from the bus, and here are some pictures we managed to capture while we were on the bus:

Mount Yōtei, also known as the mini 'Mount Fuji' in Hokkaido.

As you can see from the pictures, the view looks a lot like winter, isn't it?

So anyway, while we were on the bus, our tour guide and tour leader kept us entertained by letting us try some snacks that we could purchase from them. Even tried some beauty products lol.

Anyway, time flew by and in no time, we made it to our first stop of the day, Otaru Canal. Otaru Canal used to play a central part in the transportation of goods, then restoration works took place in the 1980s for it took look as good as it is now. It's now a common location to shoot romantic scenes for films.

Otaru Canal

It was chilly that day, with strong winds.

We had to walk a bit to get to the Otaru Canal because now, tour buses are not allowed to stop directly in that area. Apparently, tour buses were able to do that last time but they caused congestion so it wasn't allowed anymore.

Anyway, the buses were parked near Sakaimachi Street, the next place we were going to visit. Basically, we were given the free time to roam around and see for ourselves the place.

Here are some photos I took at Sakaimachi Street:

Super awesome cream puffs!

One of the main attractions at Sakaimachi Street is the Music Box Museum. Things are a little pricey here, and frankly, we don't know how to appreciate them so we took a look at things and left to walk around.

Also tried the famous Rainbow soft-serve here.

This was what we had for lunch. Not the best meal but it was alright.

Next, we went to this place called Shiroi Koibito Park at Sapporo. It's Hokkaido's leading confectionery. This is the place where the famous Ishiya's chocolate cookies are made. It's such a niceeee place! See for yourself:

Spent quite some time looking around and taking pictures here. Such a nice place really! All the huge tulips were quite a spectacular sight.

I guess we were earlier than expected, so our tour guide decided that we should go and check out some sakura because we haven't really seen any yet. So, we were supposed to head to Hokkaido's former government building and Odori Park the next day but since we were ahead of schedule, we stopped by for a while before heading to our next destination.

Yay! Caught a glimpse of sakuras though most of them are still waiting for their time to bloom. Next, we headed to Tanukikoji for some shopping.

Our tour guide told us that drug stores are booming in Japan because of Chinese tourists. Well, maklumlah China is like the home of counterfeit products so a lot of Chinese tourists actually come to Japan to grab medications and that sort of things.

Some photos I took at Tanukikoji:

After some shopping, most of us bought snacks and all... then it was dinner time! We went to Ippudo at the same area in Tanukikoji. Seats were limited and we had to queue for about 30 minutes or so.

Generally, ramen in Hokkaido is very salty and our tour guide told us that after taking different tour groups to try their signature ramen, many Malaysians (like 9 out of 10 Malaysians) actually think that the ramen is tooooo salty for them. So we went to Ippudo to try out the famous pork-based broth instead. And it was greattt! I finished the soup :D

Oh, I tell you the gyoza was so good!

So, we stayed in the Sapporo Grand Hotel. Is it grand? Well, it's alright but this is probably the stuffiest hotel we stayed in because we couldn't open the windows and there wasn't any air conditioner. The whole room was also very narrow, we practically didn't have any place to even open up our luggage without blocking the pathway in the room.

The night is still young! So, we wanted to go to this place called Sushi Zanmai (lol, coincidentally the place I usually go for sushi in KL is also Sushi Zanmai) but we got lost for a bit. We went into the convenience store and asked for directions. The Lawson employee clearly didn't know where we wanted to go but she was so helpful she took out a hugeeee big book full of maps, flipped here and there while we stood there awkwardly. Japanese, always obligated to help, haha.

Anyway, we managed to find our way there, woohoo!