Hokkaido Trip Day 3
Bubbling mud
'Twas a white and foggy morning with a thick layer of frost on the ground . . .
I woke up early, as usual, but my travel buddy was battling a migraine. Fortunately, I had a stash of pain killers with me that she could take. I let her be and went out to take pics of the foggy town. I didn't feel like changing just yet, so I went out in my jammies and borrowed a long coat the hotel provides for their guests (that coat was warm, yo! ). The fog made things look so ethereal. I was walking about, taking pics, and came across a local auntie walking her dog. She told me to not go for a walk up into the mountains, which I'm guessing because of the fog and it wouldn't be a great idea for tourists to wander into the woods. No worries there, since I was heading back to the hotel anyway.
Breakfast was served until 9am, so all's good if we get in the dining room by 8:30. She was feeling a bit better by the time I got back to the room, so we went down for a quick bath before we headed to breakfast. There was nobody there, so my travel buddy took a few pics of the communal bath. It was great enjoying a soak with nobody around. I pretty much had the same thing as the day before, rice, salmon, fried noodles, miso soup, yogurt with peaches, sausage, and taters. Of course, a glass of milk, orange juice, and hot coffee. We took our time with breakfast since we weren't checking out until 10am. Our flight back doesn't leave until 6:30pm, so we had plenty of time. Over breakfast, my travel buddy said the sweetest thing. She told me that she trusts my driving and is comfortable with me behind the wheel. That must be one of the nicest thing anybody's said to me ☺️ I do like to drive.
The fog cleared up and it turned out to be a beautiful day. We stopped by the Ainu village to take pics in daylight. I took a bunch of pics earlier when it was foggy out. We then stopped by a local bakery to get some bread. Most likely, it'll end up to be our lunch since we'll be driving and stopping here and there along the way. Just down the road from the bakery, there's a 1.5-kilometer hiking route around the Akan Lake Eco-Museum Center that features a tank with marimo and further down the trail there's the “Bokke,” a mud volcano where underground gases and water vapor push hot mud to the surface. It was pretty cool to see the mud bubbling and making popping sounds. The view of the lake was awesome, too. Since it was Sunday, of course, there were kids wreaking havoc. Ugh. There were a bunch of tourists, too (loud ones). We did have a rather late start and it was a beautiful day, so of course there will be more people out and about.
I noticed that I was at the last bar of gas, so I asked Siri to find me the nearest gas station. There was one near the michi-no-eki we stopped by on the first day. Sometimes, Siri is a bit too responsive. I was talking about Siri and something else, and for some reason, Siri pipes up saying she found something or other in Oklahoma and asked me if I wanted to call them. Nooooooo!!! π That reminded me of a time where my Google Assistant responded, saying something about chocolates, when I was on another trip with my travel buddy and we were totally talking about something else. The sucker piped up when I was in an online interview once, too. Got a few chuckles from that one, and I got the job, so all was good. Yes, I found the gas station and managed to fill the tank.
During our drive to the airport, we spotted a field with cranes, so of course, I pulled over to take pics. We were hit by eau de manure as soon as we opened the doors. Pee-yew! I guess the farmers just finished fertilizing the field. I was only out there for a few minutes, but I swear, the smell stuck to my fleece jacked for a while! I could smell the lingering stench. Fortunately, the smell dissipated before we got to the airport. Of course, we stopped by that michi-no-eki since my travel buddy wanted to pick up some cheese.
Our last stop before our flight was a farmer's market, but they were closed for maintenance! They were closed the whole 3 days we were in Hokkaido! Man, was my travel buddy disappointed! She wanted to buy a specific type of sake, but fortunately, she found what she was looking for at the airport. We took pics of a bridge that boasted a marvelous view of the sunset, but we couldn't hang around til then since we had a plane to catch.
On the way to the market, we saw bales of hay wrapped up in black plastic but there was one field that had the hay wrapped up in white plastic. It made the field looked like a Go board (Go is a board game kind of like Othello but with more sophisticated rules). She wanted to go back to take pics. The fun part was finding the right spot to make a U-turn. The highway we were on was too busy, so I turned off to a side road, where we saw a pasture with a bunch of cows. Of course, we pulled over and took pics π She got her pics of the hay and was happy.
We got to the airport pretty early so we did some shopping and had dinner. The restaurant we went to offered Hokkaido specialties -- pork and rice bowl (θ±δΈΌ, "butadon" ) and spaghetti and pork cutlets covered in meat sauce (γΉγγ«γ, "supakatsu" ). The dishes were pretty good.
Since we were landing in Haneda at 8pm, meaning that I won't be getting home til around 10 or 11pm, I decided to stay at a hotel in the city. The place I stayed at is a standard business hotel but offered a super simple breakfast of sweet rolls, fruit yogurt in individual containers, coffee and tea from 6:30am. The room was clean and bed comfortable. Soft drinks are offered all day.
On Monday morning, I made the mistake of taking the subway instead of walking to the Tokyo station. I ended up getting out the wrong exit which was way over wrong side. Had I walked, I would've made it to work on time. Because I took the subway (which was supposed to save me 10 minutes), I ended up being 15 minutes late π Never again, yo.
All in all, it was a great trip in great company. Hopefully, we'll be traveling together again in the not so distant future.
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