Japan Day 9 - Sapporo to Tokyo Fletch and I were getting into the groove of packing up and checking out every couple days. We did just that and checked the train schedules heading back down to Tokyo. Most of the trains in Japan run hourly at the least, but for that eight hour journey, our options were slightly more limited. Our choices were 10:44 or 13:30. We opted to try for the earlier itinerary, just incase anything funny happened where tickets were sold out. Best to have 13:30 as a backup option. We bought our tickets without any issue, and
Japan Day 8 - Sapporo Our morning coffee was interrupted by the sounds of music drifting in through the window. The thermostat on the apartment’s heater didn’t work, and we were keeping the window open to cool it down, even though it was still brisk out. I ran over to poke my head out the window, and noticed a small parade making its way down the street below. Day two of the Hokkaido Shrine Festival was apparently in full swing, and how fun to be able to sit and observe from above with a cup of coffee. Parade making its way
Japan Day 7 - Sapporo Fletch and I woke up to the most amazing view from the apartment, overlooking the park and the mountains in the distance. After booking everything, I had realized that we would be spending almost our entire time in Japan in cities, and while cities are definitely a change of pace from our normal lifestyle, they all begin to look the same after a while. It was nice to see some green. I watched the little lake with amusement for a while, where several couples were trying to figure out how to maneuver the oars on
Japan Day 6 - Sendai to Sapporo Fletch and I checked out of Hotel Vista Sendai where we had spent the last two nights, and walked the five minutes across the street to the train station. I had tried to strategically position us as close to the train stations as possible in each city, so that we wouldn’t have to deal with maneuvering our backpacks through packed subways or local trains. Japan is a place where you definitely don’t want to overpack, because maneuvering between crowds and small areas can get to feeling very claustrophobic. I feel claustrophobic at times