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Published: July 19th 2010
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We bought one day sightseeing bus pass which would allow us to travel to sightseeing places, as well as viewing them from the bus. We had missed the No 3 bus departing at 12:05, and needed to wait for another 20 minutes. However, I realised that the canal plaza was a walking distance from the station and we decided to walk. Whilst heading for the Canal Plaza, we found the remains of the Temiya Railway, which was Hokkaido’s first steam railway. We didn’t only see the monument and rails but also saw platforms, signal boxes, and signposts and the rails were laid towards the Otaru Museum, former Railway Museum, which we had planned visiting in the afternoon.
Having arranged to meet up with my parents at 12:30, we decided to walk along the canal. As anticipated, there were loads of old-fashioned warehouse buildings which were once used for keeping tons of coal and bricks that had been unloaded from ships and have been converted to the visitor centre, gift shops, and restaurants. There were a series of embossed carvings on the wall, which illustrated the past history of Otaru and how the canal was used, e.g. labourers unloading bags and
boxes of wheat and coal, fishermen catching a shoal of herrings and crabs. I explained to Mark that Otaru once flourished as a trade centre and main harbour of Hokkaido, and became the financial district in the 1920s.
However, Otaru’s economy declined at the beginning of the 1930s, and Otaru no longer served as a main harbour in the 1940s. After the war, Otaru appeared to be the deserted coastal town with unused wooden and stone buildings. By the late 1960s, some of the old wooden buildings were destroyed and the canal close to the sea was filled up with Tarmac. The Otaru residents were shocked to see the destruction of the historic buildings, and they protested against the modern project. Thus, quite a few warehouses and stone buildings which were built at the beginning of the 20th century have remained, as well as keeping the 1920s canal as a main tourist attraction.
We took several pictures along the picturesque canal and warehouses. We met up with my parents while walking along the canal.
We went to the restaurant where the staff were dealing with fish and shellfish which have been freshly taken from Otaru harbour. We
decided to have a set menu with rice, miso soup cooked with fish stock, pickle, and choices of three fish and shellfish, e.g. tuna, prawn, squid, salmon, salmon roe, octopus, mackerel, sea urchin, and scallop, to name just a few. We enjoyed eating fresh fish which we wouldn't be able to eat in Britain.
Otaru Annex Museum
Next, we went to Otaru Annex Museum. As we planned looking round Otaru Museum later, we bought the combined tickets. There were a wide variety of fascinating historical artefacts, maps of shipping routes where ships conveyed wheat, timber, and cotton to Japan's major ports and Sakhalin, models of the old street corners with rickshaw with rice barrels, the exhibition room of the Western style room, models of wildlife and people's life in the stone age era together with vessels and fragments of the Stone Age time which have been excavated.
Otaru Museum
We then got on the Shukutsu course sightseeing bus for Otaru Museum. We showed the combined tickets and started exploring the museum. We were impressed with the Shizuka Steam Railway, which was displayed in the entrance hall. As expected, there were scores of photographs of the steam railways and
diesel trains, number plates, station boards, articles and documents related to the memorable events, and exhibition and models of Hokkaido's first railway.
The details of the freight train included the scenes of the ship unloading boxes of coal to be conveyed to the cars of the steam railway. The exhibition of labourers digging the tunnels and building up the railway bridges in the mountainous regions didn't only look realistic but also it broke my heart, thinking how hard and painstakingly the labourers had to work in a cold and inhospitable climate. Looking at the model of the remote village where villagers were cheering for the first railway going through, I felt they would been a little shocked to see the steam railway with several cars, as they had been living in a primitive way in the rural region. It was very interesting to see the exhibitions of snow ploughs, which would been necessary for Hokkaido since the beginning of the first steam railway's operation. There were quite a few elderly visitors who expressed nostalgic about the old diesel cars, steam railways, and past memorable events. We were also amazed at the extensive railway network in Hokkaido which had been
rapidly developed since the first railway line opened in 1880.
As well as the exhibitions related to the railway industry, Otaru Museum showed exhibitions of history, science, and nature. We enjoyed experimenting with various equipment related sound, physics, and electricity.
Afterwards, we went out of the building and explored the outdoor exhibition. There was a wide variety of trains e.g. rescue train with various types of equipment and devices which would run when the passenger train got derailed, mail service cars with models of the sorting rooms and delivery goods, snow ploughs, the 1960s long distance train, and steam trains. We also noted the depot with its nostalgic design, turntable, water tank, and the monument indicating the starting point of Hokkaido's first railway.
Historic buildings in Otaru
We missed the last bus back to the Canal Plaza and decided to walk along the canal. There were loads of fishing boats moored on the water, and a number of stone buildings which were once used as warehouses, brewery factories, and the branch of Japan's mailing services and banks etc. We walked along the former financial district on the way back to the station. There were numerous symmetrical and sturdy-looking stone buildings in the back streets and corners. Most of them used to be the banks in the 1920s and they have been converted to the hotels, restaurants, gift shops, and museum. It was also interesting to learn that the station building was one of the historical buildings, which was built in 1934 and possesses scores of mysterious lamps.
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