Blogs from Hokkaido, Japan, Asia - page 8

So we had another day in Tokyo just going around looking at amazing things. Yesterday we went to Matsushima. Matsushima was hit hard in 2011 by the earthquake and tsunami. The town is now nearly back to what it was prior to the tsunami. We had to get there by the bullet train via Tokyo to Sendai and then a local train to Matsushima - so we can honestly now say that after over 2 weeks in Japan we are train aficionados .Anything you need to know about Japanese trains please tweet/email me and I will be able to answer your questions, ha ha. We decide that we are going to take a boat ride around the harbour of Matsushima to see the 100 islands - it is not a good day from the weather perspective ... read more

Avoiding Typhoon Phonfone As we left you on the last blog, we were going to ditch Tokyo and head to the backside of Japan in the Sea of Japan, staying away from Typhoon Phonfone. We were initially disappointed to be missing Tokyo as we’ve never been there… but alas, I’m sure the weather gods have something else equally wonderful planned for us. img=data:image/png;base64,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... read more

Dateline: The Bearing Sea, 500 Shades of Grey… We left Dutch Harbor and headed into the grey fog of the Bearing Sea. Small (by comparison to our ship) fishing boats, tankers and tugs we alongside us for a ways. The skies were hundreds of shades of grey and the waters hundreds more. 500 shades of greys would change from light to dark, from misty to opaque. The seas, as they rolled beneath us reflected the sky’s greys and took on their own dark and shadowy greys from below. Grey everywhere… hard to tell the sky from the horizon from the sea. We are heading west toward Figure 1 Entering Fog Bank Dutch Harbor Russia and the Kamchatka Peninsula. Later we will turn south and set course for Amerika Pass and our destination, Kushiro. Even with all ... read more

This place is so weird...but so amazing...so weird... We took the short of two hours flight on Peach, a Japanese low cost....with very very small space between seats, reaching Sapporo airport just on time for dinner before taking the 3 hours shuttle bus all the way to Niseko. The New Chitose airport, 50km from Sapporo is actually a funny adventure...as there is a huge shopping center in the middle of it. The bus ride give us a good idea of what was lying ahead. Few Japanese, some Honkies and Chinese....and a lot of Aussies with few Europeans. We arrived at the Black Diamond Lodge just before 11pm. This place is suppose to be the "cheap" option....trust me, there is no cheap options for lodging around Niseko....there are just cheaper ones...and I had no intention to stay ... read more

Yoichi is a town that makes famous whiskey. And since Otaru is now full of mainland Chinese people, I thought I might as well make a trip over to Yoichi. I got to Otaru station at 1010. I then made my reservation to the airport tomorrow (staying overnight there because of early flight on Monday). The problem is there's not that many train to Yoichi from Otaru so I ended up spending about an hour wandering round the local mall which funny enough has a massive beauty section. I managed to get to Yoichi just before noon - unfortunately the brewery itself isn't open after Christmas so I only wandered round the building and took some photos. The snow was really heavy though - at one point my hair and eyebrows were covered. Then I took ... read more