Skip to main content

Japan: Travel to Tokyo

Travel was the theme of today. We started off the day with a nice meal to end our stay at Yukomanso onsen, then caught our bus back to Asahikawa station.

With only a few minutes to catch our train from Asahikawa to Sapporo, we were happy there were no delays on the road. Once we reached Sapporo, we only had just enough time to grab a quick lunch before catching the next train to Hakodate. Surprisingly, there was a lot of confusion and crowding at Sapporo station because some trains were delayed. When looking at the activity for 2 of the train tracks between Sapporo and the Chitose airport, the board showed no trains arriving or departing! Good thing we decided to take the train instead of flying between Sapporo and Tokyo.

It wasn't all smooth though - after leaving Sapporo, our train stopped short of one of the stations along the way. We sat waiting on the train tracks for what seemed like forever not knowing what was happening, until finally, the train started moving again. That delay was enough to cause a bit of concern for our connection in Hakodate, but luckily, we had a longer connection (a 30-minute buffer). After more than 3 and a half hours, we reached Hakodate, took a quick bathroom break, then ran for our last train that would take us to Tokyo.

On the shinkansen to Tokyo, there were bento boxes for sale! My dinner ended up being a very satisfying seafood bento, complete with crab (no imitation stuff, only the real stuff). Another 3 and a half hours, and we were back at Tokyo station.

Our first priority? Something cool. It was incredibly stuffy on the train because it was so packed with people, probably traveling for the weekend. After checking out all the food options available in the adjacent malls at Tokyo station, we found a dessert joint that was open late and serving parfaits. Parfait! We each ordered a giant parfait and savored every bite before calling it a night and heading to our hotel.

Tomorrow should be much better - the beginning of our Tokyo adventure!

Comments

kktt said…
Adventurous taking the train and sinkansen from Sapporo to Tokyo. How is the experience of sinkansen going across the sea from Hokkaido to the main island(Tokyo)?
October 30, 2016 9:16 am
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Happy Chinese New Year

I spent this past weekend in Toronto, sinfully stuffing my face full of Malaysian food in celebration of the new year. The image above shows a 2006 Australian Year of the Dog coin, commemorating the event quite fittingly - since the gift of money has its own part in the New Year's traditions. Now, although I may have eaten more than my share of glorious food, I also helped in the preparations of the feast! It was weird, baking with an electric mixer after having no such technology in Waterloo - I actually took a minute to stare in amazement while it was mixing the batter. Sad, I know. On Saturday night, I went to a friend's house for New Year's Eve and then later, to First Markham Place. Apparently, there was a countdown to midnight - which I'd never heard of before... and then realized why no one did it. As we counted down (in Chinese) - "sup... gou... bat... chut... lok... mmmm..." - and hit 5, a bunch of us burst out laughing. I can't really descr...
Post a Comment
Read more

Machu Picchu to Cusco

We survived. Our day started slow with breakfast and then killing time until our train departed at 1:30pm. That's what we thought would happen.  In reality, a landslide along our train route stopped all trains. Luckily, this happened before we were scheduled to depart, so we definitely dodged disaster. We ended up waiting only 2 hours to board a train out of Aguas Calientes, but this delay was only the first of many, which was not unexpected, since no one was prepared for the landslide.  Instead of our train taking an hour to reach Ollantaytambo, it took almost 2 hours, most likely because they were only able to clear one track along the route. Then, since we had to transfer to a bus in Ollantaytambo, and there was a backlog of passengers needing transportation, we got stuck in line/traffic. It took us almost an hour to get out of Ollantaytambo, with the streets completely jammed. We finally arrived in Cusco around 8:30pm, three hours later than the originally scheduled time. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Reflections on Peru

Before I get too in the weeds, I think it's worth noting that after at least a decade of traveling to developed countries, Peru was bound to be a very different trip. It was our first time traveling to South America. It was the first time I was traveling with my in-laws. Also first time traveling to high altitude locations. Lots of firsts! The first thing we noticed was the transportation - we travelled on a South American airline (LATAM) for the first time, and found it to be a good experience. They automatically checked us into the flight 48 hours prior - I can only assume this is because they don't overbook their flights. On international flights, they provided blankets, pillows, and a light meal to all passengers (which is no longer part of the base fare for North American airlines). Of course, we did have that unfortunate experience on the flight back (also with LATAM) where one of us got food poisoning - so they don't get a perfect score. The great experience also doe...
Post a Comment
Read more