Early start to head to airport at like 5 or 6 am. dont remember :P was friggin early =_="
Saw these figurines displayed at airport :D some jap little kid was banging the display case window with his little hands saying 'kawaii... kawaiii' (cute) then he calls his dad over 'odousan!... kawaiii..." hehehe.. so cute..
Arrived in hokkaido in the afternoon.. was a 3 hour flight =\ seemed like alot of countryside from the view.. took about 1.5 hrs to next town where we were staying or something.. everythign around there is about a 2 hr drive across the whole island.
our hotel room which looks pretty traditional.. then when we came back they had layed out the sleeping arrangements :D the doona's sooo thick.. nice n warm ^__^
on the way to dinner.. random pic of lights (cant spell chandelere :P )
buffet dinner.. the meat in the seperate bowl was reaaaaaaaaaaaaally niceeeeeeeee *drool*
the street outside our hotel with lots of touristy shops
was quite cold outside n windy
the hotel where we stayed.. had a natural springs near it so we got to try out the japanese natural springs.. reaaaaaaallly nice!! they had inside pools with different types of water temperatures, and jets to massage your back etc.
they also had an outdoor natural spring which was hotter.. really nice..
this hotel had the best natural spring in hokkaido that we went to.
we were abit skeptical to try the natural springs 'onsen' as they hav certain procedures to use it.
first you have a cloth robe and slippers in your hotel room. you bring down a small towel and a big towel with you (also provided by hotel).
Usually there are 2 areas as the male and female onsen areas are split up. the male and female onsen areas are swapped during the day and night so you can try both areas as they differ slightly.
once you get in, you strip off all clothing and cover yourself with the small towel and walk into the bathing area where you are provided shampoo, conditioner, shower gel etc
after you have cleaned yourself then you can go and sit in the onsens.
some were quite hot, others milder as well as some with water jets.
theres a limit to sitting in the hot onsens which is about 5 mins then you can sit outside to cool down abit. this is so no one faints from the heat.
the onsen is known to be quite good for the body and blood circulation.
it fixed my friends bad leg which usually gives them more problems with the colder weather but they were fine during the whole trip because of the onsen. we found out that the onsen also lowered our blood pressure when we tried the blood pressure machine afterwards :D
after the dip in the natural springs, we went back to the hotel quite warm and tired. apparently the onsen keeps our body temperature warm for awhile after the dip so we were feeling hot even in our hotel rooms afterwards.
