Sapporo snow festival

So after a night in Aomori, we had a taste of what the cold and snow would be like in Sapporo, our next big stop. (Talia was very excited.) (Not so much.)

We left Aomori early in the morning, because it takes 6 hours (!!!) to reach Sapporo by train. Aomori is the northern-most city reached by the Shinkansen (the fast train), so from now on, we could only travel by regular trains.

The position of the train in the tunnel is displayed every few minutes in the car

The train from Honshu to Hokkaido passed through a long tunnel (which is actually crossing the sea), and after a short transfer in Hakodate, we finally arrived in Sapporo around 16:00.

Sapporo is the biggest city north of Tokyo and it looked very lively when we arrived: People rushing everywhere, subway lines, and long walks to get out of the station.

One of the great idea we saw in Sapporo subway: reserved cars for women, children and disabled during morning rush hour

You know you're in a big city when you see that kind of stuff :)

Our hotel was a luxurious one: Mercure Hotel in downtown Sapporo, a 5-minute walk from the Snow Festival main event are and near the busy shopping street.

We received a cup of hot chocolate as a welcome present, and we had TV with BBC! Why are we so excited? Because we haven't had foreign channels for a long time, probably since Tokyo.

All was well, but one thing: they didn't leave any shower soap or shampoo in the bathroom!

Well, it's good that we're backpackers and we have everything we need on us. Also, we probably could have asked at the reception desk, but we kept forgetting.
We didn't spend much time at the hotel and went directly to the Snow Festival main street - Odori - to admire the beautiful sculptures.

 

There were small sculptures:

And big ones:

And there was an international contest going on when we were there. They had less than 24 hours to finish their sculpture:

And a snowboard show:

And lots of food stalls everywhere. One thing is sure in Japan: You can not be hungry for very long. Or need the toilet for very long. Which is awesome if you are a girl.

Anyway, even at -5 degrees, we enjoyed being there.

That's how Japanese girls are dressed when it's -5 Celsius degrees. Insane!

The next day, we walked around the other festival events and one of them was just around the corner from our hotel: Susukino site.

Susukino site

Even if it was smaller, it was a good surprise too:

Talia tries to eat a frozen crab!

Ice Transformer!

And we could go stand on the sculptures!

Rony and Talia in their crystal palace

But it was mainly for kids:

Vroum! Vroum!

Tchu! Tchu!

We then went to warm up and have dinner in the huge underground mall that connects 3 subway stations: Susukino, Odori and JR Sapporo station.

And have some Baskin Robbins ice-cream:

And Talia bought herself a few (more) shirts. She really likes the fashion here :)
Maybe she can import it to Israel and create a start up :) This is only our 5th idea for a start up since we started our trip. :-)

On the third day, we went a bit further in Sapporo, to another Festival site and had some fun sliding on our butts:

Even if this place was mainly for kids, we had fun too.

Talia even met a family from Houston!

Then we went to do some more shopping. After all, we're leaving Japan soon. If we could bring back everything we like here, we would probably need a cargo. But since we are limited in weight (by the airplane companies and by our backs too) we need to make a selection.

In one of the mall we stroll, we saw that and of course we couldn't miss it :)

Anyway, Sapporo was fun and we're happy we came to the Snow Festival. It's the last big thing we planned to do here in Japan. But don't worry, we still have a few things to see here, mainly other snow festivals around Morioka, on the way back to Tokyo.

But that's for another post ;)

Pics from Sapporo and the snow festival:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=616687&id=906005363&l=e79d7189a8