Sapporo Snow Festival

More snowmen and the return home

The Taj Mahal in snow.

On the last morning we headed towards the south of the city to see the final bunch of snow sculptures.  These included a chicken with toy train going round it, the Taj Mahal, and lots of cool ice slides which I wanted to go on but didn't.  I thought it might be a bit dangerous given that I'm heavier than your average Japanese child and so would've gone flying out into the street before I could stop.  There was also a giant snow Doraemon.  And in one corner of the park there was 'make your own snowman' corner, except that being Japan, all the snowmen had to be the same size, which made it look a bit sinister.

A fun-looking slide that I didn't dare to go on.

After that we headed back to the centre of town for lunch and omiyage buying.  Here I will digress a bit to tell you about my omiyage.  In the past I've bought the usual collection of biscuits and crackers.  When I've given them to people they've

Although I think it's meant to be a sumo wrestler, this snowman looks undeniably evil.

always opened them straight away and tried to get me to eat as many of them myself before leaving.  This time I bought some chocolate from a famous chocolate shop called Rokkatei.  They make extremely nice chocolate.  And when I gave them away they went straight into people's bags never to be seen again.  I took this as a compliment to my omiyage-buying abilities.

A field of homogenous snowmen.

Anyway, while in the station we also bought 8 train tickets for about half the price of seven.  This was another inexplicable deal that the tourist information people came up with.  In fact, looking back, I don't know why I spent money anywhere else.  So we hopped on a train to Tomakomai, then a bus to the port, and then the ferry, pausing only to buy some special Hokkaido beer that you can't get in the rest of Japan.  The crossing back to Akita was less eventful than the trip up and so a lot easier for us all.  And so ended our journey to the north and back.

Chris always wanted to be a sailor.