Wednesday, February 12, 2014

Lake Shikotsu Ice Festival


We spent our first night in Japan at ANA Crown Plaza Chitose. 

The restaurant where we were to have breakfast opened at 5:40 am, but me and Geri were wide awake at 4:30 so we decided to go wait in the lobby and take advantage of the free wifi while waiting.
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I was expecting to get something like miso soup and toast for our free breakfast so I was surprised at the full-on buffet spread.
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Our tour group met up at 8:30 am in the lobby.  We were headed to Sapporo with a visit to the Lake Shikotsu Ice Festival and Okurayama Ski Jump both of which were on our way. Our first stop was Aeon Mall where we bought ice cleats for our shoes.
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These worked great, but some people still fell.  I think they need to put more of the grippy things on it.
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After about an hour bus ride we arrived at Lake Shikotsu.
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The wind coming from across the lake made it super, super cold there.
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Lake Panorama1

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Ramen was the perfect thing to have for lunch.
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This is my miso ramen.  Oishiiiiii!!!!
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This is Sweetie's Seafood Ramen.  She raved and raved and raved about this ramen for days.  I can guarantee you that she is missing it right now.
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Next stop . . . Okurayama Ski Jump.

12 comments:

K and S said...

fun!

jalna said...

It was, Kat!

Leslie's pics said...

So amazing what they can do with snow, but my favorite was the cute little snowmen! :-) So so so cute the little kid sliding down the slide thingy!!

Randism said...

the people and the place: outstanding!

Anonymous said...

Cooooooold!

jalna said...

The little kid kept wanting to do it over and over, Les. Soooo cute!

I agree, Rand!

Veeeeeeery, Anon.

Kalin's Mommy said...

Oh, I love your pics...can't wait for more!

jalna said...

Thanks, Mich!

Erick said...

Wow, the food looks great. Looks so cold. The snowmen look so cute.

jalna said...

Honest to God, Erick, Sweetie misses that ramen BADLY.

Nippon Nin said...

Those ramen look great!It's no secret that Hokkaido ramen is the best! And the snowmen are neat- after reading this post, it's not a bad idea to visit there in Winter...very very pretty.

jalna said...

Oh Akemi, I do hope that you get to visit Hokkaido in the winter time . . . soooo pretty.