hakodate day 4

Breakfast on the 4th day, was pretty impressive.

Salad, corn potage, yogurt with some blueberry jam, fruits, breads and grilled salmon, thick sliced bacon, a poached egg on stir-fried veggies and topped with homemade ketchup. There was also a bacon onion quiche.

Since we still had lots of time before check-out, we walked around the brick warehouse area which was turned into a shopping area.

Then after checking out, we headed to Hasegawa store to check out their yakitori bento.

Hasegawa store in business since 1978 was apparently the 1st convenience store in Japan to run 24 hours.

Their yakitori bento has nothing to do with chicken, apparently pork was more easily to come by back in the day, so their bento is topped with skewers of pork.

Choose the amount of rice you want, type of seasoning (tare (special shoyu sauce), shio (salt), shio tare (garlic salty sauce), umakara tare (extra tasty special shoyu sauce).

We chose the small (200 grams of rice) with the tare (special shoyu sauce). The sauce was a little sweet-salty, the pork very tender. Satoshi also ordered the shiso maki (pork wrapped with perilla) and beef tongue.

They have an eating area, so when our food was ready, we shared it. Satoshi, who doesn't really care much for pork, inhaled this.

Simple and delicious.

We then caught the tram to the Yachigashira area. Satoshi wanted to see the Hekketsu-hi, a monument dedicated to the fallen Tokugawa shogunate warriors.

It is up on the hillside near the Hakodate Hachimangu Shrine and Myoshin-ji Temple. Talk about trekking in the snow!

We hiked back down and caught the tram from Yachigashira to Yunokawa, which is the end of the line.

Yunokawa is an area with lots of hot springs.

We bought some yakidango (grilled dumplings) from Gingetsu.

After checking-in we ate the yakidango and cake donuts from Kin no kokoro and then went to relax in the hot springs.

Dinner was buffet-style at Tanta-an. Tanta-an is Ainu (language of the native people of Hokkaido) for lively. There was all sorts of things like crab, even curry.

Satoshi said that Hokkaido tends to cook their rice on the softer side. Their rice was a little too soft for my liking.

We also tried a soft drink called Citron, which is made with beet sugar. Nothing out of the ordinary, though it boasts that the flavor hasn't changed since 1950!

It was a great day, though our trip was coming to an end.

Hasegawa Store
23-5 Suehiro-cho
Hakodate, Hokkaido
Phone: 0138.24.0024

Yakidango Gingetsu
2-22-5 Yunokawa-cho
Hakodate, Hokkaido
Phone: 0138.57.6504
Call before going, days closed are not set

Imagine Resort
3-1-17 Yunokawa-cho
Hakodate, Hokkaido
Phone: 0138.57.9161