tokyo-niigata

From where we live it took us about 2 hours to get to Niigata

(The last time we were in Niigata was in 2003, pre-blog and we only went to Sado Island.)

Arriving at 10:30-ish, our first stop was here

Bandai City Bus Center...to try their curry

Apparently this is a local favorite, stand and eat style in the bus terminal

The yellow curry was on the thick side and had a little kick to it

I had the mini...430 yen (tax included), which seemed pretty huge to me

Satoshi had the croquette with a regular curry...680 yen (tax included)

After lunch we went to check out Hakusan Shrine and Park

Loved all the wind chimes and huge pine trees

We were a little late for the someiyoshino type of cherry blossoms but the yaezakura (double) and shidare (weeping) types were still in bloom

From here we walked through Furumachi, this area had many long shopping arcades.

In one of those shopping arcades, we stumbled on the bronze statues of the manga "Dokaben" by Shinji Mizushima, who was born in Niigata.

And bought a furuhitotsu yukidaifuku by Maruya Honten, a sweet shop that has been in business since 1878!

This hefty sweet has anko (sweet bean paste), whipped cream, candied chestnut, banana and strawberry all wrapped with a super soft and thin mochi…389 yen (tax included)

Tulips are the prefectural flower of Niigata, it was so nice to see them everywhere!

Then we walked to Toki Messe, Niigata City's convention center, shared the yukidaifuku and then went up to the observation deck.

Unfortunately it was cloudy, so there wasn’t much scenery to see, the Niigata tenugui (hand towel) exhibit that was hanging from the ceiling was pretty though

I bought this Shinnosuke rice serum face mask....880 yen (tax included) at the gift shop

And then we walked to our hotel

The hotel room we booked had two single beds squished in an "L" shape in the room...talk about teeny, it was a good thing we only had backpacks

After resting a bit, we went back out to check out Sado Benkei, conveyor belt sushi.

We had seen this place on a tv show and wanted to try.

It was nice that they had some locally caught fish for some of the sushi

Sado Nodoguro (black throat sea perch)

Sado Nanban shrimp

Sado Mebaru (rock fish)...mine still had bones! not fun eats...

I'm glad we tried this place and would go back 

On our way back to the hotel, we stopped at Cocolo, the shopping area in the station to pick up some souvenirs.

Satakeya sasadango (yomogi (mugwort) mochi and sweet bean paste is steamed in sasa (bamboo leaves)...180 yen (tax included) each

Zuika kakinotane and arare...1436 yen (tax included)

We had thought it would be "warmer" but Mother Nature had decided to bring back winter, luckily we had brought some long sleeved clothing, though we ended up wearing all the clothing we had...ha!

It was quite a long day, lots of walking (23,988) and lots of eating.

Niigata Park Hotel

1-8-10 Minamisasaguchi

Chuo, Niigata

Bandai City Bus Curry

Bandai City 1F

Hours: 8:00-19:00

Sado Benkei

Bandai Food Hall 2F

Chuo, Niigata

Closed: Tuesdays

Hours: 10:30-21:00

Cocolo Niigata

JR Niigata Station

Hours: 10:00-20:30

*if you'd like to see more photos/videos, please look here