Summer Vacation

A few weeks ago John and I took a spontaneous summer vacation! We decided to go up to Hokkaido, the northernmost island in Japan, for the first part of the week, and then pop down south to Kyushu for the final weekend of our trip.

Hokkaido was wonderful, much cooler than the hot humid weather Tokyo has been having, and with lots of wide open outdoor spaces. Our first stop was Noboribetsu, a small onsen town that's famous for its volcanic sulfur vents and geysers. After a night there we went to Sapporo, the biggest city in Hokkaido for several days, and then went out to Otaru and Yoichi. Otaru is a small port town with a lovely canal and old western style stone buildings. And Yoichi is the home of a major Japanese whiskey distillery. We really enjoyed seeing it all, and also relaxing, lying around reading, and spending time in coffee shops.

Fukuoka, the biggest city in Kyushu, reminded us a lot of Tokyo but moved at a much more casual pace. In one ramen shop (that is very famous and had a line out the door) we were told to take our time and enjoy our meal! At ramen shops in Tokyo you are expected to eat as quickly as possible and get out, so it was quite a pleasant surprise.

Both Sapporo and Fukuoka are know for ramen - miso up north, and pork broth in the south, and we ate our hearts out. We liked everywhere we went except for one place. Quick tip - if you find yourself in Sapporo, Yukikaze was incredibly good! And if you find yourself in Fukuoka we thought Issou did not live up to the hype.

Sulfur vents in Noboribetsu

John bought me this adorable coke

Coffee and cheesecake, plus John in the mirror

Our hotel in Sapporo had a fire pit on the roof

The old Sapporo brewery

Yukikaze ramen - so delicious!

Yoichi is old-fashioned and uses direct fire stills

Yoichi distillery

The canal in Otaru

Drinks on the beach in Kyushu

Fukuoka at sunset

If you're not having cake for breakfast you're not doing vacation right

Beppu Getaway

Over the summer I took a short trip to Beppu, a hot spring resort town in Kyushu, with my friend Nicola. I can't believe it's taken me so long to write about it, but it was such a refreshing break from Tokyo. The scenery was beautiful, the food was delicious, and I never say no to a good onsen.

Before we left I had trouble finding very much information about the area in English. My old paper Japan guidebook doesn't even mention the town! I'm going to go a little heavy on details and photos, so brace yourselves. 

The biggest draw in Beppu is definitely the hot springs, and for the most part that means onsen, but there are also jigoku or "hells" - hot springs so hot they are meant to be viewed rather than bathed in. There are 7 jigoku, and you can easily take a bus to all of them, but we had the luxury of renting a car and going at our own pace because Nicola has a Japanese drivers license! Each jigoku charges 400 yen admission, or you can buy a 2000 yen pass that grants admission to all. The entire tour can be done in just a few hours, so I'd recommend doing all of them. If you're pressed for time though, Umi Jigoku and Onishibozu were the two most beautiful in my opinion. Additionally, Oniyama Jigoku breeds crocodiles - apparently they like the hot water - but we found it kind of cramped and depressing. Definitely skippable.

Of course, what I was really excited about were the onsen. But be forewarned, the waters in Beppu are hot! The onsen where we stayed was so hot that neither Nicola or I could actually get in the water. Several Japanese guests looked at us like we were insane as we yelped and leapt out of the water. But they did the same thing when they tried to get in, and then agreed with us that it was shockingly hot. After that experience I decided to go to Hyotan onsen, which is a big onsen complex geared towards tourists. I was excited that it included the chance for a hot sand bath, and because I thought it was most likely to have at least some water that was a tolerable temperature. Good news - I soaked in all the baths, and none of them were too hot for me.

While we were in Beppu we decided to drive out to Yufuin, another hot springs town nearby. I think it has a reputation of being a little fancier and more sophisticated than Beppu. In any case, it was beautiful. It has a main shopping street filled with food and shops like many tourist towns, and if you follow that road far enough it ends at a pretty lake. Yufuin is also known for dairy production, so there are all sorts of ice creams, cheese cakes, and other delicious treats available.

I feel silly admitting this since I've lived in Japan for so long, but this trip was the first time I've ever stayed in a ryokan. A ryokan is a traditional Japanese inn with tatami (woven straw) floors, futon mattresses on the floor, and communal baths. Ryokans can be fabulously luxurious, but ours was definitely no frills. It's also common to eat breakfast and dinner at a ryokan, but we did not. I was surprised by how comfortable the futon was, but this was definitely a place to sleep, not to linger.

Nicola and I were both surprised by the size of Beppu and the main shopping streets. We'd worried there wouldn't be many restaurants, particularly open on Sunday night, but there were plenty of options within a short stroll of our ryokan. Our top recommendations are Genova, an awesome takeout ice cream shop, Torisutei Honten, a yakitori (grilled chicken) restaurant, and Kihei Cafe, an adorable coffee shop with a delicious breakfast. We also had delicious burgers in Yufuin at Yufuin Burger, and you can't go wrong with any of the ice cream in town.

Our little ryokan room

Steam vents and structures are visible throughout Beppu

The grounds of Umi Jigoku

Umi Jigoku

Girls' Trip

Oniishibozu Jigoku

Shiraike Jigoku

Chinoike Jigoku

Tatsumaki Jigoku

Delicious burgers

Yufuin

You can see steam billowing up in the mountains

Cheesecake ice cream

The drive to Yufuin is gorgous

Genova Ice cream
Hours: 3:00-Midnight Mon-Sat, 3:00-10:00 Sun
Phone: 0977-22-6051
Address: 1-10-5 Kitahama, Beppu, Oita
Map

Yufuin Burger
Hours: 11:00-5:30, closed Wednesday
Phone: 0977-85-5220
Address: 3053-4 Yufuincho Kawakami, Yufu, Oita
Map

Torisutei Honten
Phone: 0977-22-3787
Address: 1-15-11 Kitahama, Beppu, Oita
Map

Kihei Cafe
Hours: 8:00-6:00,
Phone: 0977-23-1134
Address: 6-30 Fujimicho, Beppu, Oita
Map

Hyotan Onsen
Admission: 750 yen, sand bath additional 330 yen + towel rental
Hours: 9:00 am - 1:00 am
Phone: 0977-66-0527
Address: 159-2 Kannawa, Beppu, Oita
Map

Nogamihonkan Ryokan
Phone: 0977-22-1334
Address: 1-12-1 Kitahama, Beppu, Oita
Map

My Favorite Ramen

Last month I had no problem telling you where the best burger in Tokyo is, but there's no way I could say where the best ramen in Tokyo is.  For starters there is just too much ramen in Tokyo for me to ever try them all.  More importantly there are so many types of broth, noodle, and topping options it would be like me telling you that penne with pesto is categorically better than spaghetti with marinara sauce. But I can tell you about my favorite ramen.  (If John was writing this he might even try to tell you it's the best)

Furyu Ramen in Shibuya

We first on stumbled Furyu with Tim and Christine back in November.  I was hungry and irritable, frustrated that we hadn't been able to find the perfect souvenir for Christine's sister, and sad that they were leaving in a few hours (so probably being a terrible host) when we finally decided to eat lunch.  I ordered the spicy miso ramen and fell in love at first bite.  Honestly, the first time I wasn't sure if it was just so good because I was starving, or if it was really that amazing.  But John and I have been back several times and it is always wonderful.

So delicious and so affordable!

Furyu makes Hakata style ramen which is a wonderful rich pork broth (called tonkotsu) with thin straight white noodles (as opposed to thicker, crinkly, yellow noodles).  The regular tonkotsu is delicious, but the spicy miso paste they stir in takes it to a whole new level of deliciousness.

I'm getting hungry just from the pictures

I normally just get the regular bowl for 600 yen.  It comes with been sprouts, green onions, and some diced up pork.  I really prefer the pork diced into tiny bites that mix into the soup, rather than the larger slices of chashu that John gets.

John's ramen with chashu

Furyu has many locations all over the city, but I personally prefer the Shibuya location.  I thought their ramen was just a little bit better than in Shinjuku.  I'm not sure about the others, but in Shibuya they have an English menu.  They also offer extra noodles, so if you aren't stuffed after the first bowl just call out "Kaedama" to the chef and you can have up to two free noodle refills.

Furyu Ramen
Hours: M-S 11:00 am-3:00 am, Sun 11:00-8:00
Locations

Kyushu: Dazaifu

While we were in Kyushu, Sarah got to visit two of her friends that had been JICA volunteers (the Japanese equivalent of Peace Corps).  One of them had a car, so they drove us out to Dazaifu, which is a town near Fukuoka.

Daziafu is know for Tenman-gu Shrine.  It was the perfect day to go - the sky was sunny and blue, it was warm and breezy, and we were all happy from our delicious waffle brunch.

Tenman-gu was incredibly beautiful, and it was great to be there with Japanese people.  We all got fortunes and they read ours to us (John and I always struggle with that part) and they explained the history of the area.

I'm always terrible at taking pictures of shrines and temples.  It's partially because I'm just using my phone, but it's also because I want to focus on the details rather than the whole shrine, so lets just get this first picture out of the way.

Tenman-gu Shrine

The Shinto religion celebrates nature, and I've heard of shrines where a tree will grow up, and they will just let it grow through the building, but I finally got to see an example!

Isn't that great?

We saw some really interesting trees that were covered in a sort of hairy moss.

And there were lots of turtles sunbathing in the lake.

Turtle Dominoes

We stopped to have some green tea and grilled red bean and mochi cakes.  I've said before that I'm not a big red bean paste fan, but when it was warm the texture was a lot different - smoother - and it tasted better too.  We sat on raised tatami at a little table, and it was absolutely lovely.

Snack Time!

After the shrine, we walked up and down the little shopping street in Dazaifu that sold crafts and snacks and souvenirs.  It reminded me a lot of the main shopping street in Kamakura.  On the ride home we could barely keep our eyes open, but it was a really wonderful afternoon!

Kyushu: What We Ate

I was looking through all my pictures from Kyushu and realized that about half of them were of food, so I thought the food deserved a blog of its own.

On our first night in town Hunter took us to one of her favorite restaurants, Ante.  She goes so often that she's good friends with the bartender/manager.

Ante Italian Restaurant and Bar

They named a drink after her!  (It's the bottom one)

We got their specialty, Omu-rice, which they made extra large for us to share.  Omu-rice is an omelette filled with fried rice.  It is normally topped with ketchup, but this one came with a cream sauce.  The rice inside was very delicately flavored and mixed with shrimp.  It's sort of an unusual dish, but this one was really good.

Omu-rice

The next night we went out in Fukuoka and came across a Japanese sweets shop.  Ichigo Daifuku is a seasonal confection consisting of a fresh strawberry wrapped in mochi, with some red bean paste filling.  This place however, was selling fruit tart daifuku, which included multiple fruits and a little bit of tart crust.  I'm not crazy about red bean paste, but this was delicious!

Yum!

So beautiful!

My favorite thing from the whole weekend was an amazing fruit waffle that we had at brunch.  We were joined by two of Sarah's friends, and all five of us ordered the same thing.  It was absolutely gorgeous and tasted just as good as it looked.

Can I have this everyday?

And finally, on or way to the airport we saw this cute little steamed bun guy in a convenience store. We didn't actually buy any, so I don't know if they're any good - but they sure are cute!

Steamed Bun Monster

Visiting Kyushu: Kurume

Over the weekend Sarah and I went to visit one of our high school friends who lives in Kurume, a small town in Kyushu.

Reunion!  We're all blonde now.

Kurume was really interesting to see, since I've only been to a very few locations outside of Tokyo. The streets and sidewalks are much wider, and it felt like I could see farther because the buildings weren't nearly as tall. The town had a very warm friendly atmosphere, and Hunter has friends all over, and is also acquainted with all the neighborhood cats.

Small Town Japan

The chickens slide back and forth on the hour!

It turns out that Bridgestone Tires was started in Kurume. I had no idea, but Bridgestone is a Japanese company. The name comes from the Ishibashi family whose last name means "stone bridge."

Hunter with the Tire

We didn't actually go in, but Hunter took us past a karaoke place that looks crazy!  It's actually based on Gaudi's architecture, but it sort of looks like a hallucination.

Creepy, right?

But everything was really beautiful while we were there.  There were still some Sakura blooming (though they're not the normal kind - these remind me a little of carnations), and the carp flags are out for the Boy's Day celebrations.

Sakura Lined Canal

Carp Flags

Stay tuned for a post about all the food we ate there!