Hakodate, Day One

So, I am incredibly slow at updating this blog... but I always get to it eventually, at least. Last summer/fall (on August 14th and 15th, to be exact), Aaron and I went to Hakodate for vacation. We'd never been up to Hokkaido before (the large island at the very northern end of Japan), but the capitol city of Sapporo seemed a bit too far for an extended weekend vacation... so we choose Hakodate, a port town at the southern tip of Hokkaido instead.

Our friend Laura, an ALT here about two years ago, had always raved about Hakodate as well, so that factored into our final decision. To be honest though, I always thought it couldn't be that great, at least not as awesome as she always said it was. Boy, did I feast on some humble pie.

Hakodate was, indeed, awesome; I would love to go back there again before my contract in Japan is up. Hopefully with friends, as Hakodate is definitely a place that should be shared. Part of the reason it's so awesome is the feeling about the town; Hakodate was one of the few ports open to foreign traders during Japan's isolation period (and before that, too), and the foreign influence is still felt to this day. Massive Buddhist temples battle Greek Orthodox church spires for dominance over the city skyline, statues of Dutch traders stand next to statues of samurai, and the food is varied and delicious.

One of those cool, old, western influences is the trolley system, which you can see above. Hakodate has the San Francisco vibe going, with trolley lines crossing everywhere. What's especially neat though is that it's not just some tourist attraction; the trolleys are used just as much as buses and taxis, and are considered to be an equally viable form of transportation. I think Aaron and I ended up using them even more than buses, actually; they were usually more convenient for the places we were interested in going.

Most of the really cool stuff was in this one neighborhood... which I've now completely forgotten the name of. It was full of neat little shops, old churches, museums, and really, really expensive looking houses. Most of the houses had cars with brand names like Lexus and such parked in front of them. It's apparently quite an old, historical district...and it's mostly uphill. You can see the main road we hiked up in the picture above; while it is gorgeous, my legs weren't impressed with the 30 degree or so angle it had going.

There is a reason for the uphill climb though; this district sits on the base of the small mountain shown above, Mt. Hakodate. This small mountain was actually the main reason we even went to that area; you can ride a cable car all the way up to the top, where you are afforded a brilliant view of the entire city, complete with the harbor opening onto the ocean, laid out in front of you. Unfortunately, you may have noticed how cloudy the top of the mountain is... that same cloud prevented us from having a clear view of the city, and hence I have no nice pictures from the summit. Considering that the night view from the top of Mt. Hakodate is considered to be one of the most beautiful in the world, I was pretty disappointed. I suppose it makes me more determined to go again sometime, though. Riding the cable car up into the mist and clouds was quite the experience, however, so I suppose I can't be too upset it was overcast when we went.

One of the little shops that was in this district was a sausage/meat shop. It was apparently owned by a German immigrant who came over in his mid-20s, then lived the rest of his life in Hakodate. There was a picture of him (above) inside the shop for all to see, and a statue of him (below) greeting everyone as they walked towards the entrance. We didn't have a chance to actually taste anything, as we weren't sure how well we could pack sausages into our luggage to take back home, but man.... it smelled and looked amazing. It was nice to see German sausage and European cheese in Japan; they're pretty hard to find most of the time. Consider me supremely envious of the people who live in that neighborhood and can go there everyday... in their Lexus and Range Rovers.... I guess I'm jealous of that too.

From here on, this post will become a photo dump. Yay! Please enjoy the various pictures of churches and statues we took in this amazing district that took up all of our first day in Hakodate. Oh, I forgot to mention...this trip was actually the first time we used Aaron's new camera, which is a real, actual, honest-to-goodness DSLR camera. It's a very nice camera, and it took some very nice pictures. I hope you agree. Day Two of Hakodate goodness should be up soon!