On the fifth day, we visited a fish market in the morning and then spend the whole evening touring event sites for the 60th Sapporo Snow Festival.
The market offers an array of fresh seafood products as well as processed products. We also popped by a fruits and vegetable market where we had a quick bento breakfast.
Thereafter, we went to look at a snow sculpturing competition and made snowmen, part of the programs for the Sapporo Snow Festival. Rachel had a lot of fun making snowmen. In fact, while all of us made one snowman each, Rachel made a second one to replace her first one as she was not satisfied with it’s appearance. As all these activities were outdoor, we were all freezing ourselves to death and did not stay there for too long. The cold damaged Rachel’s head and she kept pestering me with silly questions like whether it was possible to “make the snowmen come alive”.
We had pipping hot Hokkaido soup curry for lunch. This was one of the best meal we had in Japan. The restaurant is called Soup Curry Rasata – click here to visit their official website. You get to choose the degree of hotness for your soup curry, going from one to ten chilli. Mark took the nine chilli option, I chose three, Meiyen chose five and Rachel chose zero. In the end, we figured the average Singaporean can probably take the seven chilli option, being more accustomed to spicy food than the Japanese. All four of us were extremely hungry from the coldness in the morning and promptly emptied all our bowls in double quick time.
Although we were already very tired at this point, the four of us still dragged our feet to the shopping belt where we were at the previous night to check out the lighted ice sculptures. Although smaller in sizes, they were equally fascinating for us, having come from a 24-7 sweltering hot, tropical country where we only get to see snow when we travel abroad.
We had a sumptious dinner that night at the ramen street which we recce the previous night. We chose the restaurant that had the longest queue. It was a very small restaurant with only counter seats and can only accommodate six customers at any one time. We decided to split into groups of two so we can go in faster instead of waiting for a vacant row of four seats.Being the gentlemen we were, Mark and I let the ladies dine first. The ingrates took photos of us from the inside and slurped up their noodle while eyeing our pitiful, hungry expressions. When Mark and I got in, we devoured our ramen as if we haven’t eaten for weeks.
This was the longest and most tiring day throughout our entire Japan trip as we did the most walking on this day. In fact, my feet developed blisters that night and it continued to hurt for the rest of our trip. Then again, the experience of the 60th Sapporo Snow Festival was definitely worth it. 🙂
Watch out for my next entry on my sixth day in Japan – we will be leaving Hokkaido and heading to Yokohama and Tokyo. 
Meanwhile, you can read my previous entries if you haven’t already:
Day 1 – Kansai Airport, Hokkaido
Day 3 – Asahikawa, Asahiyama Zoo
Day 4 – Sledding, Shiroi Koibito, Crab Buffet
Day 5 – The 60th Sapporo Snow Festival
Day 6 – Staying with the Asai, Shōnan
Day 8 – Shibuya and Akihabara, Tokyo
Day 12 – Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan and Dotonbori
Day 13 – Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge and Mt. Rokko
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gosh, the Dons looks so good! and the Char Siew, is really big serviing, unlike Singapore, give small pieces.
do you have to speak japanese there?
My friend can speak Japanese. It helps a lot. 🙂
Wow! That was some holiday in Hokkaido, and it really brings back fond memories for me. Hokkaido is one of the best destinations for a holiday – the snow and ice, seafood, music boxes, onsen, and barbequed meats! Plus of course lots of Sapporo beer to wash them down….
Hi Walter, how’s things going for your life as a student again now? 🙂
I love Hokkaido too! It was the best part of my Japan trip.
just dropping by to say how lovely you wrote about Japan, so much so that it’s really firing up my desire to be in Japan one day!
wow its really eye catching l wish one day l can go to….zzzzz
infact l have friends in japan but l dont i 2 trouble them..but after watching your trip it makes me 1 2 take e courage to trouble them liau hahaha…cool l like it very very very much.
680o yen FOR ONE MELON OMG…..